10 Tips to for Save Your Printer Ink Cartridges and Saving Printer Ink

Article Written By: Brenda Stokes.

Let's face it. Printer ink cartridges are expensive. Even if you buy generic brands you are still going to be spending a hefty amount of money, especially if you print a lot on a regular basis. Each time you print, you use ink. But there are ways that you can save your resources just by taking a few measures before you hit "Print".

Make "Print Preview" Function Your Friend

In most printer driver (here is a good link for free printer driver downloads) programs there is a print preview function that lets you see just what you are going to be printing before you print it. This is especially helpful when printing things from the Internet. Images can be shifted around, whole pages can be blank and there can be just generally disorganized. A quick preview can help make sure all is well.

Only Print What You Want

If you want to print just a portion of a page, only print a portion of the page! There is no use in printing out graphics and text you have no use for. If printing off the Internet, simply highlight the text you wish to print and then print it. You should end up with a print out that contains only what you want.

Keep The Print Cartridges Alive

Even though you may not have a need to print something everyday, try to use both your black and color printer cartridges once a week or so. Just print something small or run a diagnostic test. If you let your printer ink cartridges sit, they will eventually dry up, meaning you’re out of luck when it comes to ink. This applies to all brands so Epson printer ink cartridges will be just as affected as Brother printer ink cartridges.

Use Generic Printer Cartridges (Also called Replacement Cartridges or Compatible Cartridges)

While you will not necessarily get more ink out of a generic cartridge than you would with a manufacturer brand OEM print cartridge, you will most definitely save money. And the whole point of saving printer ink is to save money, right? Well, you can definitely save money by using generic printer ink, especially for those bulk print jobs. If you need to print a lot of black and white copies of something, generic is the way to go all the way.

Power Down Right

Do not just flip off the power strip switch each time you want to turn off your electronics. You would not just shut off the power to your computer without shutting it down properly, right? So why do that to your printer? Take the time to power down your printer the right way. Otherwise, you will be cutting off the power while the print heads are not in the right position, meaning the ink will dry up faster!

Organize Your Prints

Do a little bit of planning before you hit that print button. This means, proofread text, organize images and double check everything before you print. If you look over the copy once it prints out and are dissatisfied, that is wasted printer ink, right there. Not to mention, wasted paper.

Use Black Ink More

If you are not planning on submitting the print outs as a report or project, skip the color. Make sure your printer is set to print in monochrome and you can save your color ink for more involved projects later down the line. No use in wasting the color on simple text or web print outs, right?

Use the Draft Setting

Again you can use the functions of your printer driver here. The draft setting in your printer options is really one of the best ways to save ink. It makes it so the printer prints much faster than normal and the amount of ink used per page is much less than if you printed at a normal setting. You will also notice a difference as the pages just shoot out of your printer rather than leisurely coming out.

Print Only What You Need

It can be tempting to print any old thing all the time, especially when you get a new printer or something. However, try to restrain yourself. You can keep most records on your computer these days, and as long as you back them up on a CD or an external hard drive, you do not need a hard copy. If you print only when you need to, those printer ink cartridges will last a lot longer.

Use Helpful Software

There are a lot of programs out there that can help organize all ofyour printing endeavors. These programs work by eliminating emptyspace, removing images if you do not want to print them and giving youthe option to select what you want to print without having to gothrough a big process. Just do a quick search for "save ink" and"printer software download" and you should come up with several choices.

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