Printer Icon stuck in system tray

I have the printer icon stuck in my system tray. It use to only show when it was actively printing a document. Now it is there all the time. When I hover over it it shows 1 document pending but when I click on "open all active print documents" it shows nothing. I have stopped and started the print spooler many times. There are no files in %SYSTEMROOT%\system32\spool\Printers. How do I get rid of this icon and the mystery pending document? The only printer I have is connected over a network and not directly to this computer. This computer connects via cable and the computer with the HP printer connects to the same network wirelessly.

(from another forum) "One of the two ways of connecting to the printer is causing the tray icon to be displayed. Try right clicking the icon and seeing if there are any properties that can be set. If this fails, right click the blank portion of the taskbar, choose properties, and then go through the start menu settings you have chosen. ONE OF THESE HAS A CHECKBOX, MARKED, THAT SAYS "PRINTER". Click on it to remove the checkmark, and restart after clicking apply. Then you will only recieve the notice when you are actively printing a document."

There are no properties. The only options are "Open all active printers", "Open the printers folder", and it list the one printer which opens the printer queue. The check box in the start menu options only toggles the printer option in the start menu not the system tray. The odd thing is that on mouse over it shows "1 document(s) pending for ..." When I open the printer folder there are no pending documents listed below the printer and it doesn't show in the queue. There must be a registry entry that I need to edit. If any one knows where that may.

Hi supermaughan,

Welcome to Vista Forums!

If what Richard suggested doesn't work and you've stopped and started the spooler many times and can't find the document, it may be coming from the network. Go to the computer to which the printer is attached and stop and retart the spooler on that computer and also try to restart it as well and see if that resolves the problem on this computer (and after that, rebooting both computers to make sure the icon tray is starting fresh). Are any other computers also networked to this printer? If so, do the same with them.

If that doesn't work, what is the make and precise and complete model number of the HP printer? Perhaps there's a way to reset the printer in case the printer itself is causing the problem somehow (if you have a user manual, it may tell you how to do that). At the very least, power it down and then power it back up to see if that helps.

I hope this helps. If not, please provide the info about the printer and the results of what you tried and we'll go from there.

Good luck!