PRO-100, Magenta hue, even B&W

[The Hat]

@Joe Soap has a point, before you can solve a problem you must first understand what the problem is, so it’s imperative to start at the beginning...

Not sure why my observation of no problem with the yellow nozzles would even be called into question.

No one is questioning your observations...

 

[Paul Verizzo]

As I said, nozzle test just fine. Also as said, didn't have time until last night. Not only is it OK, but a little test print shows that the magenta hue is MUCH worse!

Strangerer and strangerer. No streaking, nothing leaking.

 

[The Hat]

@Paul Verizzo, Thank you for the nozzle check, and yes it does tell us what we wanted to know, there is a problem with it.

I am not too sure about the BK, LGY and GY inks, because they all look the same on your poor nozzle print, but your Magenta and Photo Magenta inks are reversed, and that’s probably why your getting the magenta hue in your photos.

Purge the Photo Magenta cart before refilling and suck out as much of the photo magenta ink from the Magenta cart and just refill that with the proper ink, and your hue will disappear...

 

[PeterBJ]

Here is a thread about the same error.

 

[Paul Verizzo]

Thanks for that great observation, Hat. It so happens that I ordered more magenta's from PC after I refilled the carts. Did I make a mistake? Sure looks like it.

It's also time to change out the original yellow to PC's empty cart. Fun, fun.......

 

[PeterBJ]

....It so happens that I ordered more magenta's from PC after I refilled the carts. Did I make a mistake? Sure looks like it........

Probably. The photo magenta could be considered a "diluted version" of the regular magenta. The concentration of dye in the photo magenta might be only 15% of that in the regular magenta, so they are not interchangeable.

 

[Paul Verizzo]

UPDATE: Since Precision Color wasn't shipping for a week or more (second time I ordered at a bad time!) I bought a set of compatible cartridges from Amazon for $24. At first I was impressed, by that I mean they were branded on the cartridge and came with a warranty card and a website. www.sophiaglobal.com So I popped in yellow, as my original was out of ink, and the two magentas. Photo Cyan was Canon, the other four colors were from PC.

My usual "throw away" testing and casual paper is Canon Matte, cheap and it is Canon. In a word, Ugh. I had to experiment with Intensity and Contrast to get something close to reasonable. I also then noticed that the carts have a "false wall" inside, reducing the ink capacity by perhaps a third! I can't imagine that being more cost effective than 4ml of ink.

Then my new PC inks came. I already had the empty yellow cartridge and PC ink. Since I seemed to have loaded the wrong ink into my PM cartridge, I easily and successfully flushed it out. (A 1/4" hole at the top of the sponge chamber on the narrow side, using the faucet into all three holes, blow it out with compressed air, dry overnight at 150 degrees (F!) in the toaster oven, plugged the hole with hot glue. Frankly, easier than the yellow cartridge chip transfer and fill.)

My favorite test image is something I found online many years ago from tssphoto.com . No longer around. It has six small images and a 45 square color matrix and 9 black/gray ones. I took the image and made it full range, the whites 0 and the blacks 255, saved as TIF. Then converted to grayscale and put both on the same page.

The most useful small image involves flesh tones. That and the overall b&w half allows instant quality judgment, color - or lack of in the b&w side - and contrast.

So I'm back at all PC inks except for the Photo Cyan. Deep cleaned to rid the head of old ink, did a test pattern, and ran my test image.

Stunning isn't too much hyperbole to say how true it is. Very close to my uncalibrated monitor, and what difference there is, I'll bet the Canon (and PC inks) technology is closer to the truth than my monitor.

Five stars for Mike and Precision Colors! And thanks for the previous comments and suggestions.

(I tried to upload my test image, but it's in TIF format. I can upload to OneDrive if anyone wants it.)

 

[PeterBJ]

Nice to hear the printer is now OK again.

One of my favourite programs is Irfan View. It is freeware and among other things it can handle and convert a lot of image file types. It can also convert TIF to JPG or PNG which are accepted file types for forum use. A download is found here, remember to also get the plugins.

 

[Paul Verizzo]

Yes, I have been a huge Irfanview fan for almost 20 years. Does most of what I need w/o lots of unwanted, often confusing options in other programs, and fast. Too bad it doesn't have a decent Thumbnails function with a library. Moving into my new home a couple of years ago, I printed many photos for my walls. And discovered that IV has an incredible function that allows me to PRINT the mats onto the images! Yes, uses a lot of black and gray inks, but still a lot cheaper than real ones. And one can change border colors and widths to match or emphasize photo moods.

I also use, mostly use, the now gone Picasa that was a Google product. Very fast, lots of functions, easy to use..........with a few quirks that Google never took care of. I have the EXE of the last version.

I also use the Windows version of digiKAM www.digikam.org . A linux product in its DNA; extremely versatile, think of it as open source Lightroom. And free.

As I don't do things like layers and such, these three programs meet all my needs.

Here's a JPG version of my test print.