LaserJet Pro 400 color m451mw Black Ink faint and streaking

[mbshells]

For the past several weeks my black ink has been printing faint and streaky. According to supply status the black ink is at 40%. I've run a cleaning page twice in the past week. I've also done a reset on the printer (unplug from wall while printer is on, unplug every cord, hold power button for 15 seconds, then re plug in printer.)

The cartridges are farly new and regularly used.

What else can I do to fix this problem? I don't want to waste 40% of this very expensive ink cartridge.

[Apone]

go into the printer menu, troubleshooting, and select a print quality page.  it should print out a page of each color.  is the defect only on the black?  replace the cartrdige, its defective.  is the defect showing on all of them?  suspect the transfer belt or fuser assembly.  

[AlS77]

I suspect the cartridge is either defective or empty. Yes, the status shows 40%, but if the cartridge is not an HP OEM cartridge, the cartridge may not have been properly fully filled when you received it. The toner status is an educated estimate by the printer and cartridge memory chip that calculates how much toner should be in the cartridge based on how much toner should have been in the cartridge when new, how much toner per page is being used and how many pages have been printed. Also, they may have put the wrong memory chip on the cartridge, i.e. if they put a X chip on a standard A type cartridge, then the cartridge thought it had more toner than it actually had. 

The printer nor toner cartridge can actually see how much toner is really in the cartridge. 

It really sounds like the toner cartridge is empty. I've never seen cleaning pages actually fix anything. Replace the toner cartridge and see what happens. If it prints nice and black like it's supposed to, then the old cartridge was empty or bad. Try to contact who you bought the bad cartridge from for a refund or replacement if you are able to.