Hpdeskjet 5550 color is going south!

[gwqh]

Been trying to print pictures. first one is good, then I start loosing my greens and the pink starts. This usually starts about half way thru the printing process, so the bottom half of my pictures are not the same color as top half. I have changed ink cart -- never mind. I think I just broke it, the plastic cover of the printer was up and the ink cartrige cover was up and it decided to move, running into itself and making a grinding noise. Now all I hear is a computer ding somewhere! Now it has decided to work again, but color is still bad. Anyway, I have changed cartridges, now have 3 color ones open, I dinked around with the type of paper I was using, matte, plain glossy etc. Is there a simple solution - other than the costly one of buying a new printer? Seems I remember something about cleaning the ink cartridge itself? Any help would be appreciated!

 

[sghiznaneck]

Does that model come with software to do maintenance? Have you ran the head cleaning application? If not, remove the ink cartridges as you normally would, and apply alcohol to a Q tip and carefully clean the heads. Insert the cartridges back into the printer and try again. Another problem with HP printers is that everytime you remove the ink cartridges, you have to run the software to align the print heads. This is one of the first printers that I had to do this to after replacing the old ones. You should have a settings option in your software fro mHP. The cartridge alignment program is there.

 

[gwqh]

I will try everything you mentioned in the next couple days -- then post my accomplishments. Not ready to tackle it tonight!
TV got boring -- so I learned there is not enough alcohol in this house to fix this thing, rubbing or otherwise. I tried all three color cartridges - using software I cleaned, then really cleaned, then primed and calibrated. Then moved on to the rubbing alcohol on all three. All I did was manage to keep loosing my yellow as I progressed, totally at one point in time! Anymore brilliant ideas!!! Ha ha

Is it conceivable that I ran out of yellow ink in all three cartridges ? They all appear to be more than half full, Hp tri color. Or would it be more likely that this is mechanical faliure ? I really don't want to spend the money on ink if odds are it is the printer itself - Thanks for any input. now who is trying to be brilliant ! and failing.