I think one of the most annoying problems of the computer age is the low life of the printer ink cartridges and their high price, so much so that a new printer costs less than two ink cartridges. If I think about how many printers I have changed at home and how many, in general, are put into disuse, for the mere fact that the ink has run out, the chills come for such a waste of resources.
I write this article therefore hoping to come up with valuable advice, so that the life of printers lasts longer and ink cartridges are used more efficiently and less waste .
Leaving aside the fact that, depending on the type of printer you buy, you can already save ink and toner, in this article, we assume that we already have our own printer and that we want to use it in the most efficient way to make it last longer, maintaining a decent print quality.
1) Use a different font
Changing fonts from the default one can save more than 25% of ink on 100-sheet printing.
In another article we saw the results of tests and research on what was the best font or font to save on printing documents .
General advice in writing on video writing programs on the computer such as Word or OpenOffice are then to use as little bold text as possible and to write in smaller fonts.
Graphic designers and designers agree that they use modern color separation techniques to avoid unnecessary waste of ink.
You could also download, for maximum savings, the Ecofont font was developed by Spranq and, as you can see in the image, it is a type of writing characterized by tiny holes that save ink. Clearly, the image is enlarged, the real writing I can assure, it is absolutely legible and presentable even at a working and corporate level.
According to estimates, this font saves about 20% of ink or toner compared to standard fonts.
To use the free version you must download the ttf file of the Ecofont Vera Sans regular .
However, detailed instructions are available on the site to guide less expert users to the installation; on Windows, it's very easy and just move the downloaded ttf file to the C: / Windows / Fonts folder or double click on it.
By opening, for example, Microsoft Office Word, you will find, in the drop-down menu of the font choice, the type Ecofont Sans.
2) The revision of the document
I think it is absolutely useless to print something, before having thoroughly reviewed the content to check for errors and risk having to print a document over and over again.
Then select what you want to print because, generally, a manual or a book, you may need only a few pages or a few chapters so it is useless to print it entirely.
It is also very expensive to print graphics, photos and drawings when only text is of interest.
3) Configure Word options
If you print a piece of text for proofreading you must always be careful to print with the " fast draft " option activated. Before unpacking it is therefore advisable to make sure that this option is set correctly, therefore without ever printing by clicking on the print buttons but going to File -> Print -> Print Properties .
4) When printing a web page or entire websites, be careful of all unnecessary elements and eliminate all graphics, advertisements and images .
It can be done without additional software, but much better thanks to online services such as Print What You Like described in another post.
5) Use a program that better manages the prints . Printeco is a Windows program that is installed as an extension of Microsoft Office for Word, Excel and Powerpoint .
The free version for personal use allows you to manage the printing of documents opened with Office programs in order to save ink and sheets of paper easily.
Another more complex and interesting program is GreenPrint which analyzes the printing processes and, guided by the user, eliminates by itself all those pages that are printed unnecessarily and unwanted ones.
In addition, you can print a file by turning it into PDF, which requires neither ink / toner nor paper.
To provide some motivation, GreenPrint tracks the amount of paper it can save.
Another program to save paper and print multiple pages on each sheet is iPrint, which we talk about in another article.
6) Printer configuration options
Instead of manually choosing the " low quality " or the " quick draft " for each print, as indicated above, it is preferable to set this default setting so that it is always used and, only occasionally, manually change to print at higher quality.
To permanently set the print settings, you need to go (for Windows) to Start> Settings> Printers and Faxes, press the right button on the printer you are using, select " Printing preferences ".
Now, the way of presenting these options depends on the brand of printer so I try to give a general guideline for where to find the options that affect this post.
a) First of all, take note of the print layout options .
You must consider you can print multiple pages on a single piece of paper and on both sides of a sheet.
Both options can save a lot of ink / toner and paper itself.
I must remember that if you change the settings from here, every print job will use this default setting.
b) Print in black and white (greyscale) because the color cartridge costs much more than the black cartridge and wears out very quickly.
c) For some printers it is possible to reduce the graphic resolution .
This option is usually within the "advanced settings" menu.
300 dpi (dots per inch) is generally sufficient for most purposes, among other things, high resolution makes sense only if you are using high quality photo paper because plain paper does not incorporate any improvement.
Depending on the case, some printers have predefined options for saving ink which is generally called " Ecoprint " and, if there is one, it is better to use it.
7) Always use the print preview and check what you are printing.
Then you can decide to manually change the settings, for example, to print multiple pages on a single sheet or to reduce the size of an image or, for Excel spreadsheets, to decrease the size of the tables by tightening them appropriately and making it fit as much as possible into a single sheet.
8) When you start a print, it seems trivial to say it, but do not think that the PC has not received the command.
In fact, it often happens that the computer is late to print, because perhaps it is slowed down by other programs or processes, and I have seen inexperienced people repeatedly press the print button because they are convinced that the PC has not taken the lead.
The result is then to have 5/6 copies of the same sheet because it has been printed several times.
Well, just press the print button once and wait and because if there are errors, these will certainly be reported: it may be that the paper has jammed, it may be over, or there are communication problems between printer and PC or the printer is still off ...
In cases where you are wrong you have to cancel the print jobs and queues as explained on the page entitled "Manage and remove print queues quickly".
9) Turn the printer off when not in use because, apart from saving energy, you should also know that, when it is turned off, the ink cartridges are protected and do not dry out while maintaining greater ink autonomy.
10) Print until the cartridge is completely used up without being alarmed if the pc indicates that the ink is running out.
11) Finally, I always recommend reading the instruction manuals of the printer to follow the maintenance tips that are regularly ignored by everyone.
I refer to your comments for more savings tips and thanks for reading if you got to the bottom.
