How to distinguish Photo Black vs. Black ink cartridge for 6380 [ Edited ]

[KenW]

I have tried to find the difference between photo black and black to no avail.  I recently purchased a 6380 and it has two black cartridges, one denoted by a bowtie symbol, and the other by a pentagon.  The wider pentagon is almost out of ink, but I can't tell if that's the black or the photo black cartridge.  It doesn't appear that they are sold with the symbol on the packaging.  What should I buy to replace the larger cartridge on the right side of the print head assembly?  Is it CB316WN or CB317WN?

Thanks,

Ken

Message Edited by KenW on 12-19-2008 08:17 AM

[cbator]

6 months without an answer in HP's own forums..... Nice....

I'm going through this now..... I have spares of all of the cartridges, but not the huge packaging they came in. Since the cartridges don't have names on them, I have to go by the shapes...... but the printer docs, the HP Printer software Utility that tells me I have an empty black ink cartridge, and the printer wont tell tell me which symbol is plain black and which is photo black... even the packaging for the carts doesn't show the symbols........

I guess hp wants us to buy both and swap them both.

I have a 50/50 shot..... 

edit... 

I figured it out.... 

 pentagon symbol on cart: Black

bowtie symbol: Photo Black 

Message Edited by cbator on 06-24-2009 09:59 PM

[DexterM]

The HP Shopping page for both cartridges show a pic of the cartridge with the ID Symbol shown, along with the size and the Part Number(ex. CB316W). Maybe people just missed this thread, thusno replies.

HP 564 Black and HP 564 Photo Black.

[gardengal5]

I don't see any pentagon/etc symbols on the packaging on the link you supplied. 

Speaking of packaging,  boy, was I disappointed when I couldn't find any weight designation on these cartridges.   That is really lame, especially when they sell regular and XL.   I mean come on!!!   In the supermarket there is such a thing as unit-pricing so a careful consumer can see if the XL is a better deal or not.  The assumption is that it is a better deal, but often times it is not.  And don't talk to me about page yield... way too subjective.  ounces are ounces are ounces. indisputable.    I'm afraid I cannot trust HP to be straight on that one.

[Bob_Headrick]

The wide black is the standard black, the narrow one is the photo black.

As for the "ounces are ounces" comment, that is very misleading as it applies to printing.  A consumer prints pages, not ounces.  Comparing cartrdiges based on thier volume would at best be misleading for several reasons.  As an example, a printer using the #96 black cartrdige gets about twice as many printed pages per mL (or ounce) as does one that uses the #45 cartrdige. 

Regards,
Bob Headrick, Microsoft MVP Printing/Imaging

[gardengal5]

Thanks Bob not sure what you mean narrow?  wide?   we are talking about symbols... pentagon and bowties.  THose symbols should be on the packaging. If my EstimatedInkLevels shows a pentagon is low or a bow-tie is low, it should be a direct match to which cartridge to open.

As far as ounces disclosure, it depends on what is being compared.  If I am comparing Regular to XL and dollars, ounces to dollars is absolute.  They could certainly show BOTH measurements if they wanted to.      But how typical for hp to be as vague as possible.    If you think disclosure of how many ounces are in the cartridge could possibly be misleading, you are mistaken IMO.    Information is key. No such thing as too much.   They could even include the "average" (although meaningless term IMO) pages per ounce.

I forget the numbers but, hypothetically, suppose Regular was $10 and XL was $15 and the blurbe was "up to 70% more pages" .  As a consumer attempting to determine if the XL is a money-saver, that information is totally useless.  I want to compare  Apples to Apples.  Give me ounces and I can do the math to see if it is a value or not.    Maybe my problem is even assuming in the first place that XL might be intended to be a value.   Knowing HP, probably not.

[Bob_Headrick]

The original poster asked about the wide black cartridge and the narrow one.  The wide cartridge (with the pentagon symbol) is the normal black, the other one is the photo black.

As for pages out vs. mL, you might peruse the page yield site HP has provided for all its recent printers.  The page yields are reported in accordance with strict testing standards.  While the exact pages out for a particular cartridge will depend heavily on various factors such as what is printed, the comparisons across different options such as XL vs. regular will show the relative yield.  The XL cartridges typically cost 2X the price of the normal cartridges and deliver 3X the pages.  In the case of the 6380 the black XL cartridge is tested at 800 pages while the standard cartridge is 250 pages.  The pages out are measured by an ISO standard adopted across the industry, and finally gives a good "apples to apples" comparison.  This is much different from years gone by when each manufacturer had their own testing methods and reported yields could vary by 2X due to different test methods.  One manufacturer in particular defined their standard pages as one with 2" margins all the way around. Specifying ink in mL (or ounces) was typically only done by HP and provides no meaningful comparison between models or different vendors.

Regards,
Bob Headrick, Microsoft MVP Printing/Imaging

[momuv2dox]

THANK YOU SO much!!!

[Wejitu]

{Content Removed} JUST TELL ME HOW OR WHERE CAN I BUY THE CARTRIDGE WITH THE SOLID BLACK PENTAGON ICON ON IT...... {Content Removed} None of my suppliers, nor HP anywhere online is of any help to me getting this  ink cartridge.

Thank You,

Phil

{Personal Information Removed}

[videovin]

It's easy.  Since the symbol is only on the cartridge, not the box, I just open it up in the store until I find the right black cartridge.  Even the sales people in the best computer stores don't have a clue.  Hp should make it easy to buy there products but as an American company, they just don't care.