A Word About Paper

Most people don't even think about paper-except for marketing departments. The paper just magically comes out of the printer and is put in there by the paper gods. Knowing what paper you have is important. Having the wrong paper selected could possibly damage your printer or give you a crappy-looking finished product.

When I was in Egypt I saw a fascinating demonstration of how the ancient Egyptians made paper. They wove the water-soaked papyrus strands into a mat and then put them in a press. The finished produt is rough by our standards, but rather nice considered it's just a bunch of leaves. Modern paper was made from cotton, but today it's made from a combination of cotton and wood pulp. Paper is sold by weight; the most come is 20 lb. bond paper and an 8.5 x 11" ream will weigh in at five pounds.

If you buy paper that is too thin for your printer or for your printer settings; if you buy it too thick, you can jam or possibly damage feed mechanisms. It's important not to store paper for too long or in a place with excessive humidity. This can damage the paper even though your eye can not see the damage. The printer will know and not like it.

For best quality printing, use quality paper. For photograph printing, buy the recommended photo paper for that model printer.  It will be more expensive, but it will be more likely to produce lab-quality results and your treasured memories deserve it. Even with the best-quality paper, you can spoil your results if you are using a cartridge that you refilled yourself. All inks are not the same and probably the ink you refilled with is thinner than the ink that came with the cartridge originally. Also, refilling means the printhead doesn't get replaced so you can suffer from poor print quality from that. Refilling toner is also not a good idea. If you are suffering from poor laser printing quality, it may be the toner cartridge is a recycled or refilled one. The photosensitive drum is housed in the toner cartridge in some models; if it's refilled, then the drum doesn't get replaced when it needs to be. If you are unsure about this, ask your printer vendor if that's the case.  It's better to be green by printing only what you really need and don't print unecessary things like emails. Recycle your toner cartridges, (but just don't buy recycled ones).

When printing labels (a paper product), if you see that a label is starting to peel, discard the whole sheet, the others may peel off inside the printer and jam it.