Printing & Printing question about Ink consumption

[jonnyb]

We have one of those Epsons All-in One and if you run out of color then you can't print in black. If you never use color and you just want to default to black you can't do this. Epson says that you are always using some color so that it never dries out even though you may never use color.

Bad use of earth's resources. We will get rid of this printer by the way. What is this technology called where you can't use black if the color is out? Or is there such a name?

Also we want to find a reliable printer and don't want to go with Epson or HP. Is there anyone that knows the better printer to buy just for black ink?

Or fax and black ink?

Or all in one with fax that does not have this resource-hog technology?

What about Canon, Brother or Lexmark?

[photolady]

Well, the most cost productive solution, if the user only prints in black in, would be to purchase a laser printer. They've come down in price from a few years ago. I have priced them myself, and some are as cheap as $99-$149.

[jerryctx]

I second photolady's recommendation. However, laser All-In-Ones are expensive. You might get a laser printer only (I have a Samsung that cost about $99 two years ago) and keep your inkjet AIO for fax and copies.

I don't know of a monochrome only inkjet.

Inkjets use ink to cool the printheads. You should never use an inkjet from any manufacturer with empty or missing cartridges. They use a tiny amount of unneeded inks but without they will quickly die an ugly death.

[Doc]

I had the same problem with a Brother all in one machine as I was not using the color ink that often. With that machine I was forced to replace the color ink even if there was ink in the container as there is some sort of timing mechanism.

What I did was get my self an all in one laser device. I bought the Panasonic KX-MB781 for $180 (it is less now). I found it to be a great machine that does all that I need.

Hope this helps.

Doc

[jonnyb]

Thanks for the info. I always wonder about Panasonic though. To me they are an electronics company that makes phones. They used to make nice brick phones and then their phones got crummy. So I am wondering about their printer techology. Don't want to get another printer problem.

[jerryctx]

Doc likes his and I trust his opinion.

Panasonic is like Sony, they make everything (even women's epilators). Sony has a great reputation but even they made thousands of exploding batteries. For both companies, a problem with one product doesn't necessarily reflect on other products.

[jonnyb]

Thanks

[Power Bank]

Jonnyb I had exactly the same problem as you describe. I had a top-notch Epson six colours + black printer which consumed colour inks although I printed in black only. It cost me a fortune in inks. For the very rare occasion I printed in colour, it was just not worth it.
So I GOT RID of it. Best decision; that saved me a packet.

Next I replaced it with an HP LaserJet1320 laser printer. Life is bliss since then. (Also comes in a Network version to connect to more than one computer)
The high capacity ink cartridge is better value for money (prints 6000 copies) and also comes in a dual pack for a better price.

I know you hesitate with HP but in my experience this printer can not be beaten for economy, quality of print and reliability.

Power Bank

[alanb]

I had the same problem with a Brother all in one machine as I was not using the color ink that often. With that machine I was forced to replace the color ink even if there was ink in the container as there is some sort of timing mechanism.

What I did was get my self an all in one laser device. I bought the Panasonic KX-MB781 for $180 (it is less now). I found it to be a great machine that does all that I need.

Hope this helps.

Doc

I have a HP8250 which knows when the ink is past it's sell by date. It is now 2 years old and 2 inks have been replaced. I am informed by the machine that 4 remaining cartridges are out of date and that if I continue to use them, the warranty will invalidated. Since my warranty is out of date I don't care and would like to use them, since they are at least half full.
It allowed me to click OK and continue to print for about a month, but now clicking OK has no effect.
I am now using my old HP 5550. Which incidentally will continue to print when the tri colour cartridge is removed.
Does anyone know how to hack the software so that I can use the 8250.

[jerryctx]

Some (all?) HP printers have separate driver and monitor programs. If you kill the monitor they may work without ckecking ink status. Of course, you wont know when a cartridge needs replacement until the print quality suffers. Sorry I can't tell you the name or location of the monitor. Look through the list of programs that start automatically at boot. Don't delete any programs. Change the name and test.

Your comment about the HP 5550 reminded me that the HP printers which use a combined color cartridge put the print heads in the cartridge. My reference to cooling the print heads do not apply to these printers. They can indeed be used without the color cartridge. Thanks.

[alanb]

Some (all?) HP printers have separate driver and monitor programs. If you kill the monitor they may work without ckecking ink status. Of course, you wont know when a cartridge needs replacement until the print quality suffers. Sorry I can't tell you the name or location of the monitor. Look through the list of programs that start automatically at boot. Don't delete any programs. Change the name and test.

Your comment about the HP 5550 reminded me that the HP printers which use a combined color cartridge put the print heads in the cartridge. My reference to cooling the print heads do not apply to these printers. They can indeed be used without the color cartridge. Thanks.

Thanks,
I have tried making various files .old, but that didn't help.
I need to know the exact location of the monitor.
It could be that the monitor is in a printer chip, or in the head of the cartridge, because when I switch on the printer, before windows has loaded, the printer screen shows that the cartridges are out of date. The info is therefore not sent from the computer, is it?

[jerryctx]

the printer screen shows that the cartridges are out of date

If the message is on a printer screen (rather than on the computer monitor which I assumed) then you are probably correct, logic in the printer is generating the warning.

If there is a way around this problem (other than cartridge replacement) its probably only known to HP personnel and given the warranty issue they probably wont tell. Sorry.

[Power Bank]

My HP model LaserJet 1320 printer has a prgramme called Toolbox which loaded automatically when I switched on my comp. Its function is to display messages about ink levels or paper run-out etc

To identify this toolbox programme and discontinue it, I used "Autoruns" which is an Autostart programme viewer from from *ww.Sysinternals.com (not too different from "Start>>msconfig>> Run" in idea but much more detailed). I then un-ticked the HP Toolbox programme. Since then there are no more messages about the status of ink or paper or paper tray.

In your case alanb if you have an equivalent HP Toolbox programme, it could be the culprit that is stopping you! I am not saying this is the answer for you because we have different machines. But....
If yes, then uncheck the box in the Autoruns list and restart the computer. You may or may not need to remove and reload the ink cartridges before and after restart. If it does not work you can always re-tick the Toolbox prog in the Autoruns.

Hope this helps

Power Bank

[alanb]

Thanks, I'll try it and let you know.

[alanb]

My HP model LaserJet 1320 printer has a prgramme called Toolbox which loaded automatically when I switched on my comp. Its function is to display messages about ink levels or paper run-out etc

To identify this toolbox programme and discontinue it, I used "Autoruns" which is an Autostart programme viewer from from *ww.Sysinternals.com (not too different from "Start>>msconfig>> Run" in idea but much more detailed). I then un-ticked the HP Toolbox programme. Since then there are no more messages about the status of ink or paper or paper tray.

In your case alanb if you have an equivalent HP Toolbox programme, it could be the culprit that is stopping you! I am not saying this is the answer for you because we have different machines. But....
If yes, then uncheck the box in the Autoruns list and restart the computer. You may or may not need to remove and reload the ink cartridges before and after restart. If it does not work you can always re-tick the Toolbox prog in the Autoruns.

Hope this helps

Power Bank

I tried Autoruns, but could not find any reference to Tool box or anything like.
The HP website mentioned below, explained that the only way to correct the problem was to replace the cartridges. I note that they are dated Sept. 2007.
so they last 2 years
So I tried a reset using the following
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...reg_R1002_UKEN

I had already removed the printer, so I plugged it back in, tried to find tools menu, but it locked on "replace caridges". I tried removing all the 4 cartridges, then replaced them. Bingo, back to normal, but then switching off and on, "replace caridges" came back. I removed and replaced the black cartridge and found it was back to normal again. It will continue to work on a print session OK, until I restart.
At least I can use up the ink now.

Hope this can help someone else with the same problem

Thanks for your help