Why does a Remote Desktop Redirected Printer Doc appear every time I connect to Windows Server 2003 SBS?

Question

I've run into a weird, persistent issue regarding a remote desktop connection.

Every time I successfully log into a server running Windows Server 2003 SBS, without taking any further action, after a few seconds a print job spontaneously appears on my machine, titled "Remote Desktop Redirected Printer Doc".

The document is 4K, datatype RAW, processor "WinPrint".

I've heard of people running into this issue before, but can't seem to hunt down a coherent solution. It's a minor annoyance, but I get annoyed when Windows complains about a print job that, as far as I know, came from nowhere.

Any thoughts on why this would occur and how I could prevent it from happening?

Solution 1

This is probably caused by the printer software that is installed on your computer reacting badly to being exported to the Remote Desktop session.

It seems to have happened to many people, for example this article.

The solution is either to find out which part of the printer software is responsible for it and uninstall it, or, as suggested by @Sling, not to export your printer.

Another possibility is OneNote as described in Remote Desktop Redirected Printer Doc "magically appears"

The issue seems to happen to machines with OneNote 2010 (might happen in older versions too).

The issue starts when you RDP into a Server, the culprits here are our 4 RemoteApp farm servers whom have Office 2010 installed but do not have OneNote.

Once you sign in, you get a prompt from OneNote asking where you would like to save the "printed" file, after that if you disable OneNote or select an alternate printer, the "Remote Desktop Redirected Printer Doc" starts spamming the spooler.

In any case, ensure that your computer is fully patched, also with optional Windows Updates, and download the latest print software from the manufacturer website.

Solution 2

Check remote desktop application settings. Options -> Local Resources -> Printers checkbox should be unchecked. I don't know the source of problem but this help in my case to avoid annoying 'Redirected Docs' in printing queue. BTW, it looks like this settings stored separately for each PC you have connected.

Comments

[Admin]

Does this happen with more than the one server? Does redirected printing work otherwise? What have you tried so far?

[Admin]

This only happens with one particular server; redirected printing does not seem to work for me at all, though admittedly I hadn't tried it before you asked. I don't really have a need to perform redirected printing; I'm mostly monitoring logs and such on that server.

[Admin]

This happens to me all the time! I noticed my computer was booting slow, i think this is why! http://ow.ly/i/irAm and http://ow.ly/i/irAx

[Admin]

This happens to me on every printer device that is marked as a default printer. and when you don't have a printer it opens one note. So it's not a printer driver it is a problem with Remote desktop application. I don't have a solution except to have a off line printer as a default and I clear the buffer ever so often after several remote desktop sessions. I checked all over the internet and have found no one with a solution yet.