My old [win xp] but usually trusty upstairs desktop suddenly refused to print anything...kept claiming the usb attached laser printer was offline.

Checked the device manager, it showed a problem with the usb controller.

I tried uninstalling, then re-installing the usb drivers...that didn't help.

I tried the unplug from power sources for 30 minute trick, again, no dice.

Tried downloading new drivers, got nowhere.



ETA: 1st hint of a problem was when the USB sound device suddenly stopped working a few days ago. The printer was still working then so it didn't matter too much. But I need to be able to print from the computer.





Any suggestions besides installing a PCI USB controller card?

TIA

REMOVE all of the USB controllers from the Device Manager. Then reboot the PC. At reboot it should re-detect the controlls and re-install the drivers for all found USB controllers. Try giving that solution a shot.

+1 on this recommendation.

If that doesn't work, a long shot possibility is go into the system BIOS setup and make sure the onboard USB ports are enabled there. Depending upon how old the CMOS battery is in this system, the BIOS setup may have reverted to default settings resulting in the onboard USB ports being turned off.

If you can, take a look inside the computer at the motherboard. See if any capacitors are bulging or leaking. For reference, see here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor_plague

Thank you! That worked