End of servicing plan for third-party printer drivers on Windows

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https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/print/end-of-servicing-plan-for-third-party-printer-drivers-on-windows

Overview
With the release of Windows 10 21H2, Windows offers inbox support for Mopria compliant printer devices over network and USB interfaces via the Microsoft IPP Class Driver. This removes the need for print device manufacturers to provide their own installers, drivers, utilities, and so on.  Device experience customization is now available via the Print Support Apps that are distributed and automatically installed via the Windows Store. This framework improves reliability and performance by moving customization from the Win32 framework to the UWP software development framework. Finally, print device manufacturers no longer have to rebuild their software since this solution is supported across all Windows versions and editions.

With these advancements in the Windows print platform, we are announcing the end of servicing of the legacy v3 and v4 Windows printer drivers. As this is an impactful change, end of servicing will be staged over multiple years. See the following Timeline and FAQ sections for guidance on the end of servicing roadmap…

* I never install Windows Updates drivers, firmware..

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The problem with this is the “Microsoft provided” print drivers are generic (i.e. they support many different makes/models of printer) and only support “basic” printing features but none of the special features many manufacturers build into their printers.

For example, my current “Brother provided” print driver includes a Printer Console that allows me to set specific values for the printer such as sleep mode, character set, emulation mode, etc. and also allows me to “view” important printer stats like # pages printed, total # paper jams, printer error log, replacement counters for the toner cartridge, drum, fuser, etc., etc.

None of those features are available if I use Microsoft’s “generic” print driver.

Just FYI, my particular printer is a low end model that only has 2 buttons, Go & Job Cancel and a series of status lights. It doesn’t have an LCD display that allows you to set the special “built-in” features so it’s important, at least to me, to have an alternate method of dealing with them.

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What’s the actual problem with “this”?

users can install printer drivers using printer manufactures [sic] installer programs.

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The issue I find it that unless I do a tcp/ip style of print set up I may have a generic or IPP style of driver I didn’t think I installed.  Bottom line when the printer got installed and installed a driver SPECIFIC to the printer they (generally speaking) were well behaved.  Now when a printer starts doing weird stuff I realize that it’s latched on to a IPP driver and I have to go to the vendors website FIND the driver, etc etc.  It has been slowing me down installing/deploying standalone computers.

The problem with ‘THIS’ is that at least for consumers, this process will now take more time than it was taking and you’ll need to download these drivers for future needs as printer manufacturers are NOTORIOUS for removing old printers that aren’t being sold anymore.

Susan Bradley Patch Lady/Prudent patcher

2 users thanked author for this post.

wavy, windbg

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Internet Printing Protocol drivers ? I remember (vaguely) some MS printer driver that used to show up and mess with printing. ‘W’ something. See no sign of it in my current install. Is this the same thing??

Just because you don't know where you are going doesn't mean any road will get you there.

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No.

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b wrote:

What’s the actual problem with “this”?

users can install printer drivers using printer manufactures [sic] installer programs.

No problem for geeks. For most home users “drivers” are like Hottentot language let alone searching for and installing the correct drivers.

1 user thanked author for this post.

windbg

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