Spooler problem

[Marv4221]

I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium, Service Pack 1, 64 bit

The problem started several months ago: whenever I asked my HP 3000 to print a page, an HP message popped up that said "Unable to communicate with printer". When that message appeared, the printer was either printing what I asked it to, or had just finished. The HP 3000 died and I just got a new printer (a cheapo HP Deskjet 1112). However, the problem has carried itself forward to the new printer. Another strange thing is that, whereas the printer used to immediately shut down when I pressed the OFF button, now it takes its time (same for both the old and new printers). None of this seems to get in the way of printing things, but it's annoying. I ran HP's Print And Scan Doctor 5.1, but that didn't fix anything. If there's something wrong with the spooler itself, I have no idea how to fix it.


Processor: AMD FX(tm)-6100 Six-Core Processor, AMD64 Family 21 Model 1 Stepping 2
Processor Count: 6
RAM: 8138 Mb
Graphics Card: AMD Radeon HD 6700 Series, 1024 Mb
Hard Drives: C: 293 GB (167 GB Free); E: 196 GB (173 GB Free); F: 292 GB (234 GB Free); G: 148 GB (100 GB Free)
Motherboard: ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC., M5A97
Antivirus: ESET Security, Enabled and Updated