Officejet J4550 Ghosting

[Tedr3]

My printer was getting low on black ink, so I ordered both the 901 color and a 901XL and installed the XL.  Right after this, whenever something is printed, a double image image appears - it is a vertical displacement of about 2/100ths of an inch.  A

printed letter has a downward displaced light image underneath it.  I installed the old XL cart and the problem went away.  I contacted Amazon through chat and was sent a replacement.  The new replacement does the same thing.  These are genuine

HP carts.  Has anyone heard of a problem like this?

[TEJ1602]

@Tedr3, Welcome to HP Support Community!

I appreciate your efforts in trying to resolve the issue. This looks like a hardware issue.

Please reach out to the HP Support in your region regarding the service options for your printer.

Hope this helps!

Please click “Accepted Solution” if you feel my post solved your issue, it will help others find the solution. Click the “Kudos/Thumbs Up" on the bottom right to say “Thanks” for helping!

[Tedr3]

Thanks for your reply - I'm going to do more testing so I can fully describe the problem.  When you say it looks like a hardware

problem, could you be a little more specific as in there might be related problems I haven't seen?  Thanks!

[Jay_G24]

 Two cartridges have already been tried, it seems like printhead issue,

You can try steps 3,4,5 in the document -Poor Quality Black Text

Hope this helps!

Please click “Accept as Solution” if you feel my post solved your issue, it will help others find the solution.

Click the “Kudos, Thumbs Up" on the bottom right to say “Thanks” for helping

[Tedr3]

Here is the latest:

I did the Step 5 2 hour test on the new black cartridge and printed out a test page that showed both horizontal

and vertical displacement, so I did an alignment and now I am back to "normal" vertical ghosting.   Placing a ruler

across the test page color bars shows the fully black bar moved up in relation to the color bars and the lighter black

bars.  Examining the Square with the cross hair pattern shows the light ghost in the proper relation to the color portions,

so it appears that these new cartridges are putting the ghost in the right place and the rest of the letter in the wrong one.

As before, the old cartridge performs flawlessly.  Interesting, no?

[Jay_G24]

I understand, could be the printhead that is causing the issue. 

[Tedr3]

The print head is part of the cartridge, correct?  So both of these new cartridges have a problem?

[Jay_G24]

The part where the cartridge sits and the from where the ink flows out to print.

[Tedr3]

So why does the old cartridge print perfectly and the new ones don't?  Would the serial numbers from the cartridges help?

[Jay_G24]

what is the cartridge number your using?