Restore Deleted Printers

Cool !!! 😀

Thanks so much for posting this, Paul. This saved me some agony as well, particularly as I use printers at various clients' offices, so I was spared having to fiddle around getting my MacBook back in sync with their printers.

Awesome! 🙂

Unbelievable! This is just another in a PLETHORA of reasons why I'm really starting to despise my Mac computer (I adore all of my other Apple products, but the computer I want to throw out the window).

I thought the same as the other people - that I was deleting print jobs. It wasn't working for me to delete them in the que, so I tried that. How ignorant is it to not make that statement more clear? I can't be wrong when so many people read it the exact same way I did.

My problem is, I can't seem to find my backups so now I have no clue what to do. This is just ridiculous and I don't have time for it.

On a 10.6 box with all printers gone, I just restored all 8 printers in about 20 seconds without TimeMachine like so:

Utilities -> Terminal. In the terminal paste in, one at a time, each of the one-line commands in bold below.

Stop the CUPS daemon with the following command:

sudo launchctl stop org.cups.cupsd

Assuming printers.conf.O is bigger, ovewrite the empty printers.conf with it:

sudo cp -p /etc/cups/printers.conf.O /etc/cups/printers.conf

Optionally (I did not need to do this myself) restore cupsd.conf from the O (older) one:

sudo cp -p /etc/cups/cupsd.conf.O /etc/cups/cupsd.conf

Restart the stopped CUPS daemon with the following command:

sudo launchctl start org.cups.cupsd

YMMV, but you might want to try above commands before all the overly complex machinations above and at https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2027997

And I agree that with the need for a clear warning "Do you *REALLY* want to delete *ALL* your printers?" That is not clear to most folks. Even detailed info at http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1341 bluntly speaks of deleting queues and jobs, with nary a mention of printers!

MacRussell... DUDE!!! You saved me!

Thank You, thank you, thank you... for writing such detailed instructions.

You have no idea how much grief you saved me... just wished I found this article about 24 hours sooner.

Someone needs to buy this man a beer, oops I mean a refreshing beverage of his choosing!

FYI, you trick still works with OSX 10.7.3

I didn't have the following file on any of my Time Machine back-ups:

- cupsd.conf.bak

For the rest I followed all of your instructions Paul, but I didn't get my printers restored 😟

I have a Macbook Pro with 10.6.8 on it.

Tips, anyone?

Edit: It does work after all!!! The only thing is: you have to restart your Mac. Don't forget that, it's not described in the instructions from Paul but for me it was necessary to get my printers back!

Hurray, Paul, you're my absolute hero!!!

Paul, you're a legend! Thanks:) I also agree that the warning should be more dire &/or explicit.

YOU ARE AMAZING. Thank you so much for posting your solution and such detailed instructions on how to fix it! So many people post "solutions" that are extremely complex and completely un-followable for us normal folk who are NOT computer geniuses...your instructions wer crystal clear and you even thoughtfully put the paths in there for us like Macintosh HD>etc>etc>etc. Thank you thank you thank you again!!

Paul in LA,

You are a beautiful person, my friend. Well done. 😀

This worked for me on 10.5.8.

Thanks Paul in LA that got my printer back but it's showing up as offline, any idea how to get that corrected?

Hello Paul,

You made my day!

I jsut right clicked on one specific printer to 'reset' but it removed me everything, even network printers etc.

Very good instruction and I got my printers back.

Thank you

Regards

Juergen Boenisch

(A few months later....) I've done exactly the same thing with regards to accidentally 'resetting the print system'. I've read through your instructions which look invaluable. However I've got the slight extra problem of not having Time Machine backup on that side of things. I've only been using Time Machine to back up my external drive of files. Now I include the MacHD drive too but the horse has already bolted.

My Kodak 5250 printer won't show up in my Preferences when I try to add it. It shows up as being plugged in via USB but at Print Using:.. Choose a Drive or Printer Model, I just get options for Select Printer Software which takes me to an empty box, or Other which then leaves me stuck as to what to select.

Can you or anyone help me out here? What has Resetting Print System actually done and how can I get repair it? Many thanks Paul J

pajcksn wrote:

What has Resetting Print System actually done and how can I get repair it?

Resetting the printer system has deleted your printers. Without a time machine backup, you can either reinstall your printer, or you can attempt the instructions of member @ncprius2 on the first page of this thread. I dunno if that will work or not, because like I said before, I'm not an expert by any means. But if his instructions work, then you won't need the time machine backup of the printers. Let us know how it goes. Good luck!