Not Printing to Plain Paper; also Printer Quality is poor (no black color on Print quality report)

[anisman]

I have an HP OfficeJet 3830. Bought the printer about 2 years ago. I opened it up a year after purchasing it as I still had a working printer at that time. After opening it up and installing the necessary software, the printer was also wirelessly connected to my computers. I use HP cartridges and plain printer paper, however, from the very beginning, the printer has not printed with the option of Plain Paper.

For example, on my MacBook (MacOS 12.10.6; Sierra), I tried to print from Word in both black and white and color with the option of Auto Select for Paper type (on the digital display of the printer itself, when asked, I marked that Plain Paper is loaded). I tried that with both Normal, Draft, and Best quality and the printer just feeds a page through without printing anything on it. Then, instead of selecting Auto Select for Paper Type, I selected Plain Paper, and the same exact thing happened. However, when I changed it to Photo Glossy Paper, it printed in all 3 qualities and prints it in both black and white and color, but it prints it very slow, regardless of quality selected because Photo Glossy Paper is selected. 

Additionally, I am unable to print at all from my work laptop (ThinkPad X1 Yoga;Win 10 Pro; 64-bit). When I try to print from Word, it doesn't have Photo Glossy Paper exactly as an option, but besides Plain Paper, it has other options, including Inkjet Glossy Paper, and nothing works. 

Additionally, I tried to copy a document and I heard the print scan the document, but nothing printed at all. 

I really hope someone can help me.

[Kumar0307]

@anisman, Welcome to the HP Support Community!

• First, let us troubleshoot the hardware issue on the printer. If you are not able to make copies in black or color, or if there is no black on the test page, this could be a hardware issue.
• Check the ink levels and replace any low/empty ink cartridge.
• Have you tried using a new set of ink cartridges?

Clean the ink cartridges

1. On the printer control panel, swipe the display to the left, and then touch Setup.

2. Touch Tools, and then touch Clean Cartridges.

3. The printer performs the automated cleaning process and then prints a Print Quality Diagnostic page. If the print quality is unacceptable, touch OK for a Second-level Cleaning when prompted to continue the next level of cleaning.

   • NOTE: If the ink cartridge nozzles are badly clogged, it might require another cleaning cycle. If so, wait 30 minutes before you perform both levels of cleaning again.

If the issue persists, perform step 14 from this document.

Update the printer firmware

Click here to download and install the latest firmware from your MAC.

Click here to know different methods of updating printer firmware.

For more info on resolving print quality issues, refer to - Black or Color Ink Not Printing, Other Print Quality Issues

Hope this helps! Keep me posted. 

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