Spooling More than 127 Jobs to Print Queue Causes Corruption

 Last reviewed: May 14, 1997
Article ID: Q112201
The information in this article applies to:
  • Microsoft Windows NT operating system version 3.1
  • Microsoft Windows NT Advanced Server version 3.1

SYMPTOMS

After you spool 127 print jobs to a print queue from Windows NT on an ALPHA- based computer, the following print jobs are corrupt.

When the 127th job is spooled, subsequent jobs have "spooling" status when examined by Print Manager. As jobs are removed from the queue or printed, the "spooling" jobs remain in "spooling" status. If the queue is purged, the "spooling" jobs and some of the queued jobs cannot be deleted. The spool directory indicates that filenames for the spooled files are reused beginning at 32. That is, the counter for the spool filenames goes from 127 to 32. If you restart the computer, the jobs that couldn't be deleted are no longer displayed in Print Manager and they can be deleted from WINNT\SYSTEM32\SPOOL\PRINTERS.

CAUSE

The print spooler code improperly reallocated and tracked the print job ID's. The mistake was slight and only showed up on Alpha systems.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in Windows NT and Windows NT Advanced Server version 3.1. This problem has been corrected in the latest U.S. Service Pack for Windows NT and Windows NT Advanced Server version 3.1. For information on obtaining the Service Pack, query on the following word in the Microsoft Knowledge Base (without the spaces): 

   S E R V P A C K

Additional query words: prodnt
Keywords : kbbug3.10 kbprint ntprint NTSrvWkst
Version : 3.1
Platform : WINDOWS

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Last reviewed: May 14, 1997
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