How Can I Remove Stubborn Old Printers from Group Policy?

Have you tried running the command 'gpupdate /force'? While it feels redundant, sometimes forcing a refresh can help with issues related to GPOs, even if it's frustrating when it doesn't work. Some users have had luck with restarting the print spooler and then trying to delete it with elevated PowerShell.

It sounds like the problem might be tied to the print drivers. Sometimes, orphaned records can mess things up. If your old print server is still running, try re-adding the printers and then removing them again. If that’s not an option, you could set up an alias for the old server pointing to the new one in DNS, or install the driver locally on the problematic machine to see if that helps in removing the old listings. Sharing any screenshots from the control panel could also help us diagnose further!

Unfortunately, when you're running under the SYSTEM account, you can't remove a user's mapped printers directly. That's why users experience access denied errors. If they connect to the print server manually, they can delete it without any issues, but GPO is the sticking point. It's frustrating that the Delete command isn't working as it should.

Stopping the printer spool service might give you a brief window to remove the printer using elevated PowerShell. It can sometimes clear up those stuck connections, allowing you to finally get rid of the printers.