Can't Use Print Function In Any Program!!!

I tried to print something recently and to my surprise my computer WOULD NOT PRINT!!! What a nightmare. I haven't had the time to trouble shoot the exact reasons why nothing will print on my computer, but I have tried a few simple solutions (re-registering the dll for printing in Windows XP, looking to see if I had any updates applied recently that could affect it, etc.). I am a software engineer personally, but am a very busy one at that. Here are the circumstances at which this problem occured in my system:
-Happens in every program
-Event that happens, Go into click 'File' then 'Print' and each time I get an error message that says "... has encountered a problem and needs to close." with a close or debug option (of course)
-Seems to be a problem within the system itself considering the same event happens in every program I try to print something in
Please someone help me out here. I'm a hardworking person and just could really use this favor. I have a feeling either someone hacked my computer and put a virus to mess up my printer or a windows update was applied that messed it up. Please no novices even respond to this (you know who you are mr./mrs. don't have any certifications and can't even speak a computer language (and no html does NOT count) fluently). I'm not a retard, if it is a totally simple solution an average newb could come up with chances are I've already checked it off my list of stuff to try. Thanks in advanced

~Ben