HP Solution Center Has Stopped Working
Whenever I scan documents and photos on my HP OfficeJet Pro 8500 Wireless multi-function printer, I would prefer using the scan utility in the HP Solution Center. Newer HP models scan to computer quite easily but with my 10+ year old HP printer, which still prints well, scan to computer, scan to storage device, scan to e-mail and so forth have never quite worked as smoothly … usually requiring a bit of tweaking to get it to work properly. In addition, the scan utility allows fine tuning of your scans.
Last year, when I needed to scan some documents and launched the HP Solution Center, I ended up getting a white window with an Adobe Flash Player logo and a large information icon instead of the HP Solution Center tools and utilities. After some troubleshooting and research into the issue, I found a knowledge base article on the HP website which stated the HP Solution Center relied on Adobe Flash Player and since Adobe permanently disabled Adobe Flash Player as of January 12, 2021, the HP Solution Center no longer works.
This issue applies to HP printers that use the HP Solution Center. If you have a newer HP model which uses the HP Printer Assistant, it should not be affected.
Fortunately, there are a couple of HP standalone scanning applications to work around this issue – HP Scan Extended and HP Scan and Capture.
HP Scan Extended is a straight-forward download and install (downloads directly from HP’s FTP site). HP Scan and Capture is a download through the Microsoft Store in Windows 10 (you don’t need to sign into the Microsoft Store to download and install the application). If you use the HP Solution Center for more than just scanning, these applications will not bring back those other features like checking ink levels, sending a fax, etc.
Both the HP Scan Extended and HP Scan and Capture should address most scanning needs. I prefer the HP Scan Extended as the application feels more robust and feature-rich and is more oriented towards professional users. The HP Scan and Capture, which still has a good feature set, seems to be more oriented towards home users. You’ll need to decide which solution works best for your specific needs.
One final note, since HP Solution Center is no longer supported, if you format your PC and perform a clean install of Windows, you might not be able to reinstall the HP Solution Center software and related drivers. I experienced this first hand when I performed a clean install of Windows 10 on a laptop. While I could add the HP OfficeJet Pro 8500 Wireless as a printer using a Windows 10 driver, without the specific HP Solution Center software and related drivers installed, the HP standalone scanning applications would not work.
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