Take Care of Your Laser Printer
Your laser printer is designed for easy maintenance and to reliably produce high quality printed pages. By occasionally taking a few minutes to care for your printer you can extend its life, reduce the number of service calls and ensure optimum, trouble free printing.
Install your printer in the right place
Place your printer where there is good air flow around it, out of strong light, particularly direct sunlight, and away from other major office equipment. Strong light, especially sunlight, can have two effects. It can increase the operating temperature to the detriment of your printer. Remember that toner is being fused into the paper at a temperature of around 220 degrees Celsius so the inside of your printer is already very hot. Light can "leak" inside the printer affecting the quality of your output. Static electricity from other equipment, such as large photocopiers and certain types of heaters, can cause print quality problems.
Keep your printer clean
Accumulation of dirt and debris causes most damage done to printerssuch as electronic failures. Every time you change the toner cartridge clean out the inside of the printer with a lint free cloth to remove toner and paper dust. Don't neglect the outside. Because the laser printing process uses a lot of static electricity dust is attracted to your printer so clean under and around it.
Manage your toner
All toner cartridges will release some loose toner into the printer. This is why cleaning is important. Check the print density setting to prevent the printer from using too much toner when printing. Modern 1200 dpi lasser printers sacrifices black for better gray scale, so increasing the print density will have little result other than more toner consumed while printing.
Use good quality paper
Cheap paper tends to have a high clay content making it susceptible to swelling (and causing paper jams) in humid weather and in winter. The clay is more abrasive causing greater wear. Find a good quality paper you are happy with and ignore the specials on paper brands you've never heard of. You will save yourself many paper jams and some costly service calls.
Have your printer serviced annually.
If you maintain your printer well then a professional technician should be able to service your prinetr in less than an hour. An annual service and clean will set you up for a trouble free year.
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