Regionalize Photosmart c4580 printer

[Shahid Rahman]

Hi,

I bought an AIO Photosmart c4580 wireless printer from US. Then I shifted to India. The cartridges provided with the printer were HP74 and HP75. These cartridges are not available in India. I contacted HP Chat Support. They said that I have to buy HP 860 and HP 861 cartridges and then I have to change the zone of the printer to Zone 4.

I bought the cartridges and contacted HP support through email, chat and phone. None of them were able to regionalize my printer to Zone4 (India).

The cartridges which came with the printer are finished. When I insert HP860 and HP861, I get incompatible cartridges. Anyone in this forum can help me with this as HP support have ignored my issue and they are least interested in resolving the issue.

Thanks in advance,

Shahid

[Bob_Headrick]

I would suggest calling HP again.  AFAIK there are only a few specialized agents that can perform the regionalization reset.  You will need to have access to your computer and printer to complete the procedure.

Regards,

Bob Headrick, MS MVP Printing/Imaging

[mkgolder]

 Hi Bob,

It's great to read a response from someone who knows what they are talking about!

It's a little harder to listen after customer services ignores you and tech support deserts you!

I'm sitting here with my hands covered in black ink from a Russian printer in deepest darkest England which won't accept british cartridges!!

I am still waiting for a tech support person to help me re-zone my c3183 photosmart printer. I know how to do it as well, all I need is the codes!!

Is there any one you know that you could point me to, since you already know that there are only a few people who know the 'holy grail' answer to my question?

With thanks,

Murray

[DexterM]

In most cases, first level agents do not have info or authorization to carry out the regionalisation reset. Only their supervisors can do it. And it has to be done free of cost, and you should not be charged for this. Try reasoning with the agent again, and if they still refuse, then demand to speak to a supervisor.

[remson5yahoo]

but beware you can only do it three times and then you are screwed.

[Bob_Headrick]

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sharmil82 wrote:

Did you manage to get your issue resolved? I have the same problem as you with a AIO Photosmart C4780 wireless printer from the US. The cartridges provided were HP 60 and are not available in India. I have depleted the ink from teh black cartridge and the last person I gave to refill it, spoilt it.

 How am I to print out a piece of paper without ink. 

---

In India the C4700 series uses the 818 cartridges.  You will need a new set of 818 cartridges which can be used to print the required test page.  After the region has been reset the 818 cartridges will be available for printing and the 60 cartridges will no longer operate in the printer.

[fabdan]

Hi,I had a similar problem with a C3180 photosmart (moved from singapore to Italy) serial number MY66KC12K6. I am quite frustrated because after contacting several time customer service to regionalize the printer I was eventually told that I had to purchase a 20Euro assistance package to go through the procedure.

I refused to pay for the service and decided to purchase a different brand printer. I have to say this is a bit sad because I was quite happy with this printer despite the price of the cartriges.

HP just has lost a customer.

Best regards

FB

[Bob_Headrick]

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fabdan wrote:

Hi,I had a similar problem with a C3180 photosmart (moved from singapore to Italy) serial number MY66KC12K6. I am quite frustrated because after contacting several time customer service to regionalize the printer I was eventually told that I had to purchase a 20Euro assistance package to go through the procedure.

I refused to pay for the service and decided to purchase a different brand printer. [snip]

---

The regionalization reset is covered under the cartridge warranty, there should not be any charge for this.  The process can only be performed by a limited number of call agents, you may need to have your case escalated.  I will take the liberty of passing this information on to some folks at HP, someone may contact you for more information.

[W3stbrook]

I had the same issue. Has been interesting to read the threads here.

Main advice is this: CALL THE HP TECH SUPPORT LINE FOR YOUR LOCATION AND MAKE SURE YOU MENTION THAT YOUR CALL IS ABOUT CARTRIDGES NOT THE PRINTER.

On every occasion I've called, they ask how old the printer is.  If you tell them that it's older than one year they'll immediatley stonewall you, provide you with a paid-for service number and explain that they cannot hand you to a supervisor and cannot help with you 'out of warranty' enquiry. 

Many of the frontline call centre staff do not know HP policy on free re-regionalisation.

I had a US-purchased C4280 all in one.  I moved back to the UK.  Eventually I replaced the cartridges.  They, of course, didn't work with the printer.  The error message was just that there were no ink cartridges installed - no mention of a region issue.

Took me some googling to find out about regionalisation.

Took me much longer to get HP to help.  Kudos to Bob for his mention of the cartidge warranty which overcame HP's reluctance to do anything which might help me unbrick my printer.  NB - with no recognised cartridges installed, the orinter won't even scan - let alone print or copy.

Worth noting that to reregionalise the printer, HP Tech Support needs several pieces of info from the printer report page:

Line 11. 14 digit printer S/N

Line 52. 20-digit colour pen S/N

Line 53. 20-digit black pen S/N

These, with the desired printer region, are input to a regionalisation tool (some for of key generator) which outputs a 25-digit key.  This has to be input via the HP printer utility software on the Win/Mac machine.

Voila, the printer is properly regionalised following off/on reset.

This explains why no simple procedure or series of all-size codes are circulated here or elsewhere.  I'd imagine that it would require a very bored hacker to create a pirate keygen for this... or perhaps a disenfranchised tech support employee.  We can only hope.  There are some interesting (dubiously so)  looking examples floating around peer-to-peer services.

I wish I had all this info when my printer first stopped working.  Hope it's useful to others.

WB