Installing the HP OfficeJet Pro 8610 on Windows 10

I just purchased this printer and have several hours of work into installing drivers. While my Ubuntu system worked right away using HPLIP, I have two Windows 10 printers and my wife one, and none of these would install the driver.

I went through quite a number of possible fixes, including using the HP troubleshooter app which goes through some pretty time consuming procedures. None of it worked.

I called HP customer support and spent more than an hour with the representative, who claimed to have installed the printer, using the IP (and a standard TCP/IP port) rather than the normal automatic port provided. Unfortunately, he didn’t mention that he had “successfully” installed our printer by using an older driver for a different series of printer, which left some of the features unusable.

What finally worked was the solution on this technet forum page, with a minor modification.

Where it says to rename C:\Windows\System32\spool\drivers\w32x86\3 to 3.old, you need to also go back to directory x64 (in place of w32x86) and do the same thing, always presuming you’re on an x64 system.

I would reemphasize the importance of backing up your registry, and also backing up any file or directory you rename until you have everything working.