How to ACTUALLY reset ink absorber count on MG2400 and MG2500 printers

[antoniu200]

Hello,

The last few months, I have been banging my head against the wall trying to reset the ink absorber count on my Canon MG2450.
I bought a new ink absorber for it on AliExpress, but, as you could imagine, the printer's software didn't care.

Before you waste your time reading this, to fix this error, you will need soldering experience, an EEPROM programmer (3.3V will do) and TSSOP-8 to DIP-8 adapter PCB, like this:

However, any decent local electronics repair shop should be able to help you with the soldering / de-soldering part, as long as you can cover for (at least a part of) the rest.

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Let's start with the beginning: opening up the printer.
To pop off the scanner unit, follow this tutorial here:

However, once he is saying "do not pull it right away", stop.
Before taking off the scanner unit on top, you should first take off the trim for the buttons on the top-left:

This will help you disconnect and reconnect all flex cables - thus avoiding any damage to them (they aren't of amazing quality).
To do this, lift up the rear side of the scanner unit: there is an anchor point somewhere there for the trim piece. Try to pop it. The next anchor points are along the left side, which you can easily pop by pulling the trim to the right and then up.

Now you have access to the scanner unit and the button PCB flex cables. Disconnect them from the main PCB (the big, green one inside the printer - not the one where the buttons are). Try to avoid disconnecting the flex cable from the buttons PCB, as the connector is very sensitive: it moves way too much and you might break something (at least I didn't take my chances).

Once you've done this, the scanner unit is free. You may lift it safely and put it aside.

You're going to have to clean the previous ink absorber, or at least the place where it used to sit in (depending whether or not you want / can source a replacement absorber). I highly recommend using gloves for this, because there will be a LOT of ink in the absorber and in & around its place.
To clean the absorber, use tap water - preferably warm. It will take quite a while and it will never really have the full capacity it had when it was new: approx. 70% of the original each time you reuse it.
IMPORTANT: If you do decide to just reuse the old one, to know whether the absorber needs cleaning or not, do some regular cartridge checks using the driver's embedded test print. If the grey printed by the color cartridge has a slight yellow / magenta / cyan tint to it, that means the printer cannot properly clean the cartridge anymore - which means you will have to clean / replace the absorber.

To clean up the absorber spot, just use some wipes and some paper towels, if needed. Just make sure to clean up properly and not leave any hair or paper residue behind. That spot should be as clean as possible.

Next, you will need to remove the PCB.

When working with such flex cables, always make sure to grab them by the blue part (if available), because it is tougher. Otherwise, you risk bending the cables too much and breaking them.

The PCB:

Top side / bottom side

For the MG2400 series (should be the same for MG2500), on the top side, you will have a SOP-8 EEPROM, which contains executable code in S-record format.
We are not interested in that one (a mistake I made), but rather a smaller IC on the bottom side, that stores settings and stats:

You will have to de-solder it off the printer PCB and solder it to the adapter PCB, then plug it into your EEPROM programmer. The IC is an ST M24C08, you should be able to find specifications online.
Be very careful at pin orientation! The IC only goes one way and you may fry it by soldering it in reverse!

We are working with (per ST specs):

• Voltage: 1.8 V to 5.5 V
• Size: 8 Kbit (1 Kbyte) of EEPROM
• Page size: 16 byte
• Speed: 100 kHz - 400 kHz

Now that you have de-soldered and set up your programming environment for the EEPROM, you will need to read and save the data on it (keep a copy, I mean it!). After you have done so, open it inside your hex editor of choice (I recommend ImHex, but you may use simpler tools like HxD). It would be preferable to view the data in 8 Bytes per row.

You need to copy the below values and replace the ones currently in your extracted file, from address F0 to the very end of the file. These are some clean hex values that reset every printer setting back to default, including the ink absorber (except the region, serial number, etc):

Spoiler: Settings (long!)

A3 A5 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 FF FF FF FF
A3 A5 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 FF FF FF FF
B8 7C 0D 46 00 00 03 F0
50 83 48 66 FA 40 88 ED
7C 92 77 20 43 02 18 01
AE 01 14 01 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 33 24 03 00 33 24 03
00 00 00 00 BE FF BE FF
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 FF 00 3C 3C
3C 3C 3C 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 3C 3C
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF
B8 7C 0D 46 00 00 03 F0
50 83 48 66 FA 40 88 ED
7C 92 77 20 43 02 18 01
AE 01 14 01 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 33 24 03 00 33 24 03
00 00 00 00 BE FF BE FF
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 FF 00 3C 3C
3C 3C 3C 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 3C 3C
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF
5D D4 86 08 00 00 32 31
30 30 30 37 30 30 FF FF
A5 A6 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 FF 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 FF FF FF FF

Once you've overwritten the aforementioned values, use the new file and write it to the EEPROM (erase, write, verify).
You are done! All you have to do now is reassemble and test.

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I provided all values that were needed to reset the printer settings, because I could not figure out exactly which part of the EEPROM handles the ink absorber. With some more testing, I would probably have been able to, but I think I would end up destroying all flex cables in this printer before that happened...

In any case, these values successfully reset my aging MG2450 back to brand new condition, no more error 1700 or 5B00.

To get a new ink absorber, know that the same absorber is used in MG2400, MG2500, MG2900 and MG3000 printers - so, many models. I, for one, found it on AliExpress listed for MG3080.

As a future project, it would be interesting to see if we could make use of Pin 7, which is Write Protection (enabled if high - Vcc, disabled otherwise). Canon connected this pin to GND, but maybe we could use some epoxy to cover the pad on the board, then bridge Pin 7 to Pin 8 (Vcc) and hence prevent the printer from ever complaining about the ink absorber - but this means saving the config when ink level checking is off: otherwise, the printer will refuse to print, since that setting is also saved on that EEPROM.

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Anyway, thank you for taking the time to read this, hoping it was a pleasant lecture and a help to you guys.

If I can help any further, please let me know. I will be glad to help.

 

[Hogwild]

Wow, thanks for that. I assume you'd tried all the normal methods before resorting to this? This is what I see in the service manual for the Pixma MG2100 MF3100 MG4100 MG2200 MG3200 MG4200:


11 Clear Ink Counter Ink absorber counter resetting

Set a sheet of A4 or Letter sized paper in the front tray. Select one of the options (listed below) from the

pull-down menu, and click Set. After the ink absorber counter is reset, the counter value is printed automatically.

- Main_Black:

Resets the main ink absorber counter for Black - Main_Color:

Resets the main ink absorber counter for Color - Platen_Away:

Resets the counter of the platen ink absorber

opposite to the home position - Platen_Home:

Resets the counter of the platen ink absorber on the

home position side. - All:

Resets all the four ink absorber counters.