Bug 170544 - LibreOffice 25.8.4 freezes at startup showing “Waiting for printer connection…” dialog that opens and closes repeatedly
Summary: LibreOffice 25.8.4 freezes at startup showing “Waiting for printer connection...
Status: UNCONFIRMED
Alias: None
Product: LibreOffice
Classification: Unclassified
Component: Printing and PDF export (show other bugs)
Version:
(earliest affected)
25.8.4.2 release
Hardware: x86-64 (AMD64) Windows (All)
: medium normal
Assignee: Not Assigned
URL:
Whiteboard:
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2026-01-30 13:37 UTC by Juan Hauara
Modified: 2026-02-02 11:13 UTC (History)
1 user (show)

See Also:
Crash report or crash signature:


Attachments
Image: printer detection dialog appearing repeatedly on launch (101.32 KB, image/jpeg)
2026-01-30 13:40 UTC, Juan Hauara
Details

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Description Juan Hauara 2026-01-30 13:37:02 UTC
Description:
LibreOffice version: 25.8.4
Windows version: Windows 11 Home 25H2 (OS build 26200.7623)

When starting LibreOffice 25.8.4, a dialog appears saying “Waiting for printer connection…”. This message opens and closes every 1–2 seconds in an infinite loop, and LibreOffice never finishes loading. The application becomes unusable.

My installed printers (see attached screenshot):
- Brother HL-L3210CW series (status: offline)
- Microsoft Print to PDF

Important:
- The Brother HL-L3210CW printer has always worked correctly with previous LibreOffice versions.
- I have rolled back to the previous stable version of LibreOffice, and everything works normally again. The issue only occurs in version 25.8.4.
- No other application on the system shows printer-related problems.

This seems to be a regression in LibreOffice 25.8.4 related to printer detection under Windows 11 25H2.

Please let me know if you need additional logs or tests.


Steps to Reproduce:
1. Install LibreOffice version 25.8.4
2. Double to open it
3. You will see the windows "Waiting for printer connection…"

Actual Results:
You will see the windows "Waiting for printer connection…"

Expected Results:
Open LibreOffice


Reproducible: Always


User Profile Reset: No

Additional Info:
Additional system details:

Windows version:
- Windows 11 Home, version 25H2
- OS build: 26200.7623
- Installed on: 2025-12-09
- Windows Feature Experience Pack: 1000.26100.275.0

Printers installed:
- Brother HL-L3210CW series (offline)
- Microsoft Print to PDF

The Brother HL-L3210CW printer worked correctly with all previous versions of LibreOffice.

I reverted to the previous LibreOffice stable version and the problem disappears completely, so this issue is specific to version 25.8.4.
Comment 1 Juan Hauara 2026-01-30 13:40:20 UTC
Created attachment 205275 [details]
Image: printer detection dialog appearing repeatedly on launch
Comment 2 Buovjaga 2026-01-30 14:57:43 UTC
This sounds like bug 42673, but it is a very old known problem while you describe it as a recent regression. If something actually regressed, you should be able to perform binary bisecting to find out the exact cause.

https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/QA/Bibisect
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/QA/Bibisect/Windows
https://bibisect.libreoffice.org/win64-25.8

1. Open Powershell 5
2. Give this command to install the latest Powershell: winget install --id Microsoft.PowerShell --source winget
3. Give this command to install git: winget install -e --id Git.Git
4. Close the old Powershell window and use Windows Start Menu to launch Powershell 7
5. Go to some directory, could be the root of C: drive itself, so `cd C:\` and clone the 25.8 bibisect repository with: git clone https://bibisect.libreoffice.org/win64-25.8.git
6. After the clone has finished, say cd win64-25.8
7. Now give these chained commands and check if it freezes: git checkout oldest && instdir\program\soffice
8. If it does not freeze, you should be able to bibisect the issue. Next use this and hopefully it *will* exhibit the freeze: git checkout master && instdir\program\soffice
9. Next start the bibisecting with: git bisect start master oldest && instdir\program\soffice
10. Whenever you don't get the freeze say: git bisect good && instdir\program\soffice
11. Whenever you do see the freeze, say: git bisect bad && instdir\program\soffice
12. When the process is finished after something like 13 steps, it will display the first bad commit. Select and copy all the lines in this final output (you can copy by right-clicking, it gets put into the clipboard immediately) and paste here to a comment for us to inspect.
Comment 3 Juan Hauara 2026-02-02 10:47:19 UTC
I followed your bibisect instructions with the win64-25.8 repository.

Results:
- git checkout oldest && instdir\program\soffice.exe
  → also shows the “Waiting for printer connection…” dialog loop and never finishes starting (BAD)

- git checkout master && instdir\program\soffice.exe
  → same behavior, the “Waiting for printer connection…” dialog loop (BAD)

So both 'oldest' and 'master' in the win64-25.8 bibisect repo are BAD. There is no GOOD build in this range, so I cannot perform a meaningful bibisect between master and oldest.

For reference, my installed LibreOffice 24.x (previous stable version) does NOT show this problem on the same system and with the same printers.
Comment 4 Buovjaga 2026-02-02 10:51:23 UTC
(In reply to Juan Hauara from comment #3)
> I followed your bibisect instructions with the win64-25.8 repository.
> 
> Results:
> - git checkout oldest && instdir\program\soffice.exe
>   → also shows the “Waiting for printer connection…” dialog loop and never
> finishes starting (BAD)
> 
> - git checkout master && instdir\program\soffice.exe
>   → same behavior, the “Waiting for printer connection…” dialog loop (BAD)
> 
> So both 'oldest' and 'master' in the win64-25.8 bibisect repo are BAD. There
> is no GOOD build in this range, so I cannot perform a meaningful bibisect
> between master and oldest.
> 
> For reference, my installed LibreOffice 24.x (previous stable version) does
> NOT show this problem on the same system and with the same printers.

Alright, I was going by your remark "I have rolled back to the previous stable version of LibreOffice, and everything works normally again".

You still did not mention the exact version - 24.x could refer to 24.2 or 24.8. If the working version is 24.8, then the version under suspicion is 25.2 and you should adapt steps 5 and 6 accordingly.
Comment 5 Juan Hauara 2026-02-02 11:13:00 UTC
I have confirmed that LibreOffice 24.8.7.2 works correctly on this same system. 
So the last known working version is 24.8.x, and the issue appears for the first time in the 25.x series. 
Therefore, the regression range should be between 24.8 and 25.2, and I will proceed with the bibisect using the win64-25.2 repository as suggested.

Additional information:

I realized that the Brother HL-L3210CW driver might not be correctly installed on my new PC. On this machine I was never able to complete the printer setup, while on two other computers (Windows 10 and Windows 11) the same printer works normally.

However, even if the printer driver is faulty or the printer is not fully configured, LibreOffice should not block the entire startup process. The “Waiting for printer connection…” dialog loops indefinitely and prevents the application from opening at all, which is unexpected behavior. Other applications on the system do not freeze when the printer driver fails.

So the printer driver problem may be a trigger, but LibreOffice’s startup hang appears to be the underlying issue.