M140WE stopped working, account error, windows 11 apps do not list printer

[pahhur]

This is about the printer M140WE of my cousin, who runs Windows 11 on an HP laptop. Windows 11 and BIOS are fully updated.

The HP Wifi printer (M140WE) had worked for 3.5 years (nearly) without any problems.

Around 3-4 weeks ago, the printer disappeared from the print menues of different apps on windows most notably from the Browsers, from Thunderbird, and from Acrobat Reader (My cousin does not use other apps). Acrobat claims that there is no valid list of printers, or that printers have to be configured first before it could attempt to print.

The printer is shown as offline, and with a hint that there are problems with the HP smart account, but the account itself doesn't show any problems.

The HP Smart Tool, however, shows the printer as being online at 192.168.190.247, which is in the same network as the laptop (192.168.190.201).  The Wifi Repeater is just 1m from the laptop and the printer,

signal strength is very high (measured with Android Wifi Analyzer).

My action: Complete deinstallation of the drivers and the HP software, then 

My action: admin sfc /scannow, then shut down

My action: Complete disconnection from the power supply for 5+ minutes

My action: Restart, then new installation according to the given manual

Result:

The printer was visible again in the app menus, and printing documents was successful for a fistful of documents.

My action: Going to have lunch with my cousin for 30 minutes, and without letting any explicite application run on the laptop.

Result after returning: 

The printer is again not visible anymore, i.e. we have the same state as before all the actions.

Any ideas what to do here?

[DFWTechGuy]

Since the printer works right after reinstalling but disappears again after some time, you should check the wifi connection first. Try giving the printer a reserved IP in the router and add it manually in Windows using that IP. Also check if the wifi repeater is isolating devices from each other. The fact that HP Smart can still see the printer is a good sign.

[pahhur]

The router in use does not allow the assignment of fixed IPs to given MAC addresses.

The other point, I will check when I'm at my cousin's again.