The Home windows 10 Print Administration Utility, higher generally known as the Print Administration Console, has been part of the Home windows working system for many years, so it’s crucial to make sure this utility is accessible.
This console might help desktop directors with quite a few settings resembling {hardware} preferences and default printers.
Nonetheless, IT professionals are more and more discovering that the Print Administration Console is lacking from their Home windows deployments. As a desktop administrator, you need to ensure you can access the Print Management Console and know what to do when the console is inaccessible.
How you can entry the Print Administration Console
Up to now, the Print Administration Console was put in inside Home windows 10 by default. To seek out out whether or not the Print Administration Console exists in your system, right-click on the Begin button after which click on Run.
Subsequent, enter the PrintManagement.msc command on the Run immediate. If the Print Administration Console is put in, you will notice it open, as proven in Determine 1.
Determine 1. The Print Administration Console that has popped up after operating the command.
What are the Print Administration Console use circumstances?
For some, the Print Administration Console’s absence is a nonissue. In spite of everything, Home windows 10 lets you set up and use printers with out having to open the Print Administration Console. Even so, the Print Administration Console might be extraordinarily helpful for Home windows directors, significantly in an workplace surroundings.
Though many IT professionals are fast to dismiss the Print Administration Console as being a type of instruments that exists mostly for use on server working programs (OSes), the Print Administration Console positively has its place inside a desktop-centric surroundings.
For instance, if in case you have a printer that’s costly to function or used for a particular goal, resembling printing checks, then you should utilize the Print Administration Console to manage who’s allowed to print to the printer.
One of many the explanation why the Print Administration Console is helpful is as a result of it simplifies the method of working with a number of printers. Slightly than having to navigate the Printers and Scanners settings or the legacy Management Panel — which Microsoft will quickly remove from Home windows — the Print Administration Console acts as a single pane of glass interface for managing your entire printers.
These printers would not have to be instantly connected to your PC. Community printers are additionally uncovered by way of the Print Administration Console. You need to use the Print Administration Console to replace system drivers and configure all the varied print settings.
One more reason why the Print Administration Console is so helpful is that it permits entry to the print queues for particular person printers — or print system, as Microsoft likes to name it — so you possibly can see the person jobs that exist inside the print queue. You may delete a “caught” print job if essential. You too can cancel a print job and even change the order through which print jobs might be printed.
Microsoft lets you use the Print Administration Console to use entry controls and different safety settings to particular person printers. For instance, if in case you have a printer that’s costly to function or used for a particular goal, resembling printing checks, then you should utilize the Print Administration Console to manage who’s allowed to print to the printer. You too can management who’s allowed to handle the paperwork inside the print queue.
Why is the Print Administration Console lacking?
There are two most important the explanation why the Print Administration Console could be lacking out of your Home windows 10 deployment. The primary purpose is that not each Home windows version contains the Print Administration Console. You’ll find the Print Administration Console in Windows 10 Pro, Enterprise, and Education. Nonetheless, the Print Administration Console will not be included with Home windows 10 Dwelling.
Moreover, the Print Administration Console is technically an non-obligatory characteristic as of Home windows 10 model 2004 — the Could 2020 replace. This meant that the Print Administration Console was not put in by default.
In some circumstances, you may discover {that a} Home windows 10 nonetheless contains the Print Administration Console despite operating a build that is newer than 2004. Assuming the Print Administration Console was not manually put in, this might occur is that if the PC was initially operating an older Home windows 10 construct however was later upgraded to a extra present construct. In some particular circumstances, you may uncover that the replace course of didn’t trigger the Print Administration Console to be eliminated.
Nonetheless, if set up media used for deploying a machine’s authentic Home windows 10 set up is construct 2004 or larger, then the Print Administration Console won’t be put in by default. In these conditions, you will want to manually set up the Print Administration Console.
How you can set up the Print Administration Console
When you discover that the Print Administration Console is lacking out of your Home windows 10 deployment, there are two methods you should utilize to put in it. Needless to say each strategies require operating a supported Home windows 10 Version and that the Print Administration Console will not be supported with Home windows 10 Dwelling Version.
Set up the Print Administration Console with PowerShell
The primary method for putting in the Print Administration Console involves Windows PowerShell. Start by opening an elevated PowerShell session. Then, enter the next command:
This straightforward command will set up the Print Administration Console (Determine 2).
Determine 2. The PowerShell command that may set up the Print Administration Console on Home windows desktops that may help it.
Putting in the Print Administration Console through the Home windows GUI
When you would favor to not have to make use of the Home windows command line, you possibly can set up the Print Administration Console from the Home windows desktop without having PowerShell. To take action, open Settings after which click on on System. Subsequent, click on on the Non-obligatory Options tab. Now, scroll by way of the checklist of non-obligatory options till you find the Print Administration Console. Choose the Print Administration Console checkbox after which click on the Add button (Determine 3).
Determine 3. The choice so as to add the Print Administration Console through the Non-obligatory options settings menu.
Upon doing so, the Print Administration Console will set up.
Brien Posey is a former 22-time Microsoft MVP and a business astronaut candidate. In his greater than 30 years in IT, he has served as a lead community engineer for the U.S. Division of Protection and a community administrator for among the largest insurance coverage corporations in America.
