Prints test page but nothing else

[Evi]

I inherited an old HP Deskjet 400. I'm using Windows XP. The printer is
recognized by xp and appears in the Printer and Faxes list. It is the only
printer on the PC. If I press the ink light button it prints a perfect test
page. However, if I try and print anything from Windows, although the
document appears in its list of documents printing, nothing happens. There
is an orange light on the ink button. The cartridge clearly has ink in it
(I can hear it) and the test page shows that the cartridge isn't clogged.
Has anyone seen this before? Is there any point gambling a new ink cartridge
on it?

Evi

 

[Evi]

Well, Jonathan Lowe had a reply for this problem and said:

"Change the printer port setting in bios to SPP or Bi-Directional,
that printer simply cannot cope with the rate of data transferr
with the newer xp ECP or EPP port drivers. I had a lot of trouble
with some 400/420's under win98 and discovered this fix."

This sounds pretty daunting to me.
I know how to get to the screen with the BIOS and CMOS etc but what exactly
do I do when I get there. I don't want to mess it up.

Evi

 

[Evi]

Victor Bajanov had another solution for this:

The fix - go into printer properties, click the Printing Preferences
button in the General tab, in the Paper/Quality tab of the new window
select Black & White. If you have colour selected, but a black cartridge
in the printer, it will move the cartridge out and blink the light, as
if the "change cartridge" button had been pressed, because it wants a
colour cartridge. You will have to do this for each user account on the
computer. (The printer working for some accounts and not others on my PC
is what tipped me off to this).

Sounds a lot less daunting. I'll try it out at work tomorrow.
Evi