VMWare Horizon usb redirect not working for printers

[scottjones74]

printing to USB printers has stopped working since upgrading to horizon 2206 (have upgraded to 2209 to see if that helped and it did not).

we are non-persistent instant clones, print drivers are installed in the image, USB redirect is installed with the agent, USB is allowed in horizon admin.   Even checked GPO's and registry ([HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\VMware, Inc.\Installer\Features_HorizonAgent] "PrintRedir"="Local" for VMware printing )

It was working on previous versions of horizon 8.  We are using windows 10 enterprise version 21H2.

The issue occurs on zero clients, thin clients, and horizon client from a windows laptop, so I know its something with the image or a setting.  I have built two new master images from scratch to try and find the issue but cannot.  The printer is “seen” in the control panel, but it does not load the driver.  If I run the master image, the driver is loaded immediately.  

any help or direction is appreciated, this should be a simple fix but i cannot find it. 

[ofox]

"The printer is “seen” in the control panel, but it does not load the driver."

I'm not sure if I fully understand it. Did you mean you could see the redirected printer in the control panel of the remove desktop Windows, but the printer did not work?

If my understanding above is correct, I have a couple of questions.

1. What did you mean by "it does not load the driver"? How did you tell?

2. Did you try the print-a-test-page functionality that the printer itself offers?

3. Did you try VIP(VMware Integrated Printing) rather than USB-R? VIP is recommended solution for printers.

[normeyj]

Did you ever find the issue with this i am running into the same issue with the driver not loading on 21h2.  

[scottjones74]

No resolution as of yet.

[scottjones74]

If you go to devices and printers in control panel, the printer is recognized as connected (its there), but the driver will not load.  Its showing up as an unrecognized device.  The drivers are installed in the master image and the master image works fine, its the clones through zero clients.  

You cant use VMware Integrated Printing with zero clients.  We have used these printers and zero clients for years.

[Cortez_C_Cortez]

Hi Scott, any fix yet?  We have the same issue in our organization with 21H2 and 22H2 with USB attached laserjet printers with ThinOS and Teradici thin clients and windows devices with our instant clones.  We also tried attaching the printer to the base image which was able to print successfully, and the correct driver was applied.  Please post back if you find a fix.  We have tickets open with Microsoft and VMware but also no fix yet.  I am subscribed to this issue and will also post a fix when found. 

[Daniel_Pro]

we have a similar problem with usb printers and usb redirection. the problem occurs with windows 10 cumulative updates 07-2022 to 12-2022 and horizon usb redirection. the virtual usbxxx ports are not automatically created by usbmon.dll. a test with a physical windows 10 computer and cumulative update 12-2022 and vmware agent installed:

- usb printer connected directly usbxxx ports are created correctly.

- usb printer connected via horizon usb redirection usbxxx ports are not created.

means this error happens due to a combination of windows update 12-2022 and horizon usb redirection

[ofox]

The engineering team is looking into the issue. Will post once we find out something.

[jhol5]

Do you have windows update kb5015807 (released July 12th) or newer installed? I found that, that update breaks usb printers when using Teradici Zeros.

[Cortez_C_Cortez]

We have installed the latest service stack update and cumulative update every month since we encountered this issue and haven't found any resolution.  KB5015807 has been superseded by several updates since July, the newest of which we have installed from December (KB5021233).  In our case printing in 21H2 and 22H2 has never worked despite having the latest updates installed every month, but we did start deploying 21H2 in July of 2022.  If we test the same USB printing in Windows 1909 it works perfectly.  Interestingly with 21H2, if you plug in a second USB LaserJet printer after the first one fails to get a USB001 port and gets stuck as an unspecified device, the second printer works perfectly fine and gets USB002 and the correct driver from the base image. 

[scottjones74]

We have not found a true fix as of yet, my fix was to create a new image with zero windows updates installed.  The minute I installed updates using windows updates, printing broke.  This is only still an issue with VMware.  I have used laptops, desktops, etc and printing is not an issue anymore as Microsoft released a fix.  I did not have the issue with vmware horizon BEFORE I updated to version 2206 (2209 didn't fix either).  My same image on the old horizon versions didn't have the issue after Microsoft issued their update fix, but it may have been timing that I didn't notice. 

The issue is microsoft/vmware.  They point the finger at each other.  I have a ticket open with VMWare, but they have not responded much.

[scottjones74]

Well that didn't work well for long.  We started getting all kinds of security errors on windows so we reverted back to the old image were printing is not working.  VMware still has yet to respond to anything. 

[peetey100]

hi, we have the same issue on thin client and laptops running horizon. However, We have found a workaround with using a laptop running horizon with usb printer attached. If we download the latest HP 7.01 universal print driver and add under printer server as below just for good measure. Change the usb printer driver on laptop to the new universal printer driver. Then on the laptop horizon client we DO NOT enable usb printer redirection but just go to settings printers and make sure the printer is selected the VDI does seem to successfully pick up the usb printer with HP UPD installed. anyone else?

[ozbarge]

Has there been any updates on a resolution for this issue? It's causing me some major issues currently, as we are in the middle of converting from Linked Clone to Instant Clone. Now I have 4 base images to support each scenario vs 2. It's brutal at scale. 

[peetey100]

hello Ozbarge - could you tell me how you have set up your  base images for each scenario please? what is the difference between them ? which scenarios? 

Also have you tried HP universal printer Driver 7 as I have mentioned in my post?

thanks

]

[ofox]

One of Horizon customers who reported a similar problem has reached out to MSFT according to our suggestion. It was said that MSFT gave them a patch for testing that has resolved the issue for them. I got a KB number(KB9996666) from the customer but I can't find it on MSFT website.

In the meanwhile, we VMware has reached out to MSFT using our own channel. We'll share more information once we have some.

[ofox]

Exactly. If you could use VMware Integrated Printing(VIP) please do not use USB Redirection(USB-R) for printers. Both are Horizon features, but VIP aims to support printers specifically. VIP does not have such issue here, but USB-R does with certain Windows 10 versions.

Zero client is indeed vulnerable for the issue because Zero client does not run any Horizon client software thus does not support VIP. USB-R is the only option to support USB printers.

So, again, if you're not using Zero client, please try VIP rather than USB-R, then you would not hit the issue.

[ozbarge]

I've opened a ticket with Microsoft as well to see if I can obtain this magical KB. Thank you for the lead, hopefully it pans out. 

[ozbarge]

I completely understand. We are working on deploying thin clients that support VIP. But that is it's own issue that I have zero influence on. If I can fix USB redirection I can continue on the Horizon 7->8 upgrade. 

[scottjones74]

The issue is occurring with thin and zero clients.  In my open support ticket with VMware, we have tested only having VIP or usb redirection installed and the issue remains either way.  There was an issue caused by Microsoft last year, but there is still an issue with the newer horizon versions and windows.