Friday, August 17, 2007

!((@^$@?*

You have no idea how irate I can be towards my printer sometimes. And it's not that I don't like my 4 in 1 Brother printer. It does all it's jobs great except when you run out of an ink.

It drives me bonkers that when I run out of the yellow ink that I can't continue to print with the black ink. The whole printer shuts down until I replace the ink I hardly ever use! And the printer chose to run out of yellow right when I tried printing off my online 20% off Borders coupon.

Jeff and I where all ready to enjoy an evening reading magazines we never buy when I unleashed the fury. I think it was a full 20 minute tantrum on my part. I kept referring to the printer company as "The Man" and how they were all snickering at me for falling under their cleverly designed scheme to make you purchase printer ink all the time. ARRGG!

Thankfully Jeff has the level head in our relationship and since he is also the smarty pants took the 20 minutes I was ranting on about "The Man" to find a way to "Stick it to the Man!"

This is what he found out about my Brother printer. (I don't know if this trick can be used with other brands of printers.) The machine is smart. It checks ink levels using a laser light. So you have to be smarter than the machine and trick it to thinking the ink is full.

This is exhibit A: Empty Ink Cartridge that ruined my evening.


Exhibit B: Electrical Tape. You have to use electrical tape because of its density to fool the laser beam. All you need to do it place the tape over the clear portion on the cartridge. Make sure the tape is flush with the contour of the plastic.


Exhibit C: One printer ink cartridge decoy. My printer still thinks I have yellow ink! MMmmwahhahahahah!

11 comments:

  1. Oh my gosh, that is SO funny! But kind of like a human man. You do sometimes have to use a decoy to get them to do what you want them to...

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  2. HAHA! So funny Lee. Definately got a huge kick out of it. I miss your humor.

    Love , Little Sis

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  3. That's a great story! Isn't it funny how something like that can set you off?

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  4. :O
    I'm sooo gonna use this tip. I've had the same problem. My printer has not been working well with my new computer. That makes me so angry. Especially when I've just put a printable fabric sheet in and it decides to print 1/3 of the page. *$&#%@$%

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  5. How funny....and how smart ya'll are! This tutorial is one of the most needed. Thanks for sharing it!

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  6. This is genius! I don't know why the printer can't possibly print without all it's colors in attendance.

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  7. Men are genius with the tape! Give a man ANY problem and a roll of tape and you'll have a solution!

    I think Jeff deserves some cookies or something!

    : )

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  8. I shared your laugh at stickin' it to da man! LOL....

    I have a HP printer/fax/scanner/copier/dishwasher.
    It doens't do what you've described.
    In fact, when you're low, you can send all required info right to hp and they'll ship it, next day, at no extra charge!

    I haven't said one cuss word since owning this little beauty.

    Color me happy.

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  9. what a great solution! I would hate to have to waste all that ink too. hurray for electrical tape. :)

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  10. Well that was clever!! I hope you are enjoying your new job.
    Have a great weekend!! Elise

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  11. Oh, Jeff dear, we have afew things for you to do over here at my house. Be a sweetheart and pop in soon.

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