shared W2003 Laserjet 4250 glitchy on 1 specific Win7 station

Question

The LJ4250 is installed on a WinSvr2003 machine. No problems there or on any of the other W7 workstations. This process of installation has always worked. LJ4250 is somewhat dated, necessitating the local port option install described below.

The problem: Printer shows in the printers dialogue after installation. But if you print a test page the printQ, as expected, shows the job briefly in the Q, then the queue shows empty, but nothing prints. The queue on the server shows nothing too So, windows generates no notice of any sort, but the job does not print

I've tried:

• delete and reinstall the printer
• delete the Local port (described below) and try again.
• start/restart spool service
• other "ways" of installing the printer (eg as a network printer rather than local port)
• Tried this installation again after a couple of weeks. No difference
• Tried using the HP universal driver (which is the only one you can download for it from HP these days). Win7 would never agree that there is an appropriate driver (there are about 7 infs in that Universal Driver package)

Here is the Install process:

1. Windows level: log in as the user that needs the printer (not admin)
2. Explorer: Browse to W2003 server and login when challenged as an administrator, check 'remember credentials'. This is so the cx/setup will be persistent after reboots/logoffs. yeah, not an ideal sitch unless you can trust the user.
3. add a Local printer. choose local port, create a port named: \theservername\thesharenameofprinter eg.: \BFServer\HP Laserjet 4250
4. choose the HP -> Laserjet4250 driver from the selects and go.

The above has always worked in the past, This is the first time it has not.

Can anyone think of a fix for the cause of the symptom above?
I thought maybe a printer log, couldn't find one. Is there one? or are printer events logged in another log?
thanks