Print Screen functions

I have this lady I know asked me to take a look at her pc, This is a new one to me but when I formatted her hard drive and re-installed windows to get her back up and running. She asked me why hitting the print screen function is not working no more. This is why I was puzzle because I have not know that function could do that, but she told me her pc always did allow her to do that, she even hooked up her printer to the labtop she has and the print screen functions work and print what ever is showing on the screen. This is why I am puzzle because of this my machine I have does not do this and I even tryed on my wife machine and sereral others and it does not do this. But the machine she has is a Dell Dimension E520 and the printer is a Dell Photo 926, machine type 4470-0d1, any ideas of why hitting the print screen function is no longer working, from what I have read this function only allows you to print to a file, not print whats on the screen or am I wrong on this ?? She proved this to me and it does work like that on the labtop and now this is why I am scratching my head.

TBH I have never heard of it doing that, in my experience pressing the PrtScn key gives no physical reaction at all, it works silently, and once you press the button you then have to open m$ Paint (or similar) and select paste, it's only at that point the content is displayed, or if you only want to capture the top most open window then press Alt in conjunction with PrtScn to capture that window only, but each time you must paste it into Paint. The only other possible I can think of is they had a 3rd party application installed that allowed this, there are a few such tools around, Snagit is one that I know of, I haven't used it, but it is quite well rated from what I have seen, it's the only thing I can think of, unless being all Dell parts it had some kind of connection, so it might be worth asking if they can recall any details, eg like any kind of program name came up with the print properties or something, hope you get the solution you need.

Nods and this is why I am very puzzled about this, because as she told me when she hooks that printer to her labtop also the print function command works and prints whats on the screen, again a new one to me and shaking my head over this. All the dell msg board talks of printing to work or paint then printing what you wanted after, only other way I know of is script writing commands or what not. But after digging more I ran across this program call Gadwin Print Screen 4.4, and it works like a charm, you hit print screen and hit follow output and it prints whats on the screen. I supect as you said Dell must have had a program running in the background or something for it to work in the past. Thanks for the help and have a good day.

Well assuming I am reading this right, the problem system was a tower ? and they also have a laptop that is still functioning the way they expect this problem system too ? If so you have your answer, ask them to bring the laptop too you, or if you go to them, whatever works, then ask them to show you this option at work, if they are using a 3rd party application, as we both suspect, hopefully it will reveal itself to you, then you know what they are used to using, and you should easily be able to restore the function they are used too, hope this helps.

The print screen function works in DOS without utilizing the clip board……..just hit the Print Sreen key and it Err…. prints what's on the screen…..( how old fashioned!) However its unlikely the lady is using DOS…… I have only 3 customers left now who still use DOS and refuse to have anything to do with the "New Fangled Windows"…… it will be a sad day when the last one gives up…..What will I do with all my DOS books…..? Regards paws

Well assuming I am reading this right, the problem system was a tower ? and they also have a laptop that is still functioning the way they expect this problem system too ?
If so you have your answer, ask them to bring the laptop too you, or if you go to them, whatever works, then ask them to show you this option at work, if they are using a 3rd party application, as we both suspect, hopefully it will reveal itself to you, then you know what they are used to using, and you should easily be able to restore the function they are used too, hope this helps.

Aye it was a Dell Tower E520 and I was thinking of asking her to bring in the Labtop to see what is running, as Paws said the only way I knew this type of function worked was back in the old dos days, but she is running vista and I knew their was no way just by hitting print screen it would print whats on the screen to a printer output unless it was done by a 3rd party program.

If she is willing to do this I will post to let you know what I find, the print screen program on her tower as I said workes great and so much that I like it, going to install it on my system.

Update, the Lady came in yesterday and she swears up and down at me the printer print screen button was working, it was not using another program, it always printed when she hit print screen. I asked her if she could bring in the labtop, she said no because it worked as it always have worked and when I worked on her desktop it was doing the same thing but now its not. After talking to her, to try and explain what 3rd party programs are she ended up telling me when she hit the print screen button and window would pop up and then she would click yes for it to print. I then told her that is a program doing that and not the print screen button. She sounded like she understood. When I showed her the program I installed she went ahead and took the pc. and looked to be happy. Good lesson for me, because I was puzzle that one person could use the print function command in windows when I went and tryed it on 6 other machines and it would not work. Thanks Guys