Quick Fix Tips And Solutions

It is surprising how many people use colour printers to print monochrome documents. These toners cost more to produce and are therefore more expensive. In essence: colour costs you more than black.

You would also think that when you tell your printer to print black, it would only use black toner. Sadly, this is not true. Actually, your printer uses a combination of black and colour cartridges to match the information your computer sends it.

Although you may have slowed down the use of colour, you have not stopped it. A colour LaserJet is therefore a poor choice if you are only printing monochrome documents. A low cost black and white only printer is the better option since you would not need to use the colour option at all when only printing black.

It might seem unlikely, but actually your choice of font can make a huge difference to your toner use. Using serif fonts like Times New Roman, when compared to an equal sans serif font such as Calibri or Arial, will increase your toner usage by around 10%, when using the same font size. Also, your choice of font size also makes a difference to how much ink you use.

Cleaning your printer not only keeps your home or office looking neater and tidier but it can also extend its life, and that of the toner cartridge, too. By making paper path cleaning a regular part of a maintenance routine, you will help your machine to live a longer and more productive life.

Regularly removing the toner cartridge and cleaning under and around, removing the paper, dust, and toner residue that builds up under the cartridge ensures you minimise the potential for printing problems before they arise.

If toner cartridges are not used optimally, you will not get the best out your printer. Here are a few suggestions to assist Middle East and Africa users so you waste less, and help the environment, too.

  1. Toner cartridges contain light, temperature, and humidity-sensitive components, so they should not be exposed to extremes of cold, heat or humidity
  2. Always store laser toner cartridges at room temperature (Around 20oC)
  3. Do not touch the electrostatic components of the cartridge as this may discharge them which can lead to them not working properly
  4. Always handle toner cartridges with care as they have moving parts and can be damaged with rough handling

If toner cartridges are not stored optimally, you will not get the best out your printer. Here are a few suggestions to assist Middle East and Africa users so you keep your cartridges in such a way that you will get the very best in performance from them.

  1. The toner cartridge should stay in its original package until you install it. The shelf life of an unopened cartridge is approximately two years; however, the shelf life of an opened package is approximately six months
  2. If the toner cartridge is removed from the printer, always store the cartridge:
    1. Inside the original packaging
    2. Right-side-up in a horizontal position
    3. At room temperature (Around 20oC)
  3. Never expose the toner cartridge to direct sunlight, or to direct artificial light. Bright light and direct sunlight can permanently damage your toner cartridge. If the original packaging is not available, you should cover the of the cartridge. If the original packaging is not available, you should cover the of the cartridge with paper and store in a dark place
  4. Keep the area in which your store your cartridges as dust free as possible. If you keep your cartridge in its original packaging you dust will not be a problem. Dust damages both your printer and your replacement cartridges, so keep dust in workplace as low as possible at all times

Follow this advice if you wish to get the optimal performance out of your cartridge and printers.

  1. Do not touch the surface of the photosensitive drum in the cartridge and protect it from light and possible contamination from any other source
  2. Do not expose the cartridge to unnecessary vibrations or shock
  3. Never manually rotate the drum, especially in the reverse direction; this can cause internal damage and toner spills
  1. For optimum use, paper should be stored in a temperature controlled environment
  2. While reusing paper that has already been printed on one side is good for documents that are meant for internal use, there is always the chance that paper that is not perfectly flat will cause jams and damage to your printer and cartridge
  3. Thicker grades of paper may not be suitable for your printer. Check with your printer handbook before use

When was the last time you optimised your printing structure? If it is not up-to-date and working to its full potential you could be losing up to 40% of your output. GIT is fully up-to-date on the best products and services in the market to help you optimise your printing.

You may have a fleet of devices purchased by different departments, for different purposes over a long period of time. Each of these items is at a different stage of redundancy and inefficiency and all of them require different consumables and servicing. By consolidating your fleet with GIT you will create a more efficient and lower-cost infrastructure.

We can supply you with:

  1. Strategic multifunction systems
  2. A balanced use of printers and MFPs
  3. Enhanced security
  4. One standard brand
  5. Modern toner and energy efficient printers and MFPs

The benefits to this are sizeable:

  1. You only stock supplies for a small range of machines making record keeping simpler
  2. Your staff have similarity of operation throughout the company, so reducing training time
  3. Universal drivers and tools make administration simpler
  4. It is easier to keep large reserve stocks and so minimise order delays
  5. There is the benefit of faster speed printing
  6. There is better and more efficient colour printing
  7. There is the option to scan instead of photocopying
  8. There is more efficient power consumption leading to reduced utility bills

What is more, older generation printers consume much more energy and may not be Energy Star compliant; they break down more often, helping to create more assistance requests and the cost of servicing is regularly higher. These older printers may also be incompatible with your operating systems. Contact us to discuss this further.

Visit HP’s Business Support Centre for technical information and services for your HP printer. If you are looking to download drivers and software, learn how to troubleshoot a problem, setup, install, and configure a specific printer, print a configuration page, download a manual or simply want to discover your HP printer, please visit

‘Page Yield? What’s that?’

Page yield is the how many pages altogether a cartridge can print. Until recently, every printer manufacturer has used a slightly different way of measuring this, so it has been almost impossible to accurately compare figures

The International Standards Organisation (ISO) created new international standards for monochrome printers in 2004 and colour printers in 2006. ISO standards for ink and toner cartridge yields now accurately define what affects yield. All printer manufacturers use the parameters when talking about ‘cartridge per page yield.’

In practice, variations such as operating temperature, humidity levels, page coverage, the size of job or the type of media, whether it is duplex or single-sided printing, or even the font size, all affect the per page yield.

GIT operates the ISO system, and so you can be sure that the figures we supply you on page yields correspond to those of OEM companies around the world, and are why we can say, honestly and transparently that our GT branded cartridges outperform even the OEM companies who offer the same kind of product.

‘What’s that is the page yield of my device?’

If you would like to understand the page yield of your printer as per OEM specifications followed by us, please visit the OEM websites for detailed information. For your ease of use, we have compiled links to a few of the most common websites:

HP:

“https://learn-about-supplies.ext.hp.com/

Canon:

“https://www.usa.canon.com/printers/inkjet-page-yields/page-measure

Xerox:

https://www.xerox.com/en-us/office/toner-yields