No longer printing in black

If there is adequate black and magenta ink in there, and nozzle clean has no effect, then I think the print head may have failed. You can buy these replacements, eBay lists them, but it may be more economical to buy a new printer, for which you will have a warranty.
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OfficeJet 7880 Not Printing


A little more information would have been helpful in troubleshooting this problem. Did the printer ever work correctly? Did it just start printing yellow lines one day? Has it been out of use for a long time or, did you buy it in this condition. Also, is your computer a Windows PC or a Mac and which version of the OS are you using?


If you don\'t have the manual, you need to download one. I saw a link in a previous post or you can go to HP.com. The manual is crap as far as troubleshooting but it has all the part numbers of ink cartridges and printheads.


From the skimpy info you have supplied, I am going to assume there is something wrong in the ink supply system.


1. First you need to print a test page to find out if anything other than yellow can get to the paper. Find the HP Printer Utility. Again, not knowing what computer and OS you are using, I can\'t give you any explicit info. On Windows you might find something in Control Panels>Printer or under Programs you might find the HP Printer Utility. On a Mac maybe System Preferences>Printers or Go>Applications>HP Control Center.


2. If it only prints yellow boxes, or yellow boxes with streaks, you can run the Clean Printheads utility and reprint the test page. If you get more yellow or other colors start to show up, this indicates there\'s something wrong in the whole ink supply chain.


The HP 7xxx printers use the CYMK color system and have separate ink cartridges for each color: cyan, yellow, magenta, and black(K). In addition, the printheads are separate from the ink cartridges: yellow/black printhead and cyan/magenta printhead.


3. The problem could be in the ink cartridges or the printheads, or both. If the printer has been sitting for a long time, the ink will gel and clog up the whole system. Check the ink cartridges first. Are all four of them installed? Are they HP brand? Take them out one at a time, shake them and the reinstall them. Print another test page. Did anything change?


4. If more colors are printing, even with streaks, you should probably replace all the cartridges with GENUINE HP cartridges that are not expired. This could cost you $50-$60 on an eBay purchase but if you buy non-HP, or expired cartridges, you will not be a happy camper, long term. If you want to do this on the cheap, buy a black cartridge and see if you can at least start printing text. If you\'re making progress, you can buy the color cartridges later.


5. If replacing the cartridges fixed the problem, you\'re home relatively "free". If you have to replace either or both of the printheads, this can be expensive. They can run from $50-$100 each, so you\'ll have to make a decision on how much you want to spend on a printer that sold for $175 at Costco 6-7 years ago. Don\'t get me wrong, this is one of HP\'s better print engines but you will have to make an economic decision based on how much it\'s going to cost to bring this printer back to life. You can probably pick up a used 7xxx printer on Craigslist for $50-$75.


Hope this helps.

Hi Collin, These HP's are known to be somewhat of a pain, not a great printing system, but to be honest I not a fan of inkjets of any discripition, such a messy and costly way of acheiving a colour print. Give me a Oki or Kyocera Laserprinter/toner based print system anyday but that for you to think of for the future....

I also find many issues with ink quality of refills (toner and ink refill quality causes 9 out of 10 print quality service calls, great for business;)

But if you have found a constant reliable medium then that shouldn't be the issue, but if a cartridge wasn't performing correctly then you insert one that does you will have to prime the good ink threw the system before you will see any result, and is seems to me that the real issue is some but not all of required quanity of magenta ink isn't flowing threw to you prints hence faint and streaky, have you tried fitting a known good ink and priming a few times? Heres the instructions from the web, let me know how you go, theres not many options really but I always start with known unquestionable good ink, just because 9.5 out of 10 times it is the issue and to fix or to write off stuff with any certainy you got to start from a solid starting block.

Please follow this procedure and tell me if it improves you mag image at all

Try doing the priming session about 3 times in a row without testing & then do a self test print-out. I have seen about a 25% success rate. Hold down the (OK & HELP) buttons & keep them held while plugging in the power cord & if it doesn't automatically power on then also hit the power button. Keep the OK & Help buttons held down till the printer turns itself off all by itself or goes right into the priming session. If it turns off then let go of the 2 buttons & just hit the power button once & it will go right into the priming session for about 4 minutes .

Cheers

Steve

Try printing multiple layers using the spot printing function in the ALPS driver.

Check the ink levels- it sounds like your Magenta is out- HP deskjets use CMYK to mix the colors- C = Cyan, M= Magenta, Y = yellow, K = intensity (black). Red is usually a blend of Magenta + Yellow- so if you don't have magenta ink in your printer, when you try to print out something in red- it will come out yellow

I’m happy to help further over the phone at https://www.6ya.com/expert/susan_42b401e0b1603d8a

This is a known issue with these Brother InkJets, here's my solution for someone else with the same issue:
Note: If this model doesn't have a number pad to enter Maintenance mode try:
Menu, Mono Start, Up Up Up Up
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Unfortunately this is a known issue with these machines and often times the printhead needs to be replaced which need to be done by a service technician.
If it's still under warranty you can contact brother who will direct you to a local warranty shop for service, if it's out of warranty all you can do is try running the Power Purge operation a few times to see if it clears up.
If the Power Purge doesn't help and it's out of warranty you'll need to replace the printer as the cost of fixing it will be more than the cost of a new printer.

Here's my solution on how to run the cleaning mode from another post here on FixYa:

You'll have to run the cleaning mode a few times,
to do so you'll have to get into Maintenance Mode.

To do this:
Press MENU then * then 2 then 8 then 6 then 4
This takes some practice and you have to press them all within a few seconds.
If the machine doesn't say MAINTENANCE when you do it press STOP/EXIT and try again.

When in Maintenance Mode:
Press 7 then 6, then press 3, then press BLACK START
It will say Cleaning - this will take some time when it's done it will go back to MAINTENANCE

After it's completed try 0 then 9, this will print out a small Print Quality test page
it should have several rows of each color (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black)
if they still don't look right then run the cleaning mode again and then print another quality page.

Continue to do this until the quality is back to normal,
when you're done to exit maintenance mode press 9 then 9 to return to normal operation.

note: this cleaning mode uses up a fair amount of ink, use sparingly

note: maintenance mode is for brother technicians and has some codes that can damage your machine, only use the codes I've explained in this solution

I'm not familiar with Lexmark but I think your printer is set only to print on black cartridge (black only option) There's something wrong with the settings. Check the settings, look for the color options.

I have a similiar issue that just started happening recently - the printer shows FULL inks but the PC thinks it has empty inks. I tried the * #, 123 reset hardware failures, but that didnt help. Printer run self diagnostics says all is fine....

I am using USB connections - and this has been fine for years, until now. Maybe a microsoft patch issue?

go into printer and faxes and and right click on your printer and and go to printer Prefereces you should see either print in black in white or gray scale

this should fix it for you

Good Luck

Happy Computing

Your MP500 is similar to my MP780. I don't think you can get anything from the stores. It is hard to tell if the yield of 200 is accurate or not. It probably is but a lot depends o the images and text you are printing. If you print the color red, your yellow and magenta cartridges will be used to produce red. So in effect you will use up 2 colors to produce one color. To print something in greed your printer will mix the Cyan and Yellow (I think) and for blue it will mix Cyan and Magenta. So if you are wanting to print something for your own use, I suggest you print in black/greyscale only and in draft mode. However for presentation, I think it is best you do the standard printing. Black in draft mode I understand only uses the PG5 black cartridge. If you print anything in colors specially pictures, there is no way to accurately determine the yield and not a good idea to scrimp on the ink or else you get a poor quality picture.