Printing isn’t cheap. With printer ink costing at least twice as much as premium champagne, you’ll want to get every drop’s worth. Try these simple and proven strategies for prolonging the life of your ink cartridge:
Dismiss Low or Out of Ink Warnings
If you’re receiving a warning from your printer that it’s out of ink or running dangerously low, go ahead and ignore it. In PC World’s article “How Much Ink is Left in That Dead Cartridge?,” a test revealed that most ink cartridges still hold anywhere from 8 to 45% of their ink when the message appears.
Avoid Large Fonts and Bolds
Large fonts and bold text require more ink, so save by slimming down the size of your text. Some ink saving fonts to try are Arial and new courier.
Proofread Before Your Print
Examine your documents carefully before printing them out – you just might save yourself a reprint.
Play With Your Printer Settings
Printers have been purposely set to guzzle ink before leaving the factory. Luckily for us, it’s an easy enough change. Simply update your printer’s default settings. To do this on a Windows-based computer, click start > printers > right click on your printer and choose “preferences”. Changes worth considering include:
- Setting the print quality to “draft”
- Choosing “print in grayscale” to prevent color printing
- Choose “document options” to print multiple pages per sheet
- Only Print What You Need
