THE NEWS IN PRINT

Your old printer is completely worthless; why not do what these guys did and entertain yourself by attacking it? Just think of all of those times that it drove you to the brink of insanity with paper jams, low ink jet cartridges and slow printing. Do you really want to show it the mercy of a recycling center? Of course not. You want to kick it, torch it, shoot it or find some other creative way to destroy the bane of your life!

You'll have a difficult time being original though; the people who have come before you have set the bar high as they raged against their machines. Here are 25 ways to make that printer pay for what it put you through. Bookmark it should you ever need to vent your frustration!

It can get pretty annoying to see maintenance messages appear on any printer; especially laser printers which needs to be maintained and conditioned periodically.

Here is a small set of actions to perform in order to remove the maintenance message(count) that appear on your HP multi-function laser printers:

1. Restart the printer
2. Press and hold the Select button which sets the memory count
3. Continue to hold until all the LEDs (three) on the top panel are lit up
4. Release the Select button
5. This brings in a new set of menu; use the up arrow navigation key to scroll up to New Maintenance Kit option
6. Hit the Select key to reset the maintenance count
7. New Maintenance message appears indicating that the maintenance count has been reset

The maintenance count reset operation works on HP LaserJet 4100MFP, 4101MFP, 4200, 4250, 4300, 4350 and 9000.

The above mentioned operations are to be performed if you are sure that the HP laser MFPs is well maintained; and just to remove the message and nothing more. If you are unsure about the status of maintenance, it is advised to get it checked by HP technicians.

Laser printers do need regular maintenances. Follow instructions as per the service manual provided by HP.

I have calibrated some of the measuring instruments I own but have never heard of calibrating a printer. I came across a blog post by Alpha Murgev who I assume is a photographer. She recommends that the monitor and printer be calibrated before photos are printed using a photo printer at home. I remember having a conversation with a friend who is an amateur photographer. He told me that he doesn't like to print photos at home as the colours obtained on paper are far from what is captured. He prefers to have them printed at a local studio. This is one post that I definitely would like to share with him and all our readers on Cartridge Save The News in Print blog.

Alpha recommends calibrating the monitor before heading for the printer. After all, we see before we print.

The printer calibration involves printing a blank page on a blank piece of photo paper. If the printer isn't calibrated properly, a few colours should be visible on the print-out. If the colours are visible, the colours can be adjusted by trial-and-error method until the slate is blank. If no colours are observed on your printer when you print the blank page, your printer is calibrated and good to go.

Alpha also provides the opposite colours for each colour which is extremely helpful for all photo and graphic enthusiasts. By adding amounts of opposite colour, the intensity of original colour reduces. I could probably use this tip on some of the images I mess with. Here it is for reference:

For reference, the colour wheel goes:

- Red is at one end of the scale, and Cyan is its opposite;
- Green is at one end of the scale, and Magenta is its opposite; and
- Blue is at one end of the scale, and Yellow is its opposite.

So, if you want to lessen a blue colour cast, add more yellow.

I have previously written about the need for printer friendly pages on websites that carry content in the form of articles. While the printer friendly pages serve those interested in data only, it does not do any good to the designer who would have spent his creative bit on the looks and feel of the website. Also, it might not be the best if a user likes to print with the banner, styles and the fonts used on the website.

Suppose a user gets on a website and directly hits print; depending on the size of the website, the content along with the styles get printed. If the website is too wide or if the printer drivers are unable to recognise some of the functions used, the output will definitely not be as desired. It either spreads out onto multiple pages with abrupt divisions in the middle of a page.

I found a solution on Tim Almond's website which helped me print a few pages in its original form.

One solution is to go into the pages, remove the reference to the print style sheets and go again.

However, there is a less intrusive alternative (it requires Firefox to install).

1. Install Chris Pederick's Web Developer Add-On. Go to the web developer plug-in download site and choose Install Now. Once installed, you'll need to restart Firefox. You will now have a new toolbar.
2. Choose the CSS button on the new toolbar, the Disable Styles menu and Print Styles submenu.

Let me reveal a little secret of mine. I used to be a web designer before I started working as a quality specialist cum blogger. One of the things that I strongly stood for is Mozilla Firefox and at the same time, detested Internet Explorer. I have had nightmares designing websites to be compatible with IE. Firefox was sweet, simple and uncomplicated. Also, the Mozilla browser offered umpteen number of features that were unmatched by any other browser.

Firefox allows you to add a custom message either in the footer or in the header. You could write anything under the sun that you wish for. If you are using a common printer at office, one could easily identify and segregate his prints from others by adding his name in the print-outs.

You can enable the option of adding a custom message by following these actions:

- Click on the File menu

- Click on Page Setup

- Select Margins & Header/Footer tab

- Use the dropdown menu and select Custom to print the message of your choice

Maybe there could be different applications using the custom message feature. If you think of any, let us know.

via Mozilla Links