Help needed: Canon iP4000 printing color instead of B/W

[Trigger 37]

minstrel, I think "Jackson" gave you the clue on duplex, but your response was kind of terse. Anyway, I have about 6 different Canon printers and all of them use pretty much the same driver, and it always works. If yours is having problems it should not be that hard to re-install it.

To get the printer to print in Pigment black only, reguardless of duplex mode, you need to go to the "Print Advisor" and select "Fast Black", then click on next. This will take you to the next page where you can confirm you are using plain paper,... then click OK and you should be ready to print. This function works everytime for me and as I have said, on my PC I have about 10 printers installed, and each of the works fine.

If this is not working for you,... and you want additional help, add to your post a step by step process you are using to print anything. This would include as an example; File>Print>select printer>Preferences>Main>Print Advisor>Fast Black>------etc.

 

[minstrel]

Yes, the advice to turn off duplex printing was very good. I didn't mean my reply to seem terse. It was meant as a joke. "When in doubt, reinstall" is used a lot about Windows and Windows drivers around here.

I will try your approach, even though my driver is in Swedish, so "Print Advisor" is probably called something completely unexpected, as was the "duplex" checkbox. But I'll find it, no doubt.

Cheers!

 

[minstrel]

It doesn't really help that there are three places where you can set the printing options. There's the "standard" printing options in the Advanced tab in the properties for the printer, the "Printer settings" in the General tab, and then again the Options when you're printing.

 

[minstrel]

I tried using the Print Advisor, and got the same results as with choosing greyscale "manually", so to speak. It works for single sided printing, but not for duplex printing. The printer still goes into color printing mode when doing duplex printing. This has to be a bug in the driver. Or maybe it's a scheme to drain people's color cartridges if they use duplex printing, forcing them to buy more ink cartridges?

Anyway, thanks to everyone for the suggestions. Much appreciated.

 

[jackson]

This duplex 'driver bug', is no bug.The fact is, is that it has been kicked around forums for a while.
Canon designed it the way it works.


http://www.stevesforums.com/forums/view_topic.php?id=95623&forum_id=40

 

[fotofreek]

An added dimension - don't use your printer if any of the carts are empty. You will clog and/or burn out nozzles. Remember that the printer automatically does periodic cleanings of all nozzles, so any cart that is nearly empty will be emptied, even if you don't print color images. If you really don't want to ever print color I would suggest that you buy decent quality aftermarket carts - several people here use G&G carts - just to keep all the nozzles alive.

 

[ghwellsjr]

If none of your color cartridges were empty, and you did duplex printing in greyscale on plain paper, the printer would reduce the intensity of the pigment black and add or substitute various combinations of dye colors to produce the correct intensity of grey. But since some of your colors are out of ink, the combination no longer produces grey. I'm guessing that when you say your printer is printing in color when you specify duplex plain paper greyscale printing, it is not printing a normal, acceptable color image, but rather a weird looking, off-color image.

In my first post answering your question I should have also directed you to the FAQ: What is the difference between pigment and dye based ink? A new answer has been added that may provide you with more relevant information.

 

[minstrel]

This duplex 'driver bug', is no bug.The fact is, is that it has been kicked around forums for a while.
Canon designed it the way it works.


http://www.stevesforums.com/forums/view_topic.php?id=95623&forum_id=40

Thanks! That was exactly the information I was looking for!

I still think it's weird, since duplex printing is mainly (I'd guess 95% or more of the time) done with black and white text from a word processor, so it seems silly that you are forced to print that using the color cartridges. Definitely a design flaw, IMO.

 

[Trigger 37]

I don't think it is a design flaw at all. They did it on purpose to force people to use more ink. I learned a long time ago that Lexmark was doing the same thing. You really never knew when you were printing something in black ink or a mixture of colors, until you ran out of ink.

Canon has known about this issue for a long time. If it was a mistake they would have fixed their driver, even if they had to re-write it. They have a very easy way of distributing software fixes,.. if they want to. Have you ever seen one? They have updated drivers on their web site, but no one ever finds out about them unless you go there and search for yourself.

I think I will ask Canon Tech support just for fun and see what answer I get. By the way Mintrel, why can't you find a driver that is in the correct language? Why not just use one that is in English? It seems that you can read and write English.

 

[ghwellsjr]

Here's where this has already been discussed, including a report on what Canon says:

http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=7953#p7953