6 Ways to Help Your Printer Ink Last a Long, Long Time

Printer Maintenance Tips to Lower Your TCO

Printer ink is one of the biggest costs of operating a printer for the long term. You might wonder why then, since Great Lakes Computer sells replacement ink cartridges, that we’d find ways to help you use less of it…and that’s because we value putting you first each and every time.

You probably haven’t had time to audit how you could be using your ink better, so we’ve created this handy little checklist to help you get more out of your printer ink:

1. Ignore Low/Out of Ink Warnings: If you’re the type who likes to stay on top of printer repair like a hawk, then keep this in mind: when the printer says the ink needs replacing, that’s not necessarily the case. PC World conducted a study and found that cartridges that were “out of ink” still had anywhere from 8-45% of it still left!
2. Do You Really Need the Quality? By default, most printers print on “high resolution” or “best,” both of which use the most ink. Instead, set the quality down to “low” or “draft” or a similar setting that’s appropriate for your printer. Also, print in grayscale where possible. If you need the quality, use it if you have to, but in general you can do less with what’s already been set.
3. Print Your Photos at a Local Department Store: Yes, you can print photos on your printer. But, it’s generally more cost-effective to send them over the internet to the local department store and have them printed, and especially so if you consider printing them on special photo paper that costs more.
4. Use Smaller, Thinner Fonts: It takes less ink to print that smaller font. However, don’t make it so small that whoever’s reading it can’t decipher what you’re writing. One idea is to use the Ecofont typeface. The font actually has holes in it invisible to the naked eye at a size of 30 points or less. The font is free across the web if you Google it.
5. Proof What You Print: You’re going to use a ton of ink if you have to reprint a long document or graphic you just spent hours working on. Instead of printing it out, proof it yourself, or have someone else do it, and you’ll save a ton of ink.
6. Print Only What You Need: Only need a small paragraph on a graphically intense web page? PrintWhatYouLike.com helps you do exactly what it’s named to do – print only what you want from each web page. You can get rid of those obnoxious ads.

Some good, helpful advice for common printer repair and maintenance problems. Save some money and help the environment too!

Want to investigate how you can save even more money on your print needs? Depending on the quantity of print jobs in your environment, Great Lakes Managed Print may be an economical and budget friendly route for you to take. Contact us today for a free print cost assessment and we can tell you if this is a good route for your company to take.