Printer Weirdness
 

Just bought a brand new ink cartridge for the printer, but I'm having a hell of a time printing out some black&white photos.

If I set the printer properties to "HP Glossy Paper", it runs through as if it's printing (print head moves back and forth, etc.) but the page comes out blank.

If I set it to "Plain Paper", it will print, but has no gray at all (thus losing all detail).

I downloaded the drivers again and it has made no difference. I've also tried sending the print from three different programs (Photoshop, MS Picture Manager and Picasa).

What could be going on?

** I only replaced the black ink cartridge, assuming that black & white images (set as Grayscale in Photoshop [ie no color information]) would not need the color cartridge to print correctly. Am I wrong? **

You need the color cartridge to print black and white photos correctly.

Your printer is printing your photos as it would with the color cartridge installed. You can set it to "black and white only," I believe, but that may depend on the printer model and still probably won't provide photo quality.

alright, good to know. I figured as much, but was hoping to avoid the $20 for another cartridge

I think merleniau is pretty much correct. Regardless of hue, photos use the color cartridges to print. I believe the black cartridges are for when you select text only or something along those lines.

Of course, I could be completely wrong. I'm usually never right about these things.

it wouldn't surprise me if they use the color cartridge for the gray tones. guess i'm ponying up for another cartridge