Hot printer tips
More inkjet caveats:Store old but usable cartridges in Ziploc bags or something else relatively airtight. Stick to using the paper recommended by your printer manufacturer (if you don't know what to use, go with the standard 20-pound copier paper); also never mix paper types in the same batch, and be careful about setting your paper guides, as many inkjet printers are rather flimsy. Keep the inside of the printer clean, using tweezers and canned air to clear out the debris and gook from the inside. Lastly, if your printer maker posts new printer drivers for your particular model, download and use them.
Clean the nozzles of your inkjet printer periodically.
Each printer's software has you perform this task differently, but however you do it, do it at least once every few weeks, particularly if your printer sits unused for stretches of time. The printer "blows" ink through the nozzles to remove dried and gunked-up ink; it may seem wasteful, but you save in the long run by not having to replace half-used cartridges.
You should run your ink jet printer's cartridge-cleaning utility fairly regularly.
Don't wait until print quality starts to degrade. Most printer software comes with self-test features under the Properties\Utilities section of their main screens; run the tests and see for yourself if the test produces less-than-excellent results. Run the cleaning utility and run the test page program again. Really badly clogged cartridges may need multiple runs of the cleaning utility. The downside: the cleaning process uses a disproportionate amount of ink, so running the utility without need wastes ink.
If you frequently print documents
using different printer settings, such as black and white drafts versus color documents, you're probably getting tired of changing these settings each time you print. You can avoid this busywork by tricking Windows into thinking you have two different printers. "Install" the same printer twice, then set the Properties for each to match your most commonly used settings. From then on, the only setting change you'll have to make is selecting the printer you want to use. To "install" your printer again, select Start, Settings, Printers and click Add Printer. Follow along with the installation instructions, and when asked, opt to keep the existing driver. Also, be sure to give this "second" printer an appropriate name, such as Color Docs. When the installation is complete, you'll see two different printer icons in the Printers window. To adjust their properties, one at a time, right-click an icon, select Properties, and so on. The next time you want to print a document, select the application's Print command, select a printer in the resulting dialog box, and click OK.
For lots of extra info about printing, consult your Windows CD.
Drill down to the \OTHER\MISC\EPTS folder, double-click EPTS.EXE, and the Enhanced Printer Troubleshooter appears. Follow along, answering the questions it asks, and with luck, you'll find a solution.
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