"Could not connect to the printer..." error message

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsnt.print (More info?)

I have an NT 4.0 server which hosts several shared printers. On
Monday, two of my W2K Pro SP4 users complained that they cannot
connect to any printers shared on this or any server. All other users
are fine.

On closer inspection, they both get the "Could not Connect to the
printer. You either entered a printer Name that was incorrect or the
specified printer is no longer connected to the server" message when
they try to add a shared printer.

Here's a few quick facts:

* both users are administrators on their machines
* the same thing occurs even when domain admins logon to their
machines
* both users can browse and connect to all network shares
* both machines are free of viruses, spyware and adware
* I have tried renaming and rejoining the machines to the domain
* I removed all anti virus software
* The same thing occurs when starting in safe mode with networking
* I removed all hotfixes - no luck. I reapplied SP4, no luck.
* checked DNS/Wins etc
* I can successfully print directly to the printer via IP
* it's not licence logging or anything - all licence logging is
disabled

I'm tearing my hair out over this one. Please help!

Thanks in advance,
Pat_Mc_Crotch
Australia