Windows 10 Devices And Printers Icons

| 16-09-2021
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Printer showing in document printing option but not showing in Device and Printers. If you are not find the Printer icon not showing in Devices and Printers in Windows 10, then you may have to tweak the Windows Registry. For example, you can set a default printer, change the settings on a wireless mouse, or find out why a device has a yellow warning icon next to it. Tap or click to open Devices and Printers. Press and hold or right-click a device, and then tap or click a task.

This article provides a solution to an issue where printers installed using the same driver and port on Windows are grouped as one when viewed within Devices and Printers.

Original product version: Windows 7 Service Pack 1
Original KB number: 2015694

Windows 10 Devices And Printers Icons Downloads

Symptoms

Consider this scenario:

  • A computer running a version of Windows listed in the Applies To section
  • Install two or more printers using the same printer driver and installed with the same printer port (that is, LPT1)
  • View the installed printers within Devices and Printers

In this scenario, when viewing the installed printers within Devices and Printers, you may notice that some of the printers are grouped together and are associated with the same printer icon.

Cause

It's an expected behavior.

Find my printer and devices

Resolution

To work around this issue, you can use the following steps to create a Printers desktop icon that will list the installed printers separately:

  1. Open the Registry Editor (Select the Start button > type REGEDIT.EXE without the quotes and press the enter key) When prompted with User Account Control select Yes.

  2. Expand to and selected the following registry key:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerDesktopNameSpace

  3. Right-click on the NameSpace registry key and choose New Key, enter the following GUID for the new registry key name (be sure to include the brackets)
    {2227a280-3aea-1069-a2de-08002b30309d}

  4. In the right pane, right-click the registry value (Default) and choose Modify, for the Value data enter Printers without the quotes

  5. Close Registry Editor

  6. Right-click on the Desktop and select Refresh

    Note

    After selecting refresh of the desktop, a new desktop icon called Printers will appear. Double-clicking on the new Printers icon you will be able to see the installed printers separately. You can also Add, Remove, View, or Manage the print queues, change printer settings, and choose printer preferences from within this new Printers Desktop icon.

More information

There are several factors that contribute to the printer grouping, and the type of device as with the more common Multi-Function Printers. The way that printers are grouped or not depends on the following factors:

  1. Same driver.
  2. Same Port.
  3. Same HardwareID.

Typically it's identified that if the devices use the same HardwareID means same hardware printers, drivers may be different, PS, PCL, and so on. The determining factor is the port and the HardwareID.

For more information on Windows 7 Device Experience, see Windows 7 device experience.

Windows 10 Devices And Printers Icons Compatible

Devices and Printers is a special system folder which shows the important devices connected to your computer with fancy icons. This folder was first introduced in Windows 7. Windows 10 comes with this folder in the classic Control Panel. You can create a special shortcut to access this feature faster.

The Devices and Printers folder provides a useful user interface to access and manage your peripheral devices. It shows advanced properties of devices and is able to download realistic looking images for printers, cameras, mice and keyboards. It also contains a number of quick actions in the context menu of a device. It also replaces the classic Printer folder.

For fast access to this useful folder in Windows 10, you might want to create the Devices and Printers shortcut on the Desktop.

To create Devices and Printers shortcut in Windows 10, do the following.

Windows 10 Devices And Printers Icons Printing

  1. Right-click the empty space on your Desktop. Select New - Shortcut in the context menu (see the screenshot).
  2. In the shortcut target box, type or copy-paste the following:
  3. Use the line 'Devices and Printers' without quotes as the name of the shortcut. Actually, you can use any name you want. Click on the Finish button when done.
  4. Now, right click the shortcut you created and select Properties.
  5. On the Shortcut tab, you can specify a new icon if you wish. You can use the icon from the c:windowssystem32devicecenter.dll file.
  6. Click OK to apply the icon, then click OK to close the shortcut properties dialog window.

The command we used is special Active X (CLSID) command. Refer to the full list of these commands available in Windows 10: CLSID (GUID) shell location list in Windows 10

Now, you can move this shortcut to any convenient location, pin it to taskbar or to Start,add to All apps or add to Quick Launch (see how to enable Quick Launch). You can also assign a global hotkey to your shortcut.

Tip: You can add Devices and Printers to This PC or to the Desktop context menu if you want.

Printer Control Panel Windows 10

That's it.

Find My Printer And Devices

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