OfficeJet 710 prints only bottom half of words

[Rich13]

Hi folks. I've got an HP OfficeJet 710 connected to my Dell Dimension running XP.

This printer hasn't been used much in months. When I tried it recently, it printed nothing on the page -- almost like I was using white ink.

I replaced the black cartridge and cleaned all of the copper parts and rollers. I also ran a commercial sheet of alcohol(?) soaked felt through the printer. Now I get printouts that only show the bottom half of each line. I cleaned the cartridges using the HP toolbox feature three times. Still no luck. BTW, I could not get the HP toolbox to "align" the cartridges, and there is no onboard feature for aligning the cartridges. I'm wondering if I have an alignment problem.

I'd like to use the 710 just for sending/receiving occasional faxes, so I have no expectation that this old unit is going to handle large volumes.

Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks!

Rich

 

[njwcad]

Sound like the jets are blocked.

 

[Rich13]

Problem solved. I had installed a new black ink cartridge. It was a generic cartridge purchased at Office Depot. I exchanged the generic for a 'real' HP cartridge, and it works fine.

Lesson learned!

Rich