Print-quality issues

General advice

When you have any print-quality problem:

To achieve the best performance from your printer, use only genuine manufacturer's supplies and accessories, whose reliability and performance have been thoroughly tested to give trouble- free performance and best-quality prints. For details of recommended papers, see Order paper on page 125.

Make sure that the paper type selected in the front panel is the same as the paper type loaded into the printer. To check this, use the View loaded paper key on the front panel. At the same time, check that the paper type has been calibrated. Also make sure that the paper type selected in your software is the same as the paper type loaded into the printer.

CAUTION: If you have the wrong paper type selected, you could experience poor print quality and incorrect colors, and perhaps even damage to the printheads.

Check that you are using the most appropriate print-quality settings for your purposes (see Printing on page 43). You are likely to see lower print quality if you have moved the print-quality slider to the 'Speed' end of the scale, or set the custom quality level to Fast.

Check that your environmental conditions (temperature, humidity) are in the recommended range. See Environmental specifications on page 182.

Check that your ink cartridges and printheads have not passed their expiration dates: see Maintain the ink cartridges on page 120.

Avoid touching the paper while printing is in progress.

Print quality troubleshooting wizard

The Print Quality Troubleshooting Wizard can help with the following problems:

Horizontal lines across the image (banding)

The whole image is blurry or grainy

Lines are too thick, too thin or missing

Colors are inaccurate

To start the wizard:

From the HP Utility for Windows: go to the Support tab, and select Print quality troubleshooting.

From the HP Utility for Mac OS: select Print quality troubleshooting in the Support group.

From the Mac OS Print dialog: go to the Services panel, select Device Maintenance, then select Print quality troubleshooting from the list of maintenance tasks.

From the Embedded Web Server: go to the Support tab, select Troubleshooting, then select Print quality troubleshooting.

142 Chapter 13 Troubleshooting print-quality issues

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HP Z5200 CQ113A#B1K manual General advice, Print quality troubleshooting wizard