Ask HN: How do you keep your printer operating | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How do you keep your printer operating

2 pointsBatFastard4 comments

I have an inkjet printer at home, but it only gets used occasionally. This seems to cause the ink in the jets to dry up and ruin the print over time. So I was thinking, "Maybe I just need to print something everyday, or every few days" to keep the heads in good shape. Does anyone have a simple way to schedule a print job to run automatically? One caveat, it needs to work on a Windows 10 machine which is the only one that is turned on all the time.

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Windows 10 has a task scheduler (http://superuser.com/questions/982419/setting-a-scheduled-ta...), so that part is easily done. You can also use the command-line print command to print text (http://superuser.com/questions/477895/printing-from-windows-...)

You probably want to print color. For that, using the /p switch with write.exe to print to the default printer may be an option (https://www.techwalla.com/articles/wordpad-command-line-opti...)

Having said that: you probably are better off ditching the inkjet and getting a cheap laser printer. Even if this McGyver trick works flawlessly, it still may be more expensive in ink, paper, and electricity costs.

The only thing inkjet are significantly better at than that cheap laser is printing full-color photos, but doing that at a commercial printer gives even better results, so even if you do that, consider whether having an inkjet at home is worth it.

Search for Windows Task Schedule, there is a graphical tool that lets you define repeating tasks and a CLI option with the AT command. You can also do it from PowerShell by writing a cmdlet.

After having multiple inkjet printers die or have cartridges "expire" well before we'd used up all the ink we switched to an HP laserjet. Costs far more upfront but paid off in minimized frustration over the years. Am on my second HP laserjet in ten+ years. Only change the cartridges every couple of years.

Brother laser printers are cheap and very durable! never had a problem, even with the one i got for $50.

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