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Move Spool dir to another partition

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5 replies

by chrissaw 1 view

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Hi there,
I have a W2K3 PDC on a system partition of 3.5 gig
and a Data partition with 45 gig.

Some users send to the printer jobs between 800 mb to 1.2 gb. There is 1 gig free space on the system partition. So for those jobs, the directory Windows\system32\spool\printers hold the job and become out of space.

Is there a way to move the Windows\System32\spool directory and sub-directory to another partition?

Thank's

5 replies

by joseph moore

Yes you can. I'm checking this from my XP Pro box. The names should be the same for Win2K3.

First, stop the Spooler service in the Services applet.
Open Printers And Faxes, where you can see the installed printers.
Click File -> Server Properties -> Advanced tab
There is a box called Spool Folder. Just change the path listed there to whatever folder on whatever drive you want.
Click OK.
Then restart the Spooler service.
That's got it.

by ronypp

To change the spool folder location
1. Open Printers and Faxes.
2. On the File menu, click Server Properties, and then click the Advanced tab.
3. In the Spool folder window, enter the path and the name of the new default spool folder for this print server, and then click Apply or OK.
4. Stop and restart the spooler service, or reboot the server.

To open Printers and Faxes, click Start, and then click Printers and Faxes. If the server functions as the print server for a large number of printers or for print jobs that are typically very long, you should consider moving the spool folder to another location.
The spool folder might require a large amount of disk space to spool. The spool folder should not be located at the root directory (generally C:\).

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