When printing, "Loading Preview" never ends, so impossible to print

[ArtemisTwo]

Until recently, I was able to print from my PC to the printer without any trouble. Since yesterday, however, when I click to print something, the print dialogue says "Loading preview," but never actually does load a preview of the document. The little ellipsis (...) at the end of the words "Loading preview" hop and skip, but nothing actually happens. Cntl+Shift+P does the same thing. I'm not aware that I have changed anything having to do with the printer, so I'm finding this inexplicable. 

I tried Support Assist, but that also didn't resolve the problem. I'm having to email stuff to the printer to get anything to print. I use wifi to connect to the printer. 

When I go to Control Panel to look at printers, I see the printer twice - one's labeled HP ENVY 5660 series, and the other is labeled HP ENVY 5660 series (Network). Frankly, I don't know the difference, nor do I know why the printer would show twice. However, if I select the former, and try to print, the error message changes to "The selected printer is not available or not installed correctly. Check your printer or try selecting another printer." There's an option to "print using system dialogue," but if I click that, it just churns and churns, but does nothing. If I select the latter, I get the "Loading preview" which never does load the preview.

Any ideas you may have for me that would help me go back to this thing operating properly would be gratefully received!

[MOSHIE14]

Hi ArtemisTwo,

Thank you for contacting HP Forum and I hope I could help you.

I suggest you do the following:

1.) Uninstall all drivers and software for HP ENVY 5660 series

2.) Properly shut down your PC and Printer and "ON" it back again.

3.) Install the complete drivers and software on your PC.  You can donwload it here.

http://support.hp.com/ie-en/product/hp-envy-5660-e-all-in-one-printer-series/6809225/drivers

4.) You can also download the "Software" and "Utility Diagnostic Tools" and run it is you still have any issues.

[ArtemisTwo]

Thank you, Moshie. I did as you suggested and there is some improvement. The problem remains with some kinds of pdfs. If i pull a pdf out of my computer's files, it opens in Adobe Reader and I can print those; some pdfs that are attachments to emails and which also open in Adobe Reader will also print.

However, pdfs that are embedded in an email open in a different kind of pdf window, not Adobe Reader. The screen is all black, with just the file name, the number of pages, and three icons (rotate, download, print) across the top, and the pdf text or image filling the rest of the screen. If I click 'print,' the Loading preview message shows up in the print dialogue, but the preview never actually loads, so I cannot print that way. I have to save these to my computer, then open them to print. Anything that opens in that all-black window never loads a preview and cannot be printed directly. Interestingly, when I click the print icon, for a second, the "selected printer is not available or not installed correctly" shows, but is immediately replaced by the "Loading preview" message instead.

This is really irritating because they used to print just fine, I've made no changes to my computer since they were still printing, so I can't understand why they no longer print. I've never had the diagnostic tools process fix anything; do you really think it might be able to address this problem? I'm kinda desperate at this point.

[MOSHIE14 · Accepted solution]

Hi ArtemisTwo,

I think your Adobe drivers needs to update or the PDF attached to the email was corrupted. 

1.) Open Reader or Acrobat.
2.) Choose Help > Check for Updates. If a new update is available, it installs automatically.
3.) Once installed, restart your computer.
4.) Try to print the PDF again from the email.

Here are some links also concerning corrupted PDF file in email.

https://forums.adobe.com/docs/DOC-4621

I can also suggest to repair your Microsoft Office.  Please see link below

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2769349/repair-process-for-an-office-click-to-run-applicati...

Please let me know if you need further assistance. 

[ArtemisTwo]

Moshie, I just realized that, after I uninstalled all the printer stuff, I did not shut down and restart my computer. Do you think that might be an issue? If so, I'm happy to uninstall again, restart, and reinstall.

I don't think the problem is a corrupted PDF - it fails to print these PDFs that show on the black screen from several different sources. 

Finally, what does Microsoft Office have to do with any of this? I use very few Microsoft Office applications and am not having a problem with any of them, so I'm reluctant to mess with success unless there's a good reason. Can you tell me why you think this is necessary? Thanks!

[MOSHIE14]

Hi ArtemisTwo,

I think you try to shut down first and try again and try to update Adobe driver. 

The reason why I say to repair Office because as what you have mentioned issue only happened when it is attached in email.  I think there is no harm if you try to repair Office because you are not uninstalling it.

[ArtemisTwo]

Yay, Moshie! I'm back in business and all is working properly, as it did previously. I was not able to repair Microsoft Office because the link had instructions for repairing MicrosoftOffice 365 and I did not find such a program on my computer - there is, of course, a lot of Microsoft stuff in the program list, but nothing with a similar name, so I just left it alone.

Thank you so much for your help and your patience with me!

[MOSHIE14]

I am glad that it is now working and my suggestion worked.  Thank you for the kudos.  Please let me know if you still have any issues and I am willing to help.

Happy Printing...