10 Most Common Printer Problems and fixation

10 Most Common Printer Problems and fixation.

Despite the promise of a paperless future, it is likely that you still have to type something from time to time. While modern printers are better than printers from the 90s or 2000s, they still don’t seem as smart and reliable as other modern devices. Below are some of the most common printer problems you may encounter, and most of them can be fixed without too much trouble.

1. The Printer Is Offline

At some point, you are about to press the print button and get a message that the printer is not available or connected. Assuming the printer has been set up and working before, you can try this:

Table of Contents Make sure the printer is on and indicates ready without displaying errors. Make sure your connection (USB, Wi-Fi or Bluetooth) is working. Try printing from a different computer, if possible, to determine if the problem is with the computer or the printer. Restart the printer and the device you are trying to print from. Uninstall and then reinstall the software and printer drivers.

In most cases, this will fix a reboot of all devices involved in the print request.

2. Wi-Fi Printing Is Sloooow

Shared Wi-Fi printers are quite popular these days as that means you only need one printer in your home. However, if you are having problems with the Wi-Fi signal, you may run into a situation where your Wi-Fi printer takes a long time to start up, or it even pauses printing in the middle, waiting for its buffer to fill up again.

Wi-Fi signal problems with your printer are no different than problems with any other device, so here are 10 ways to strengthen a weak Wi-Fi signal . You should also see the Troubleshooting Wi-Fi (Wireless) Printers section.

3. â€œGhostâ€ Paper Jams

Unfortunately, ghost jam is not some creepy musical genre. Instead, it happens when the printer reports a paper jam, but after investigating, you cannot find it.

While a technician can correct some of the causes of ghostly jamming, the most common cause is tiny pieces of paper or other debris caught between the rollers.

Open the printer according to the instructions and make sure there is nothing on the casters that you might have missed. If possible, try rolling the paper rollers gently to see if they move freely and anything falls out.

Turn the printer off and on again, or see if a factory reset helps if your printer has this feature. A standard printer reset to factory defaults typically involves unplugging the power cord for 30 seconds and then plugging it back in.

4. Misaligned or Weird-looking Text

This is a problem specific to inkjet printers. Many modern inkjet printers do not have permanent printheads. Instead, every time you insert new cartridges, you also change printheads. While this means you always start with clean nozzles, it also means you need to calibrate the printheads.

Check your printer utility for the head alignment feature. Some printers can do this automatically, while others print a chart, and then you need to choose which text alignment setting looks best. Even if you did the alignment the first time you installed current cartridges, they may drift over time, so it’s worth a try.

5. The Printer Says New Cartridges Are Empty

When you insert new cartridges into the printer, it usually automatically detects that you have done so and resets the ink counter. This is especially true if you are installing new cartridges using the printer utility. Different printers may use different ways to measure ink flow or ink level, but if your printer suddenly reports that its ink tanks are empty when you know it isn’t, start by pulling out the power cable, wait 30 seconds, and then turn the printer back on. switched on.

Also, check your printer utility software to see if there is any manual override.

6.Prints Are Streaky, Wet, or Just Ugly

Assuming you are not using third-party cartridges and printheads, stripy or wet prints are usually an indication that you are using the wrong paper for the selected print mode. For example, if the printer thinks you are using photo paper, but you have plain old copier paper in the tray, it is using the wrong amount of ink and creating a mess.

The answer, of course, is to make sure your paper type and print settings match!

7. Print Colors Look Different Than On-Screen

The science of color is tricky, and getting your print to look like it does on the preview screen is much more difficult than you might think. Professional print publishers use specially calibrated, accurate color screens, tuned to match the same color space as their printers. This ensures that what the designer sees on the screen looks the same as the final print.

Getting a color print that matches the on-screen preview is an unrealistic goal for most home users. However, you can try to find a closer match. First of all, try to preview the operation on a device or screen that has been calibrated at the factory. It is desirable for the display to reproduce about 99% of the sRGB color space. You can also manually calibrate to tweak the screen even better or return it to the exact factory settings.

8. When You Print, Nothing Happens or a PDF Save Dialog Opens

This may take many by surprise, but getting a digital PDF with your printout instead of a paper copy is for a silly reason and it’s easy to fix.

It’s all about the existence of virtual printers. They look like a real printer to your operating system. Windows has a virtual printer called Microsoft Print to PDF, and chances are good that you sent a print request to this printer and not the real one.

Check again that you have selected the correct printer in the print preview. It may happen that your real printer went offline for some reason, and the next available â€œprinterâ€ was moved to the head of the queue, which turned out to be virtual.

9. Print Quality Isnâ€™t What You Expected

If your print looks more like an Ecce Mono than an Ecce Homo, the most likely reason is that the print quality settings were changed by the last person who used the printer and you forgot to check them before printing.

10. Constant Paper Jams

If you think paper jams on every second or third page, the main reason is the paper you are using. If you use paper of poor quality, the wrong thickness, or the wrong texture, you increase the likelihood of problems.

Check again that the paper you are using meets the printer manufacturer’s specifications for quality and type.

Do not load too much paper into the feed tray; make sure the sheets of paper are neatly aligned before placing them in the tray. You can also fan the stack of paper before placing it to make sure none of the pages are sticking together.