laser-printer interview questions
Top laser-printer frequently asked interview questions
We've just replaced the toner cartridge of our Brother MFC7360N, but the printer keeps displaying the message replace toner, what should I do?
Source: (StackOverflow)
I have an FSP EP1000 UPS.
The User's Manual says:
CAUTION: NEVER connect a laser printer or scanner to the UPS unit.
This may cause the damage of the unit.
Why is this restriction?
Source: (StackOverflow)
In every laser printer I have ever used, when toner is running out, it becomes evident on the left hand side of the page before it becomes evident on the right side of the page.
The printed matter always, without fail, appears lighter on the left first.
Why?
Source: (StackOverflow)
My Brother 1210w 'bends' the paper that comes from it. It seems to deform the paper due to heat: printing more pages yields higher deformation.
Is this a common issue? Did I get the wrong printer? Is my printer defective?
Can this be mitigated/solved with a different paper?
Source: (StackOverflow)
I have an HP LaserJet M175nw laser printer which goes into sleep-mode after 10 minutes of non-use. I know sleep-mode uses a very small amount of power, but the flashing light on the control panel is driving me nuts. I know I can turn-off the printer via the on/off button, but when it is turned on manually, there is some whirring sound which I guess might be the machine warming-up.
Is any toner used during this warm-up (or cleaning) cycle? Am I better-off keeping the printer in sleep mode, or is it OK to turn off manually?
Source: (StackOverflow)
I need to print a large number of letter sized pages. Each of these pages will have very little text (e.g. serial no.). I will be using a mono laser printer (probably Lexmark T654). The page volume may exceed the printer's monthly duty cycle (300k).
Is there any driver or printer setting that will help reduce mechanical damage and let me print beyond max duty cycle (by resetting the counter of course)?
Source: (StackOverflow)
At an office where I work, there is a Samsung CLP-310 laser printer:
The staff turn this off every evening. Right off -using the hard power switch on the back. They are trying to reduce their impact on the environment, but it doesn't make much difference (we have cheap, environmentally-friendly hydroelectricity), and this just causes a lot of inconvenience in the mornings.
The printer has no power over night and, it seems, is forced to run extra maintenance routines when it is turned back on the next day. I am not convinced that fully disconnecting it from the power every single day is such a good idea- as takes much longer to start printing in the mornings, and probably wastes toner when performing these extra warming-up/calibration steps.
In addition, people in the morning often have to wait a much longer time to retrieve their documents, as they usually only discover the printer is still turned off at the back when they walk up to it to pick up their work.
We are based in Vancouver, where electricity is cheap (only $0.069/kW.h).
The printer uses only 10W in standby, which works out as $0.00069/hour here. To save a single Canadian dollar, they would need to turn this device off for nearly 1,500 hours.
To put it another way: this printer is on 12 hours a day, for 6 days a week. That leaves 96 hours/week that they don't use it, or 4992 hours per year.
4992 hours x $0.00069 = $3.45 savings per year (before you take into consideration the cost of extra power and toner used when powering up from a cold start 312 times per year).
They have 2 other printers (one inkjet, one laser), but always leave them on standby. The reason? There is no green standby LED on the other printers so, psychologically, they feel like the other printers don't use power in standby mode. Not to mention, they have a big domain controller (4 internal drives) and a print server, that are both on 24/7, as well as 25 PC which are always on standby (Wake on LAN enabled, used for LogMeIn). What's an extra 10 Watts, if it makes peoples lives easier every morning?
Oh... and in the winter they put a couple of electric heaters on to keep staff warm at their desks. 1,500W each!
I am considering recommending that they stop shutting this printer down all the time using the main power switch as it wasn't designed to be used that way. This will stop staff having to wait around for their documents every morning. Waiting 2 minutes extra per day adds up to 8 hours per year. That's 8 hours of waiting, for $3.45 (or less) in electricity savings.
Is this a reasonable suggestion to make given the circumstances?
Source: (StackOverflow)
I am refilling a laser printer with cheaper toner bought in a bottle. It was suggested to not overfill. Are there any dangers to overfilling?
Can it damage the carthridge or printer? Produce blackened pages? Increase amount of powder used per page?
I am refilling my laser printer Samsung CLP 365. Toner supplier attached some not very impressive instructions paper that looks like just copied off google frankly. (Not in english)
It says toner cartridge should be refilled with a pre-measured amount to only half the cartridge capacity. Is this really necessary? I cannot find any instructions on the internet that also say that. There are many videos on YouTube showing how refilling is done, neither mentions it.
Source: (StackOverflow)
I've got a feeling that my laser printer's drum could be wearing out. I just printed a fully black page as a test, and this is the result:
Click here for high resolution
Note a small degree of horizontal banding as well as overall image "roughness". Is this patterning normal, or is the drum wearing out? Do I need to replace the drum? (I've printed less than 4000 pages on this drum unit.)
Edit: The printer is a Brother HL-2170W. It is nearly three years old and was purchased refurbished; the supplied drum unit has a specified yield of 10,800 pages. The drum was never replaced, and the toner cartridge has 70% of its life remaining. All supplies used in this printer are genuine Brother supplies. I've cleaned the OPC drum itself with minimal improvement, and I've cleaned the corona wire as well. Could the failure be related to the age of the drum unit?
Edit 2: Blank pages are clean and printouts are free of repeating extraneous marks.
Source: (StackOverflow)
What are the possible risks associated with refilling and/or using refilled laser printer toner cartridges? How can I mitigate them?
Source: (StackOverflow)
Has anyone got a good list of the costs of running colour laser printers, both for colour and black that take into account different usage volumes.
E.g if the dram needs replacing after 20,000 pages, but I am only do 10,000 in the next 3 years, I don’t care about the cost of a new dram.
So a simple “cost per page” figure is each printer is not good enough to be useful in real life.
(A spread sheet / website that I could type my own usage values into would be great.)
Source: (StackOverflow)
I have a Samsung CLP-620ND printer that has suddenly started making loud grinding noises every time it prints. It also blurs parts of the printouts most of the time as though something is smearing the toner prior to the paper reaching the fuser.
The service manual for this model of printer does not seem to cover noise, and the print quality troubleshooting in this manual does not seem to describe the problem. One review of the printer (that I can no longer find) suggested that the problem might be the paper transfer belt. Before I spend $130+ on a new paper transfer belt, I'd like to know if anyone agrees with this assessment.
What are the likely causes of this problem? How can I fix it? Are there parts I will need to replace?
Source: (StackOverflow)
I have a Samsung ML-1640 laser printer with the starter toner cartridge (that was in it when I bought it).
I also bought a toner refill kit and performed the refill. Worked great for 20-30 pages, printer then stopped, because the toner cartridge has reached its maximum page count ("Toner Exhausted" - red LED).
If you buy a new toner for the printer, it will have a chip on it, that limits it to xxxx pages printed, before the printer will refuse to use the toner cartridge any longer. So if you refill that toner cartridge, you need to reset the chip (an easy operation from what I can see on youtube).
However - I have the starter cartridge, and that does not have the chip, so I cannot reset it. - but still refuses to use the toner. It would seem there is a different kind of reset mechanism, that needs to be done.
How can I make my printer use the starter cartridge again?
Edit:
Some guides around the interwebs mention a method where you short two lets on a chip while powering it on. It is however a poor google translation from Russian, so it is barely understandable. http://www.scribd.com/doc/45791992/how-to-reset-page-counter-in-Samsung-ML-1640-1641-1645-2240-2241
I tried it and it does not work.
Source: (StackOverflow)
I'm printer newbie. I have 2 models of Fuji Xerox printer: CP105b and Phaser 3124
When using CP105b for hundreds of printing output, the black toner level warning LED blinking. I refilled it with good toner powder until nearly full, and trying to continue printing. But the LED keeps blinking, even after I power off and on the printer. I just ignored the warning and print as usual.
After about 45 pages printed, a dialog box appeared force me to replace the cartridge, even the cartridge still has lots of toner powder. Apparently this printer model come with fake toner level warning.
Note: Some people told me, HP printers also comes with fake toner level warning. HP printers have memory which remember the cartridge serial number. It can remember only 2 different cartridge serial number.
So in order to reset HP printers memory, just use 3 different cartridge. When we use the third cartridge, the first cartridge serial number has been deleted.
How about Fuji Xerox? How to reset the memory?
Source: (StackOverflow)
How can I clean up the internal parts of my Samsung laser printer ML-1665? The printer was ok, but after stopping to use it for quite too long, it started smudging paper. I thought it was the toner, so I replaced it with another brand new, original unit. Since then printing is way better, but some spots still remain, see pictures below. I think the damaged toner just leaked to the printer and now I need to find the right pieces that need a cleanup.
Replacing the drum seems an alternative, but what is the drum exactly? Is it available from Samsung for this old model? How can I replace it myself, in case I go for this option?
Spotted document sample
What should I clean up here?
Detail of spotted piece
Source: (StackOverflow)