need help! Dell printer spool recovery

OK, so my gf types out and prints a document at my place last night but didn't realize that I didn't have a printer, so then she saved it to her jump drive. However she straight up took the jump drive out and consequently lost her document.

I found the document on my Dell printer spool this morning saying pending so I found where the spool file was and copied it to another location. I then did a google search and tried a few programs to recover the data but none of them can reform the document. At best I get hex digits and such. I'm stuck! And I'm not sure if its because Dell uses a proprietary spool format. Any ideas?

OK, I haven't tried this for a while, and I only did it when I knew I didn't have a printer available.

Can you alter the print (spool) file properties to "print to file" if you can, you should be able to transport and print that.

:)

updates:
I don't have it in my que anymore
but the spool file itself is still in tact

does that change how I go about recovering it?

OK pal,

A bit more information please. It will save me getting back to you later.

1. What operating system.
2. What is your default printer (might be a fax machine or something?)

I will start up a Dell box and disconnect the printer later on and see what I can find out.

Incidentally, did she delete the document? It may still be on your system as a .doc, .txt, .rtf or even a .bak file. Have you looked in your wastebin and in your temporary files?

Cheers,