HP OfficeJet Pro X451 and X551 Series Printers - Interpret the Print Quality Report

note:

Do not clean the printhead. Cleaning the printhead unnecessarily wastes ink and paper.

1. Resend the print job to see if printing the Print Quality Report resolved the problem.
2. If the print job looks correct, troubleshooting is complete.

1. Make sure cartridges have ink and are properly installed.
2. Perform the Clean Printhead steps in 'Perform a Clean Printhead'.

note:

After each of step, the Print Quality Report prints, which you will use for comparison to see if the defects are improving. Evaluate the Print Quality Report each time it prints to determine if the defect is fixed. If the defect is fixed, troubleshooting is complete.

1. Load the printer with regular, unused white paper.
2. On the printer control panel, press the Home button.
3. Press Setup, and then press Tools.
4. Select Clean Printhead.
   • No defects present: If the Print Quality Report does not have any print defects, continue to 'Perform a Clean Ink Smear'.
   • Defects present: If the Print Quality Report still has defects, clean the printheads again.

note:

After each of step, the Print Quality Report prints, which you will use for comparison to see if the defects are improving. Evaluate the Print Quality Report each time it prints to determine if the defect is fixed. If the defect is fixed, troubleshooting is complete.

1. On the printer control panel, press the Home button.
2. Press Setup, and then press Tools.
3. Select Clean Ink Smear.
   • Defects present: If defects are still present after doing a Clean Ink Smear, do another Clean Ink Smear, especially if the Print Quality Report shows improvement.
   • Defects present after second Clean Ink Smear: If the Print Quality Report still shows defects after a second cleaning, go to the final step in this document.
   • Special case defect: The defect on the Print Quality Report is color variation across the bars (see the table of defects above) and the problem goes away after performing a Clean Printhead, but then reoccurs in the same location on the color bar the next day.
     Check to see if any of the following conditions are true:
     • Prior to the print quality problem, the printer was unused for more than three weeks.
     • The printer was recently moved or experienced a large temperature shift.
     • There was a recent paper jam.
     • The print quality problem seems to be getting better as the printer is used, especially when printing dense backgrounds.
     Conditions ARE true
     If any of the conditions above are true, a printhead recovery may solve the problem. Contact HP for assistance.
     Conditions ARE NOT true
     If the conditions above are not true, the the defect is likely to reoccur, even if a cleaning fixes the problem temporarily. See the final step in this document.

• When printing an image, make sure it has a sufficient resolution. Enlarged images might appear fuzzy or blurry.
• If the problem is confined to a band near the edge of a printout, use the software you installed with the printer, or another software program to rotate the image 180°. The problem might not appear on the other end of the printout.
• Always use the power button to turn off the printer. This protects the printhead from exposure to air.