Color Ink Cartridges all running out very quickly

[RnRMusicMan]

Hi Ryan_O,

Welcome to the HP Forums!

I see that you are having the same issue. I would like to point out this article for you, Ink Usage in Inkjet Printers, and especially the following paragraphs:

Some ink evaporates over time

Ink cartridges lose some ink to evaporation over time. This lowers the volume of ink available, and may change the chemistry of the inks. Cartridges cannot be completely sealed due to altitude variations during shipment and temperature variations during storage and use. HP cartridges are designed to operate reliably after a long pre-sale shelf life, and throughout many months of usage once installed in the printer.

Some color ink may be used when printing black text-or-graphics

There are several circumstances when color ink may be used—primarily to improve print quality, and sometimes to improve printer reliability—even if the document appears to be only black text-and-graphics. Many HP printers utilize chemical interactions to improve the quality and permanence of plain paper black text-and-graphics by adding small amounts of color ink to certain black areas. Some dark images which look black may contain a combination of black and color inks. For black and white images and photos, a blend of colors called "composite black" may be used to achieve significantly better image quality and smoother gray tones than can be accomplished with black inks alone. Some inkjet printers utilize pigmented black ink, which is incompatible with some inkjet photo paper. In this case, dark or black areas are made up of color inks. Page yield testing is conducted with all cartridges (black and color) installed in the printer. For more information see Inkjet page yields .

For users who wish to print utilizing just black ink (despite the reduced print quality), many HP printers offer options. For example, a driver color setting (by selecting "print in grayscale with the black cartridge only" in printing preferences) specifies printing using only black ink. In addition, many IPH printers can operate in "reserve mode," which allows the user to continue to print with just the black cartridge when the color cartridge is removed or not installed.In HP IIC systems, all supplies are required to be installed in the printer for the printer to function.

Otherwise, I would also see this guide, Fixing Print Quality Problems for the HP Officejet 6600 e-All-in-One and 6700 Premium e-All-in-One (....

If this does not help, please call our phone support at 800-474-6836 for further assistance. If you live outside the US/Canada Region, please click the link below to get the support number for your region. Country-language selector.

Have a great day!

[DC0366]

I have a photosmart 6520 and while printing out a presentation had to swap out the cyan cartridge with a new HP cartridge and reprint approximately 15 pages.  After reprinting the pages, I received a message that the new cyan cartridge is running low and needs to be swapped out.  I find this to be unacceptable performance.  I have been using HP products since my first RPN calculator in the late 1970s.  It is very disapppointing to have to question the quality of HP products.  There is clearly an issue with the cartiridges if they can run out so quickly.  It gives me pause on purchasing another HP product.

[ShaBo]

For the past 2 years or so, my HP cartridges run out with very low levels of printing.  There has been a big drop off in quantity of ink in each cartridge.  Also, my HP printer, copier, scanner, faxer detects a counterfeit cartridge (i.e. not a true HP product).  The cartridges are expensive and I'm starting to think it would be more economical to use a kinkos or other printing shop rather than throwing money away with these HP cartridges.  I too print almost exclusively in black, but the color cartridges also run out quickly.

Just thought I'd compare notes with other HP users.

Happy printing!

Shannon

[RnRMusicMan]

Hi DC0366, and ShaBo,

Welcome to the HP Forums!

Are you using Genuine HP Ink Cartridges? Or refills? Please, see this article, Can I Refill The Ink In My HP Ink Cartridge? 

See link for HP's warranty statement on cartridges & printheads

Limited Warranty for HP Ink Cartridges and Customer-Replaceable Printheads for HP Inkjet Supplies

What this warranty does not cover

This warranty does not cover HP ink cartridges or customer-replaceable printheads that have been refilled, remanufactured, refurbished, misused, or tampered with. If failure or damage to ink cartridges or customer-replaceable printheads is attributable to the use of a non-HP, expired or refilled ink cartridge, or to the use with a non-designated HP or unauthorized OEM printing device, HP is not responsible for the cost of replacement or refund of the purchase

price.

Hope this information is helpful!

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[Tom1566]

My HP OfficeJet Pro 276dw used to work GREAT for about a year.  Then, one time recently our black ink ran out and a pop up asked if I wanted to cancel the print job or continue using a combination of the remaining ink cartridges (colors).  I pressed OK to finish my current print job.

Now, I've looked everywhere for a setting to turn that off, but can't find it.  NOW, my printer used a WHOLE magenta and WHOLE cyan cartridge and WHOLE yellow cartridge printing 20 black and white pages in 2 days!  I'm pretty sure it's a setting, but WHERE is it?  Otherwise I gotta throw this thing away.  $80 in color ink in 2 days....I can get a laser printer WAAAAY cheaper.....and it won't be HP if I can't get this fixed!

[teberhardt]

I am having the same problem.  I have been through 3 full sets of ink with my 8500 Premium and still on the same original stack of paper in the tray.  Considering it's $100+ for those tiny cartridges labelled XL, this feels like HP is taking advantage of it's customers.  What can be done to make this better?  Are we at the point where we have to start trashing a working printer to get something that will work?