// PRINTER & SCANNER SUPPORT
Scan to folder stopped working after a Windows update
The office printer still prints everything you send it, but press Scan and the file never lands in the folder on the PC. Nobody touched the printer. The only thing that changed was a Windows update on the computer — and that is exactly the point. Your scanner has to sign in to that PC to drop a file into a shared folder, and Windows has been quietly getting fussier about who it lets in. Here is what really changed, what to check on each side, and the fix that will not fall over at the next update. Rated 4.9 on Google.
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/01 — WHY ONLY SCANNING BROKE
Why printing still works when scanning to the folder does not
Printing and scanning to a folder are two entirely different operations that happen to run through the same box. When you print, your PC pushes a job out to the printer and the printer prints it. Scan to folder works the other way round: the machine has to reach back across the network, sign in to your PC as though it were a member of staff, and write a file into a shared folder. Different direction, different protocol, different permissions — which is why one half can carry on faultlessly while the other stops dead.
The half that stopped is the sign-in. Windows uses a protocol called SMB for shared folders, and Microsoft has spent recent years steadily raising the bar on what it accepts: connections now have to be signed so they cannot be tampered with, anonymous ‘guest’ logins are refused, and the original 1990s version of the protocol is long gone. Office multifunction printers are often years behind that curve. The scanning half of their firmware tends to be written once, shipped, and rarely revisited.
So the honest summary is this: the update did not break your printer. Your scanner is asking exactly the same question it asked last week — Windows has simply stopped accepting that way of asking. Nothing is damaged, no scans are lost, and the folder is still sitting where it always was.
/02 — ON THE PC
What to check on the computer that holds the folder
Start on the computer — that is where the change happened. Work through these before touching the printer.
- The share itself. Right-click the folder, open Properties and check the Sharing tab still shows a network path.
- The network profile. After a large update Windows may treat the network as brand new and mark it Public, which switches file and printer sharing off. It should be Private.
- The account the scanner signs in as. Does it still exist, and has the password changed or expired? If the colleague whose login the scanner borrowed changed theirs on Tuesday, scanning died on Tuesday.
- Microsoft account switches. If that user has moved from a local account to a Microsoft account, what they type each morning is a PIN, and a PIN cannot be used to sign in to a share.
- Blank passwords. An account with no password has never worked over the network — Windows only allows those at the keyboard — so if that is what the address book holds, it was never the thing that was working. What may have been working is the share accepting a connection that proved nothing at all, and that is one of the doors recent Windows has closed.
One warning about testing: not from a PC that already has the share open, since Windows may reuse a login saved months ago. Use a different computer and type the scanner’s credentials when asked — refused there too and the fault is on the PC, accepted and it is the scanner’s settings. Check the PC is not asleep at the time, either.
/03 — ON THE SCANNER
What to check in the scanner’s own address book entry
Every office MFP keeps its scan destinations in an address book. On most machines you can edit it far more comfortably from the printer’s built-in web page — type its address into a browser on any PC on the network — than on the touchscreen. Note what is there before you change anything.
Any one of the details it holds can be the fault.
- Where it is sending. If the destination is stored as a numeric address rather than the PC’s name, and that PC has since been given a different one, the scanner is knocking on an empty door. A renamed share or a tidied-away subfolder breaks it the same way.
- The username. Many machines need it written as the PC name, a backslash, then the account —
OFFICE-PC\scanner. Some have a separate domain or workgroup box that must be filled in, or deliberately left empty. - The password. Never trust the row of dots; most machines show a placeholder whether or not anything real sits behind it. Retype it, and check the field has not truncated it — some accept fewer characters than Windows does.
While you are in there, find the setting for which version of SMB the machine uses and choose the newest it offers. Then check the manufacturer’s site for firmware — newer SMB support is exactly the sort of thing that turns up in a free update.
/04 — THE FIX THAT LASTS
Give the scanner its own account on the PC
The fix that lasts is to stop the scanner borrowing a person’s login and give it one of its own. On the PC that holds the folder, create a local account — call it scanner — give it a proper password, set that password not to expire, and put those details in the printer’s address book entry. Two reasons it earns the twenty minutes:
- Nobody’s password change can break it again. Staff change passwords, hand in notice, have accounts disabled. A dedicated account sails through all of that, and a refused sign-in named
scanneris obvious in the logs. - It can only reach one folder. Grant it access to the scan folder and nothing else, on the sharing permissions and the folder’s security permissions both. A password held in a printer that any member of staff can reach through its admin page — and that has to be written down somewhere to be entered — should not also open your accounts folder.
Windows 11 Home lacks the graphical account tools, so on Home the never-expires part is a one-line PowerShell job using Set-LocalUser. Record the password in your password manager.
Meanwhile, scan to email or scan to a USB stick keeps the office moving, and scan to email is worth keeping permanently as a backstop — though on Microsoft 365 it needs care, as Microsoft has been retiring the simple password-based sending older scanners rely on.
/05 — THE BAD ADVICE
The workaround the internet will offer you, and what it costs
Search this problem and you will be told, confidently and often, to put SMB1 back, to turn off the requirement for signed connections, or to switch on guest access. The guest setting people quote is usually the wrong one anyway — it governs how your PC connects out to other machines, not how the scanner connects in — and the version that does apply means anything reaching the PC can write into that share without proving who it is. Two of the three will have you scanning by lunchtime. All three are a poor trade for a business, and it is worth knowing why before anyone does it to your PC.
None of them are scanner settings. They are settings for the whole computer. Turning off signing does not loosen one connection from one printer — it loosens every connection that PC makes and accepts, so anyone who gets onto your network can sit in the middle of your file traffic. Allowing guest logins means anything that reaches the machine can write into that share without proving who it is. And SMB1 is the protocol at the heart of the ransomware outbreaks that stopped hospitals and factories a few years ago.
The point is the ratio: you weaken every share on that computer to accommodate one device that could usually be fixed properly instead. If the machine genuinely cannot be brought up to date — and some cannot — the conversation to have is with whoever supplies or maintains it. On a lease or a service contract, keeping it able to talk to current Windows is reasonably their job as much as yours.
If you would rather not spend an afternoon on it, this is routine work for us: usually one remote session while you watch, or a visit anywhere across Bournemouth, Poole and Dorset.
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// GOOD QUESTIONS
Frequently asked
Why can the printer still print if it can’t scan to the folder?
Printing goes one way and scanning to a folder goes the other. Your PC sends print jobs out to the printer, which needs no permission from anything. Scanning to a folder means the printer connects back to your PC, proves who it is, and writes a file — a completely separate route with a sign-in at the end of it. A Windows update that tightens how sign-ins to shared folders work therefore stops scanning without touching printing at all.
Do we need to buy a new printer?
Almost certainly not. Nothing has failed — the machine is asking to sign in the same way it always has, and Windows has stopped accepting that method. In most cases the fix is a dedicated account on the PC and a corrected address book entry on the printer, which costs nothing but time. It is worth checking the manufacturer’s site for firmware too, because newer SMB support does sometimes arrive that way. Replacement is a last resort, not a first move.
Can we just uninstall the Windows update?
There is usually a short window after a large update in which Windows will roll it back, and yes, that would restore scanning. We would not advise it. These are deliberate security changes rather than bugs, so the update will return and you will be in the same position with less time to plan. You would also be leaving the machine without recent security fixes in the meantime. Fixing the sign-in takes about the same effort and it stays fixed.
Everyone online says to turn SMB1 back on — is that safe?
It is the most common advice online and the one we would push back on hardest. SMB1 is the old file-sharing protocol that the big ransomware outbreaks spread through, and switching it back on affects the whole computer, not just the connection from your scanner. You would be reopening a known route into every share on that PC to save reconfiguring one address book entry. If your machine truly cannot do anything newer, talk to whoever supplies it before you weaken the computer.
What can we do today while the folder is being sorted?
Two things work immediately and neither depends on the shared folder. Scan to email sends each scan as an attachment from the printer itself, and scan to a USB stick puts the file straight onto a memory stick at the machine. Both are worth setting up anyway as a fallback. In the background, ring us on 01202 775566 and we will usually sort the folder in one remote session while you watch — or come out to you if the printer needs hands on it.
Scanner still refusing to file anything?
We sort office printers and shared folders for businesses across Bournemouth, Poole and Dorset — usually remotely, in one short session. Call 01202 775566.
01202 775566 · help@365techies.co.uk · MON–FRI 9AM–5PM