Prints comming out over saturated: A friend says her HP Photosmart 5520 is printing pics that are very vivid, oversaturated. HP told her when the carts are below 50 percent, they...

sabrejet

A friend says her HP Photosmart 5520 is printing pics that are very vivid, oversaturated. HP told her when the carts are below 50 percent, they should be replaced. I have never heard this for any printer. Any thoughts? Thank you for your help.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

It's probably the difference between the way it looks on the monitor and the printer.
Old monitor???
My monitors are not calibrated, but none of my images come out over-saturated on the printer.

(Below 50% capacity, chuck the cartridge???

Tech had no idea what to tell you,!!!

I'd chuck the tech support........

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

sabrejet wrote:

A friend says her HP Photosmart 5520 is printing pics that are very vivid, oversaturated. HP told her when the carts are below 50 percent, they should be replaced. I have never heard this for any printer. Any thoughts? Thank you for your help.

Is she using printer profiles (called ICC profiles) for the paper she is printing on? This could help. It could also be her editing or her monitor. Many variable. I would certainly never purchase any printer where I had to throw away half full cartridges.

Say Cheese Loc: Eastern PA

It sounds the same as if your cars mechanic tells you the fuel tank must be over half full or it will not run correctly. Bunch of nonsense.

pecohen Loc: Central Maine

Say Cheese wrote:

It sounds the same as if your cars mechanic tells you the fuel tank must be over half full or it will not run correctly. Bunch of nonsense.

That one is mostly nonsense but at least historically it was once good advice. In a cold climate, a car sitting outside for an extended period of time with a fairly empty tank of gas could start to run quite poorly. The problem was the condensation of water vapor above the level of the gasoline resulting in water contamination of the gasoline. There was an additive called dry-gas that fixed the problem; it seems to have been just a container of alcohol that would mix with the water droplets so the foreign droplets would behave much the same as the gasoline.

Today, gas tanks are sealed more tightly and don't let fresh air in so that reduces the problem somewhat. More significantly, most gasoline you can buy now comes with alcohol mixed in and that alcohol will let the droplets of water+alcohol ignite.

cjc2 Loc: Hellertown PA

I would NEVER replace an ink cartridge at 50% unless there were some specific problem with that cartridge. What a way to make money, and what a knucklehead tech! The ONLY reason I would consider this would be if the cartridge were very much out of date. In my experience, when this condition presents, the user usually has BOTH the software AND the printer controlling color. I would strongly suggest reading and learning about color management on the Red River Paper site and color balancing your monitor with either a Spyder or ColorMuki. Best of luck.

Fredrick Loc: Former NYC, now San Francisco Bay Area

Longshadow wrote:

It's probably the difference between the way it looks on the monitor and the printer.
Old monitor???
My monitors are not calibrated, but none of my images come out over-saturated on the printer.

(Below 50% capacity, chuck the cartridge???

Tech had no idea what to tell you,!!!

I'd chuck the tech support........

aellman Loc: Boston MA

sabrejet wrote:

A friend says her HP Photosmart 5520 is printing pics that are very vivid, oversaturated. HP told her when the carts are below 50 percent, they should be replaced. I have never heard this for any printer. Any thoughts? Thank you for your help.

Sounds to me like a scam to get you to spend more money on ink. If that is really true (doubtful) it's a ripoff.

canyondweller Loc: Tucson,AZ

sabrejet wrote:

A friend says her HP Photosmart 5520 is printing pics that are very vivid, oversaturated. HP told her when the carts are below 50 percent, they should be replaced. I have never heard this for any printer. Any thoughts? Thank you for your help.

It might be something as simple as going into your printer properties and change the dpi setting. There may even be a checkbox that says "save on ink". This will use less ink. Without me seeing your print property screen it's hard to tell you which setting to adjust. I'm confident that there is something in the settings that can be adjusted to reduce the amount of ink that sprays on the paper.

sabrejet

She wants to thank you for all your help. I think there will be a new printer soon.

AirWalter Loc: Tipp City, Ohio

sabrejet wrote:

A friend says her HP Photosmart 5520 is printing pics that are very vivid, oversaturated. HP told her when the carts are below 50 percent, they should be replaced. I have never heard this for any printer. Any thoughts? Thank you for your help.

Some programs that are used to print thru your printer have an option that you check so that it prints "vivid". Make sure that she doesn't have that checked. The only other advice I have from experience is to not buy anything made by HP. Their products are literally junk and their customer support is just as bad. If anyone has any HP products that you are happy with count yourself extremely lucky.

AirWalter Loc: Tipp City, Ohio

sabrejet wrote:

She wants to thank you for all your help. I think there will be a new printer soon.

Make sure it isn't an HP. I have 3 Canon printers and have never had a problem with any of them, knock on wood!!!

canyondweller Loc: Tucson,AZ

I have always owned HP printers and computers and never had issues with them, but then again I'm an IT person.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

sabrejet wrote:

A friend says her HP Photosmart 5520 is printing pics that are very vivid, oversaturated. HP told her when the carts are below 50 percent, they should be replaced. I have never heard this for any printer. Any thoughts? Thank you for your help.

Sounds like an ICC color profile mis-management issue...

Someone wants to double her ink consumption!

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

cjc2 wrote:

I would NEVER replace an ink cartridge at 50% unle... (show quote)

Good advice!