Printing a lot is a necessity while paying more for inks often causes the owners to purchase cheap quality inks. But by following a few helpful tips, it will be convenient to save on printing. Saving it to grayscale mode, testing pages, using the right fonts are indeed helpful for saving ink with the printer.
Grayscale Printing
Grayscale printing means the printing that makes use of only the black ink tank. The grayscale printers handling the black and white prints, then the prints will be done automatically. But the printers handling both the black and white as well as color prints, then the grayscale printing has to be manually selected.
The essential factor to remember is the black and white printing always does not equal grayscale printing.
Grayscale and black and white printing is different from the purview of printer and grayscale option. When a color printer is used for printing black and white but not selecting the grayscale option, then often the black ink is created through the varied color mixture, other than using the already existing black ink.
When the grayscale is chosen manually, then printing takes place using the black ink tank, in its place. The manually grayscale printing selection process to print differs, whereas for many Windows computers, clicking on “Print” on a document should be done easily by following the steps.
- The Printer has to be selected and “Printer Properties” have to be clicked – “Properties” – “Options” – “Preferences”. This button can also be called by other names, which can be easily found in the tutorial for the running operating system.
- Right when the Window opens, the “Features” or “Paper Quality” must be selected.
- Next clicking process are – “Advanced” > “Print in Grayscale”>”Black Ink Only”>”Black & White”.
- Now you are ready to start printing in grayscale.
For Mac, grayscale printing selection must be done following a similar process – “File” > “Print” > “Select Printer” > “Quality & Media” > “Grayscale Printing”. There is also a tutorial to guide you clearly.
To get the grayscale as the default setting for Windows 10 computers, these steps –
- Reach the Start Menu and then click on “Settings” > “Devices” > “Printers and Scanners”.
- Scroll to locate “Device and Printers”, where the installed printers will be displayed.
- Click on the necessary printer and then select “Manage”.
- Select “Printing Preferences” situated on the left on the next screen.
- The “Printing Preference” dialog box will be appearing.
- Based on printer manufacturer different layout of options and various tabs will come up, and an area selecting either “Grayscale” or “Color” will be there.
- Choose the “Grayscale” option.
Keep On With Regular Printing
Printing regularly indeed saves ink since the ink is prevented from drying out. If the ink has not been used more recently and is overly dried out then it might have to be disposed of and it will be wasted. You need to ensure printing the pages regularly for the ink to move at its best. What should be done when there is nothing for printing? Well, this is our next tip.
Running a Test Print Page When Printing is Not Being Done Regularly.
When regular printing is not done regularly, then print a test page simply. A test page is quick to print page by following the easy steps. Getting into the test page printing habit semi-regularly is a good idea since test prints are even helpful in identifying a series of issues able to repeatedly occur with the printer, that might go unnoticed.
The test page printing options include – “Start” > “Devices and Printers” >. Right-click on the printer, and then on “Printer Properties” > “Print a Test Page” for the Windows Computer.
For the Apple computers, “Apple”> “Printers and Scanners”> (select the printer) “Open the Print Queue” > “Print Test Page” for the Mac.
Choosing the Ink Saving Font
Being passionate about ink-saving techniques, you can always use the ink-saving font. Varied ink-saving fonts are available, while you could use them without having any hint about it. These fonts include Times New Roman, Calibri, and Garamond are better to conserve ink. Ecofont even comes under this category, which a Netherlands-based company SPRANQ had designed for ink consumption reduction. It gets it done by creating characters having small holes in them that result in fewer pixels.
Saving on printer ink is indeed a very good habit – it is beneficial for the environment and even helps in saving money. The ink saving techniques as discussed here, especially the regular test print running, are indeed helpful in identifying if there are any underlying issues likely to happen to the printer, without realizing anything and so steps can be taken.
Quest 