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PaperPort Pro 14.5 Patch1 Image Printer not working

Out of six desktops running Win7 Pro 64bit with PaperPort 14.5 Pro on Windows 7 Pro 64bit and Office 365, one PC has an issue with PaperPort printing PDF documents out of any application, when using the PaperPort Image Printer.

I have un-installed PaperPort and all Nuance components, I downloaded the PaperPort removal suggested in another PaperPort post here on Experts-Exchange, rebooted, re-installed clean PaperPort 14.5 Pro and Patch 1, and no luck. Same issue.

WHile in Word and Excel things are a bit better because the Nuance PDF ribbon works, as well as the "Send to PaperPort" button & shortcut - no issues here, in Outlook the only way to create PDF documents out of emails is to use the Scansoft PDF printer which works, but provides the very cumbersome way of browsing through folders. My client and his staff create a huge number of PDF documents on a daily basis for their customers, and this issue is a drag for this one PC.

I ran out of ideas on what exactly could stop the PaperPort Image Printer to open PaperPort. It keeps accumulating documents in the queue all in error. I looked at the various posts that were written by Joe Winograd, but I couldn't find anything that would help me fix this nagging issue.

Joe, if you are reading this post, I am hoping that you might have a suggestion that might save the day. Any feedback or ideas would be very much appreciated.
Thank you.
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Joe Winograd
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Hi Lee,
Good to hear from you again. I'm busy right now on a client issue, but will provide some ideas for you as soon as possible, probably in an hour or two. Btw, sorry for the 8-hour delay in replying, but your message came in at 1:28am my time. Regards, Joe
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Hi Joe. Thank you for looking into it. No worries about the delay. I am on the west coast, in CA. This is the one client I mentioned in previous messages, we are waiting to the end of the year with the move to Win10. This particular PC used to work fine with a previous user and Office 2010.  The user left, the PC was stored for a year. Brought it back online, removed the old user profile, added the current (new) user to the system (Win 2011 SBS domain)  and brough the system up to date with Win7. Also deployed Office 365 to the system. Office 2010 is still on the PC, but not used anymore. The user had it for two weeks and just now started to complain about this feature of Paperport, so it is safe to say that printing with Paperport and office 365 never worked. Any ideas would be great. Thank you for your help. Lee.
Hi Lee,
Thanks for the additional info...very helpful. My client issue is taking much longer than I anticipated, but I should be able to get back to you later today.

Btw (unrelated to PaperPort), since you moved the user from Office 2010 to Office 365, you may get a complaint from the user that Microsoft Office Picture Manager is missing...many users love Picture Manager! If so, my EE article will help you to resolve that complaint:
How to Install Microsoft Office Picture Manager in Office 2016/Office 365

If you prefer videos over articles, here's a 5-minute EE video Micro Tutorial that explains how to do it:
How to Install Microsoft Office Picture Manager in Office 2013

Although that shows the method for Office 2013, it works the same in Office 2016/365 (and Office 2019, too).

More later, Joe

Update: As promised, here's more...maybe more than you want. :)

The PaperPort Image Printer is one of the more troublesome parts of PaperPort (I've had on the drawing boards for a few years an EE article called, "The PaperPort Image Printer does not work — now what?", but it hasn't made it to the top of my to-do list yet). As I said during our discussion at my PaperPort 14.5 upgrade article, when I can't get the PaperPort Image Printer working, I switch users to the ScanSoft PDF Create driver (aka DocuCom PDF), which you mentioned above, but you said that it is "very cumbersome".

So, four ideas for you:

First, the issue with the PaperPort Image Printer may be that its desktop printing executable is not starting with Windows. This file must be started with Windows in order for the PaperPort Image Printer to work (this is the location on 64-bit W7):

c:\Program Files (x86)\Nuance\PaperPort\pptd40nt.exe

Run msconfig and click the Startup tab. Look for that file and make sure that the check-box is ticked. It should look like this in W7:

User generated image
Second, I've seen times when a PaperPort uninstall/reinstall does not remove the old PaperPort Image Printer and does not install a new one. In this case, uninstall the PaperPort Image Printer via Control Panel>Programs and Features (note that it has its own entry in Programs and Features, separate from the PP14 entry). Then install the PaperPort Image Printer by itself using the technique documented in this EE article:
PaperPort will not install - the installer detected a previous installation

Third, you said that the ScanSoft PDF Create driver works, which is good news, but that it is cumbersome...it certainly is! Here's what I've done to overcome that problem:

• Create a new folder to receive all documents printed to the ScanSoft PDF Create driver. I like to name this with a plus sign as the first character so that it appears at the top of the user's folder list...makes it very easy for a user to find the printed docs. For example:

+PrintedDocs

• Control Panel>Devices and Printers

• Find the DocuCom PDF Driver or ScanSoft PDF Create printer icon (they are the same driver):

User generated image
• Right-click on either one (changing one will change the other because, under the covers, they are one-and-the-same)

• Printing preferences>PDF Settings

• In the Destination section of the dialog:

Naming Method drop-down: Save in named folder; auto-name file

PDF Name or Folder box: Browse to +PrintedDocs (or whatever you decided to name it)

If File Exists drop-down: Add trailing number to filename

By doing the above, printing to ScanSoft PDF Create will require no user intervention...the entire cumbersome process is gone! The PDF creation is 100% automatic...just like the PaperPort Image Printer, including automatic file naming. One difference, of course, is that the PaperPort Image Printer puts the PDF file in the currently open folder on the PaperPort desktop, while this method always puts the PDF in the +PrintedDocs folder (or whatever you decided to name it). There are some other differences, discussed in section (3) of my EE article, PaperPort - How To Create Searchable PDF Files, but my experience is that most users do not care about the differences and are fine with the ScanSoft PDF Create method, as long as it is completely automated after doing the print.

Fourth, if you can't get a Nuance PDF print driver to work, there are many free drivers out there. Eight good ones are Bullzip, CutePDF Writer, doPDF, Foxit Reader PDF Printer (part of the Foxit Reader install), Nitro PDF Creator (part of the Nitro Reader install), PDFCreator, PDF-XChange Printer (part of the PDF-XChange Editor install), and PrimoPDF:

http://www.bullzip.com/products/pdf/info.php
http://www.cutepdf.com/Products/CutePDF/writer.asp
http://www.dopdf.com
http://www.foxitsoftware.com/Secure_PDF_Reader
http://www.nitroreader.com
http://www.pdfforge.org/pdfcreator
http://www.tracker-software.com/product/pdf-xchange-editor
http://www.primopdf.com

They have varying features and some folks prefer one over the other, so you may want to experiment to see which one your user likes the best (and, to use your word, which one can be configured to be the least "cumbersome"). At one time, CutePDF was my favorite, then it was doPDF, and my current choice is Bullzip. So, I suggest trying Bullzip first to see if it works well for your user; if not, try doPDF next; then the others until you find one that the user likes. As with the Nuance products, all of them install a "printer" so that you can "print" to it from any Windows program. When you "print" to it, the print driver, of course, creates a PDF file. Btw, if you have Adobe Acrobat (the full product, not just Adobe Reader), then you'll already have a PDF print driver called Adobe PDF.

Well, I think that's it. Let me know how it goes. Regards, Joe
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Thank you so much for all the tips, Joe. I will visit my client early next week and see if anything you mentioned above helps. I will post the outcome as soon as I have something new. Lee
Sounds good, Lee. Looking forward to your feedback. Regards, Joe
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Hi Joe,

I finally was able to stop by my client's office tonight to go through all the steps outlined in your instructions. Let me just say right of the bat that the darn PaperPort Image Printer still doesn't work. However, the tip on automating the PDF creation with ScanSoft PDF Create worked. But not without a minor annoying issue. Let me go into details, point by point:

1. Msconfig & pptd40nt.exe - no issue there, the box was checked just fine, so the problem was not there

2. Removed PaperPort Image Printer from Add/Remove Programs, rebooted Win7PC, installed manually per your instructions above, no issues with the installation, but no luck with the functionality

At this point, I moved to your thrid item on the list - ScanSoft PDF Create

3. Created folder, setup options, and tested, works like a charm! It creates the PDF no issues. Of course, the user will have to simply rename their file and drag it to the appropriate folder in PaperPort from that folder. That is the good news.

The annoying part with ScanSoft PDF Create is that everytime it used, it drops an file in the printer queue - see 1st screenshot attached. As I said, the PDF file is created just fine, but there a residue in the queue. When you go to print again using ScanSoft PDF Create, you will see the documents waiting in the queue, see 2nd screenshot attached.

I can go into the queue, delete the waiting to be printed files, and use the ScanSoft PDF Create again, and we go back to square 1 in the queue. Is there any way to address this minor issue, so that the queue stays clean, and the user doesn't see these files piling up in the queue?

Just to add the complete details, in Devices and Printers there are two print queues, the Scansoft PDF Create and DocuCom PDF Driver. It doesn't seem that there is a way to separate them, and until you tell me that I can delete one or another, I am reluctant to do so, in order to keep ScanSoft PDF Create working.

If you have any ideas on how to eliminate this annoyance with ScanSoft PDF Create, that would be great.

As far as the free PDF links that you posted, thank you very much. I was familiar with a few of them, and I will sugest them to the user, if the client is not completely happy with the work around of ScanSoft PDF Create, we'll pick one of the free PDFs editors and go with it.

Meanwhile, I wanted to thank you so much for taking your time and provide all the details in your response. I look forward to hearing back from you in case you might be aware of the minor issue described above.

Thank you again. Lee
ScanSoftPDFCreate_Queue.jpg
ScanSoftPDFCreate_DocumentWaiting.jpg
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Hi Joe,

Thank you for the follow responses. I checked the two screen for Scansoft and they look identically with what is displayed in your screenshots, so no luck there. As far as fixing the needle in the Windows haystack is concerned, I will skip it. I mentioned before that these clients will get new systems, with Win10 in a few months, so I will not worry about spending more time on this. The client is happy, as the fix for the folder helped a lot, there is no point in spending more time, to perhaps not fix anything :):). I appreciate the responses and mark this ticket as closed with your solution. I will open another question, related to the size of the data that Paperport needs to handle shortly.
Thanks a lot again. Lee
Hi Lee,

> so I will not worry about spending more time on this

Sounds like a good decision.

> mark this ticket as closed with your solution

Thanks for that. Thanks, too, for taking the time to write that very nice Testimonial...much appreciated!

> I will open another question, related to the size of the data that Paperport needs to handle shortly.

Will look at it soon.

Regards, Joe