Is it possible to print in black when the color ink is empty

[chenrp]

Is it possible to print in black when the color ink is empty? I have a BROTHER DCP 130C. I know this problem exists in HP printers too. Is there any way to "fool" the printer, so that she would "think" that there is color?

Thanks in advance

 

[chenrp]

It's all a matter of going into print setup and telling the printer to print Black and White only. You will have to keep the empty color cartridge in the printer.

no. you'w wrong. the printer won't print in black(even if i tell it to print in black and in draft mode) when any of the color cartridges are empty.
i think that i should put a paper on the sensor/ that way the printer would "think" that the cartridg is full.

 

[dixon_pete]

Ya, it's all part of the income model. It's why you can buy a $150 piece of kit for $50. The ink they sell for $20-35 is worth what, like 50 cents?

Have a look at www.zink.com as a possible alternative. I'm not spamming this. Just I had this idea last April of embedded ink and I was pleased to see it actually happening. Will make printing so much simpler and cheaper.

 

[sailer]

It's all a matter of going into print setup and telling the printer to print Black and White only. You will have to keep the empty color cartridge in the printer.

no. you'w wrong. the printer won't print in black(even if i tell it to print in black and in draft mode) when any of the color cartridges are empty.
i think that i should put a paper on the sensor/ that way the printer would "think" that the cartridg is full.

I've had a similar problem with my HP printer. I figured out that I could take the empty cartridge out, wipe off the printing head and stick it back in, after which it would work. Its stupid, but sometimes thats the way the things are.

 

[4Ryan6]

My Epson does the same thing its very irritating and no changing of the settings resolved it, until I changed the culprit cartridge, thats one feature I wish I'd known the Epson carried in its bag of cons.

My older Lexmark didn't do that, but it appears from this thread theres quite a few newer brand named printers on the market today that do exactly the same thing.

 

[sailer]

My older Lexmark didn't do that, but it appears from this thread theres quite a few newer brand named printers on the market today that do exactly the same thing.

I've wondered from time to time if this was a way that companies are fighting back against people who were getting cheap refills of their cartridges instead of buying new expensive ones. I never underestimate companies and their greed for my dollars.

 

[nilepez]

It's all a matter of going into print setup and telling the printer to print Black and White only. You will have to keep the empty color cartridge in the printer.

no. you'w wrong. the printer won't print in black(even if i tell it to print in black and in draft mode) when any of the color cartridges are empty.
i think that i should put a paper on the sensor/ that way the printer would "think" that the cartridg is full.

Probably wouldn't print if you covered the sensor, as it'd think you didn't have a cartridge in at all.

With Epsons, if the one of the ink cartridges is empty it's supposed prevent you from starting print jobs until it's refilled, but I've seen times where it does continue to let you print anyway.

 

[4Ryan6]

I've wondered from time to time if this was a way that companies are fighting back against people who were getting cheap refills of their cartridges instead of buying new expensive ones. I never underestimate companies and their greed for my dollars.

You more than likely nailed it right there!

 

[WizardOZ]

It depends on the brand and model of printer you have.

Some will allow this, but most won't. As was noted in other posts it is all about the money. I don't know of a printer manufacturer that doesn't force you, one way or another, to buy ink cartridges either prematurely or regardless of the nature of the print job you are doing.

I have a Lexmark Z53 and if I don't explicitely specify B&W printing, it will use the colour cartridges even for a job that is B&W / grayscale only. And so it goes.

There was a test done about 2 or 3 years ago on THG that demonstrated that the official ink cartridges from various manufacturers would show the cartridge was empty when it still had enough ink left to print at least 100 pages. This effect was shown to be the result of programmed settings in the firmware of the cartridges and printer. Draw your own conclusions here. You may want to look into the less expensive cartridge refill kits, especially in the case of printers where the cost of replacement cartridges exceeds the cost of a new printer with a complete set of cartridges.

You should also seriously consider the environmental impact implications of this fact of consumer life. Not just from the landfill impact when it is "cheaper" to discard a functional printer and buy a new one, rather than replace the ink cartridges, but from a greenhouse gas generation and consumption of non-renewable resource perspective. Remember, plastic is made from oil. As are parts of the inks used. But the amount of oil used in the plastic of the body of the printer is much grater than the oil in the ink cartridges. Oil used to manufacture plastics is not available for gasoline, etc. And then there's the global warming / climate change issue to consider.

 

[sailer]

It depends on the brand and model of printer you have.

Some will allow this, but most won't. As was noted in other posts it is all about the money. I don't know of a printer manufacturer that doesn't force you, one way or another, to buy ink cartridges either prematurely or regardless of the nature of the print job you are doing.

I have a Lexmark Z53 and if I don't explicitely specify B&W printing, it will use the colour cartridges even for a job that is B&W / grayscale only. And so it goes.

There was a test done about 2 or 3 years ago on THG that demonstrated that the official ink cartridges from various manufacturers would show the cartridge was empty when it still had enough ink left to print at least 100 pages. This effect was shown to be the result of programmed settings in the firmware of the cartridges and printer. Draw your own conclusions here. You may want to look into the less expensive cartridge refill kits, especially in the case of printers where the cost of replacement cartridges exceeds the cost of a new printer with a complete set of cartridges.

You should also seriously consider the environmental impact implications of this fact of consumer life. Not just from the landfill impact when it is "cheaper" to discard a functional printer and buy a new one, rather than replace the ink cartridges, but from a greenhouse gas generation and consumption of non-renewable resource perspective. Remember, plastic is made from oil. As are parts of the inks used. But the amount of oil used in the plastic of the body of the printer is much grater than the oil in the ink cartridges. Oil used to manufacture plastics is not available for gasoline, etc. And then there's the global warming / climate change issue to consider.

All very nice environmental talk, but I really don't see any solution to the problem in what you've written. If you know of a printer that doesn't cause prblems, tell us what it is.

 

[Grimmy]

Just a lil humor here.. Thread kinda reminded me of a commercial for that easy button.

Where the guy says, hey, the printer is out of ink.

The other guy says, well shake it.

So he turn around, places the ink cartridge on the table, picks up the printer and shakes it. :lol:

I do recall HP being picky when one of it's colors starts to run out. Ever since I switch to a cannon printer, it has separate black, the 3 colors, and 2 photo cartridges. I've been out on all the color, and been running off just the black. :lol:

Though I did have to switch it to grey scale, and the printer would start up warning me, but I was still fortunate to be able to print black/white pics/documents.

I do recall an HP I used to have, and remember going out to buy ink when it got to a certain point, and even couldn't print in grey scale.

 

[rupert86]

Printing black when color is empty is not possible on my HP DeskJet 3535 (Its a cheapo). The other way round is possible though: when the black is empty it will combine all 3 colors from the color cartridge to put out a (very dark greenish) black. It works even when the black cartridge is not present.

I simply exhausted the color cartridge and refill it (all 3 partitions) with black marker ink using a syringe. I've got it professionally refilled about 8 times, but now the holes are widening I think, so the precision and quality of output is affected.

The black one rests in friend's printer.

 

[jitpublisher]

Many printers will use all four colors to print black. If the ICC profiles of the printer are set to to build black out of process color, then you have to have ink in the color cartridges to print even black. You MAY be able to get around by first printing the document to PDF, setting the document for grayscale only, and creating a grayscale PDF, then send that to the printer. It might work it, it might not.

 

[WizardOZ]

It depends on the brand and model of printer you have.

Some will allow this, but most won't. As was noted in other posts it is all about the money. I don't know of a printer manufacturer that doesn't force you, one way or another, to buy ink cartridges either prematurely or regardless of the nature of the print job you are doing.

I have a Lexmark Z53 and if I don't explicitely specify B&W printing, it will use the colour cartridges even for a job that is B&W / grayscale only. And so it goes.

There was a test done about 2 or 3 years ago on THG that demonstrated that the official ink cartridges from various manufacturers would show the cartridge was empty when it still had enough ink left to print at least 100 pages. This effect was shown to be the result of programmed settings in the firmware of the cartridges and printer. Draw your own conclusions here. You may want to look into the less expensive cartridge refill kits, especially in the case of printers where the cost of replacement cartridges exceeds the cost of a new printer with a complete set of cartridges.

You should also seriously consider the environmental impact implications of this fact of consumer life. Not just from the landfill impact when it is "cheaper" to discard a functional printer and buy a new one, rather than replace the ink cartridges, but from a greenhouse gas generation and consumption of non-renewable resource perspective. Remember, plastic is made from oil. As are parts of the inks used. But the amount of oil used in the plastic of the body of the printer is much grater than the oil in the ink cartridges. Oil used to manufacture plastics is not available for gasoline, etc. And then there's the global warming / climate change issue to consider.

All very nice environmental talk, but I really don't see any solution to the problem in what you've written. If you know of a printer that doesn't cause prblems, tell us what it is.

Well dude, there are three responses to your "observation"

1) I can only legitimately discuss equipment that I have actually used / own. Anything else is an outright lie. I'm sorry, but I am not interested in lying.

2) read the Fu**ing Manual. Both printed and online versions. For good measure, go to the manufacturers web-site. Odds are, none of these will address the issue raised by the OP. I know that my Lexmark Z53 documentation didn't. And, having read manuals from HP, Epson and Cannon, their documentation or web-sites are no better. They are all out there to sell you more new (very expensive) ink cartridges. This leaves us with the clasic trial and error appraoch. AKA "lets try it and see what happens". Since I don't own every single Ink-jet printer out there, or ever manufactured, all I can do is make some semi-general comments and offer up direct experience with the actual devices I have. Do you really want me to lie, not only to the OP, but to everyone else? OK, I'll lie to you: you are extremely brilliant, charming, gorgeous, sexy (to the point you make me drool), and wise and perceptive in your comments. Should I lie some more?

3) Ink jet printers are an amusing and wasteful prduct line. At the bottom to lower midrange end, it is cheaper to repalce the ink cartridges by discarding the old printer and buying a new one. On top of which, the new, bottom end device is likely to have more feratures and better performance than the old one did. In the midle of the range, it is cheaper to buy new cartridges, given the price andf performance of the printer than it is to replace the printer as above. Bit this is only true if the specific printer continues to offer specific advantages. But the life span of such products is limited. At teh very top end / speciallized printer category, thereis no question - replace the dead cartridges.

As for Environmental Impact issues, I think it is better to get the more expensive printers where it makes economic sense to repalace only the cartrideges. Mind you, it is up to us consumers to push for this stuff, but I don't see it happening, especially in the US.
Your comment was stupid and shallow. The truth of my comment is found in teh length of my reply - due to the need to repeat basic economic and performance facts of life.

I am sortry that my post didn't giove ou that warm and fuzzy feelimg. This is the most fundamental issuie with ink-jet printers. They provide stunning imager quality, but are extremely expensive to run, especially at the low end op the price scale. On both a performance and environmental level.

And the reason you niether know or grasp this fact is?

Get a grip.

 

[sailer]

I am sortry that my post didn't giove ou that warm and fuzzy feelimg. This is the most fundamental issuie with ink-jet printers. They provide stunning imager quality, but are extremely expensive to run, especially at the low end op the price scale. On both a performance and environmental level.

And the reason you niether know or grasp this fact is?

Get a grip.

I wasn't asking for any warm and fuzzy feelings. I was asking for a solution, like the name of a printer which does not pose the problem. It seems to me that you have a chip on your shoulder for some unknown reason. You talk a lot without giving answers and then get angry when someone questions you. Instead of complaining about the problem, try thinking of a solution. That would be better for you and everyone else, and even the environment that you said we're destroying.

 

[WizardOZ]

I am sortry that my post didn't giove ou that warm and fuzzy feelimg. This is the most fundamental issuie with ink-jet printers. They provide stunning imager quality, but are extremely expensive to run, especially at the low end op the price scale. On both a performance and environmental level.

And the reason you niether know or grasp this fact is?

Get a grip.

I wasn't asking for any warm and fuzzy feelings. I was asking for a solution, like the name of a printer which does not pose the problem. It seems to me that you have a chip on your shoulder for some unknown reason. You talk a lot without giving answers and then get angry when someone questions you. Instead of complaining about the problem, try thinking of a solution. That would be better for you and everyone else, and even the environment that you said we're destroying.

Umm..., yes you were asking for "warm and fuzzies". My original post, typos and all, did answer the OP's and your question. But, since you didn't like /want to hear it and are - again - trying to blame the messenger, I will say it again. More explicitely for those as thick and inattentive as you show yourself to be.

These are the cold, hard facts of life:

1) ALL inkjet printer manufacturers make the bulk of their profit on the replacement cartridges they sell the user.

2) WRT the bottom-end inkjet printers, it is cheaper to buy another new printer (which includes a set of ink cartridges) than to buy an appropriate set of replacement cartridges. If you think I am blowing smoke, just go to your local Staples, BestBuy, etc and compare prices of repalcement cartridges vs new, same-model, bottom-end printer. Note that newer revs will have more and improved "features". You will be most unhappy. I remind you of the environmental implications of this.

3) I have enough experience with the assorted brands, both as a user and in the context of working for a computer consultant to say unequivacally that I don't know of a single printer manufacturer where the price of replacement ink cartridges isn't an outrageous scam.

4) THG did a little study of this issue some time ago. As I noted in my original post, they found that major manufacturers had actually gimmicked their cartridges to read as empty when they weren't. To the extent of up to 15%. Which part of this wasn't clear?

5) One has two options: keep buying the manufacturers cartridges, or get any one of the refill kits available on the market.

The "solution" you are demanding is a cheap, low-end colour laser printer. But, tragically, these only offer a 600 x 600 DPI resolution at best, far below what even some of the bottom end ink-jets are capable of. A significant issue for applications like photo printing.

So, I have provided a solution, and it isn't what you and the OP wanted to hear. Too Bad, So Sad, but there you have it - another beuatiful theory destroyed by an ugly little fact. Effing well deal with it. As I state explicitely in my signature: There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch (TANSTAAFL).

Look it up, you foolish Bozo.

 

[sailer]

The "solution" you are demanding is a cheap, low-end colour laser printer. But, tragically, these only offer a 600 x 600 DPI resolution at best, far below what even some of the bottom end ink-jets are capable of. A significant issue for applications like photo printing.

So, I have provided a solution, and it isn't what you and the OP wanted to hear. Too Bad, So Sad, but there you have it - another beuatiful theory destroyed by an ugly little fact. Effing well deal with it. As I state explicitely in my signature: There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch (TANSTAAFL).

Look it up, you foolish Bozo.

So, there is no solution to the problem for those who want high quality prints. Therefore, all the rest that you have to say doesn't matter. The problem is real concerning the refills, but nothing better exists, so we are stuck with it for now. You have had a good rant. Feel better?

 

[4Ryan6]

That dudes an ass! :roll:

 

[sailer]

That dudes an ass! :roll:

He does seem intent on qualifying for that award.

 

[WizardOZ]

That dudes an ass! :roll:

He does seem intent on qualifying for that award.

I can't help wondering who is the "ass" here.

The one who refuses to acknowledge and deal with reality, and is demanding a non-existant free lunch solution?

Or the one who is telling it like it is?

One more question: who is the stupid one here - the one who refuses to accept and deal with reality or the one who is familiar with and trying to explain reality?

One more time:

ALL reviews, tests and analyses of inkjet printers conceede that they are very expensive to run, the costs of repalcement cartrifges are exhorbitant, and the printer manufacturers have gimmicked their cartridges to force premature repalcement of same.

The refill kits work OK, but are not the same quality as OEM cartridges, by and large. There are only extremely limited mechanisms available to "fool" the printer into operating in black and white mode when the colour cartridge is empty or dead.

Generally speaking, inkjet printers are the equipment of choice for the very highest quality output. Even the lowest priced inkjets can outperform even the lower priced upper end colur laser (or equivalent) printers in terms of DPI resolution. There are exceptions. Note that not even the highest end mass-market non-ink-jet colour printers are claiming to be capable of "photo-resolution" (see Cannon Pixma printers for contrast) performance.

And FYI, the top-end performance range colour laser / equivalent consumer printers start at prices of around $5,000.00. Which is at least 5 times more expensive than the top-end large-format capable inkjet printers. And the cost of toner cartridges for the high end laser printers is around one or two kilobucks (and higher, depending on the device).

Sailer and 4ryan6 are, in fact the asses here.

They are not interested in dealing with or accepting reality, and are attempting to hide this by attacking someone who tells them what they don't want to hear. This is behaviour and performance typical of especially bratty and immature adolescents. Having 10+ years experience as a Scout leader, dealing with children between aqe 6 and 19, I say with 100% assurance that these two posters are, on their very best day, incapable of performing at a mental or emotional level higher than 15 years old, regardless of what their actual chronological age may be.

I'd pity da fools, except that both actually do know better.

 

[BustedSony]

A few older printers could print black and white INSTEAD of colour, it was a choice of which cartridges were used.

Eveything else aside, if a print head tries to print without any ink it will become damaged or burn out, so there has to be a margin to assure the cartridge is not dry. With Kodak introducing printers that use far cheaper ink than the others it is possible that there will be a price war with consumable prices finally becoming more reasonable.

The best non-branded ink seems to be Q-ink, there are some colour differences but it is not subject to the excessive ink or clogging other cheap inks seem to cause.

 

[4Ryan6]

What the hell are you posting all that crap for?

You trying to ward us all away from using printers?

We don't need a printer history lesson, we need the original problems solved, if you don't have a solution STFU!

 

[sailer]

What the hell are you posting all that crap for?

You trying to ward us all away from using printers?

We don't need a printer history lesson, we need the original problems solved, if you don't have a solution STFU!

I wonder if this guy should be reported for obnoxious and irrelevant behavior, or perhaps a bit of insanity? Baron seems quite enjoyable in comparrison.

Oh yes, I've used all sorts of printers, dating back to daisy wheels and the original dox matrix types. The new ones might be a bit expensive on the refills, but I wouldn't go back to those old things for any reason.

 

[croc]

I can answer to that... Epson stylus photo rx510 will print b&w, color, anything, with NO ink as long as the cartridges are installed. Someday maybe I'll pull out the color cart.'s and see what happens.

I am sure that it was an oversight on Epson's part, so I haven't updated the firmware...

Its been my contention for some time that printer MFG's should just give us the printer, then get their money through the consumables.

 

[BustedSony]

I can answer to that... Epson stylus photo rx510 will print b&w, color, anything, with NO ink as long as the cartridges are installed. Someday maybe I'll pull out the color cart.'s and see what happens.

I am sure that it was an oversight on Epson's part, so I haven't updated the firmware...

Its been my contention for some time that printer MFG's should just give us the printer, then get their money through the consumables.

The rx200 sure won't print if it considers the ink low!

The printers are free now anyway, we're paying for the ink and manual, if that. Buying a cellphone package is the same way. No, I think we should pay cost plus markup for the printer, THEN pay less for ink.