A Data Collection Agent (DCA) that is offline or checking in late has stopped uploading meters, supplies, and alerts. Every device behind that DCA will go stale until communication is restored.
Start Here: The DCA Health Page
Most causes can be identified in under a minute from the host machine itself.
On the computer where the DCA is installed, open a browser to localhost:1301.
Review the four communication checks. A green dot means that check is passing.
Use the result to jump to the right section below:
Device was Off, Asleep, or Off the Network
The page does not load: the DCA service is not running. See The Print Tracker Pro Watcher Service Has Stopped.
The page loads but one or more checks are red: see Blocked Network Communication.
Cause 1: The Host Computer Is Off, Asleep, or Off the Network
The DCA can only collect data while its host machine is powered on and connected to the same network as the printers. This is the single most common reason for an install to go quiet.
Check that the host machine is powered on, awake, and on the customer network. Also confirm the machine has not been decommissioned or repurposed, which happens more often than you would expect.
Avoid installing the DCA on a laptop. Laptops are taken off the network, carried home at nights and weekends, and put into sleep mode. Data accuracy depends on the agent being online as much as possible. A server or an always-on desktop is strongly preferred. If a laptop is the only option available, expect gaps in collection.
Cause 2: The Print Tracker Pro Watcher Service Has Stopped
The DCA runs as a Windows service named Print Tracker Pro Watcher. If that service stops, because of a Windows update, a resource limitation, or a permissions issue, the DCA stops checking in and meters stop uploading.
Check the service status
On the host machine, press Windows + R, type
services.msc, and press Enter.Scroll to Print Tracker Pro Watcher in the list.
Check the Status column. If it is blank or reads "Stopped," the service needs to be restarted.
A healthy service looks like this, with a status of Running and a startup type of Automatic.
Start the service
Right-click Print Tracker Pro Watcher and select Start.
If it fails to start, right-click it again, choose Properties, open the Log On tab, and verify the service has a valid account with permission to run.
Allow 5 to 10 minutes for the DCA to check in and resume uploading meters.
Configure the service to restart automatically
Do this while you are already in the Services window. It prevents a single stop from turning into days of lost data.
Right-click Print Tracker Pro Watcher, choose Properties, and open the Recovery tab.
Set First failure, Second failure, and Subsequent failures all to Restart the Service.
Set the reset fail count interval to 1 day.
Click Apply, then OK.
If the service keeps stopping
If the service starts but stops again within a short time, something else is causing it:
Confirm that antivirus or EDR software is not terminating the
printtrackerpro.exeprocess. See Antivirus or EDR Software Blocking the DCA for exclusion steps.Confirm the host machine has adequate free memory. At least 1 GB free is recommended, and the DCA host should meet the published system requirements.
Reinstall the DCA using the latest installer from printtrackerpro.com/download. A reinstall preserves the entity registration.
Cause 3: Print Tracker Processes Are Missing or Being Terminated
For the DCA to run, the host computer needs two processes running:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Print Tracker Pro\printtrackerpro.exeC:\Program Files (x86)\Print Tracker Pro\ptpwatcher.exe
Both should appear in Task Manager:
If either file is missing from the installation folder, an antivirus or anti-malware program has almost certainly quarantined it. Add the exclusions described in Antivirus or EDR Software Blocking the DCA, restore the quarantined files or reinstall, and then restart the service.
Cause 4: Blocked Network Communication
If the processes are running but the health page shows failed checks, the problem is usually the customer's network security, firewall, or a change in proxy server.
Print Tracker does not require port forwarding or any special networking configuration. All traffic leaving the agent is encrypted with TLS. The DCA does need outbound access to the following:
Allow the entire *.printtrackerpro.com domain where possible. If you allow only individual hostnames, you will need to revisit the network configuration whenever Print Tracker adds a service.
Add the nested wildcard *.remotetechnician.printtrackerpro.com explicitly as well. Some firewall and proxy allowlist products do not treat *.printtrackerpro.com as matching a nested subdomain such as device.remotetechnician.printtrackerpro.com.
Domain | Protocol | Port | Purpose |
dcam.printtrackerpro.com | gRPC streaming (HTTP/2 transport) | 443 | Receive jobs, upload meters, fire alerts. This is the main URL. |
csr.printtrackerpro.com | gRPC (HTTP/2 transport) | 443 | Register the agent under the entity you configure. |
hc.printtrackerpro.com | HTTP | 443 | Report agent health status. |
HTTP | 443 | Automatically upgrade the agent and its data gathering instructions. | |
HTTP | 443 | Download Chromium, used for web-based data collection. | |
remotetechnician.printtrackerpro.com | HTTPS / secure WebSocket (HTTP/1.1 upgrade) | 443 | Remote access to device embedded web servers, if the feature is enabled. The agent opens an outbound tunnel on demand, and technicians reach each device through its own HTTPS subdomain. |
Remote Technician is outbound only. It does not require an inbound firewall rule, a NAT rule, port forwarding, or customer-side port 7000. Outbound TLS on TCP 443 must permit WebSocket upgrades and long-lived connections. Proxies or firewalls that block or strip the HTTP Upgrade header can prevent Remote Technician from working.
If You Cannot Get the DCA Back Online
When remote troubleshooting is exhausted, the options are:
Have someone on-site assist with getting the existing DCA back online.
Have someone on-site uninstall, reboot, and perform a clean reinstall on the original host computer.
Deploy a new DCA on a different host, preferably a server or desktop that is normally online. Agents registered with the same datalink code cluster automatically and de-duplicate their data, so this is safe to do alongside the existing install.
Monitor the devices with a Print Tracker Cube, a small always-on appliance that removes the dependency on a customer PC.
Contacting Support
If the DCA still will not come online, contact Print Tracker support with:
The install name and the entity it belongs to
The DCA version shown in Web Admin under Installs
The host machine OS version and available memory
A screenshot of the localhost:1301 health page
Windows Event Log entries from the Application or System log around the time the service stopped
The name of any antivirus or endpoint security software on the machine