I had an HP printer that printed quite well. Didn’t have it for very long, but for the short time it was in service the prints were very good. One day however, a message appeared on my screen, ink threshold exceeded – and the printer would NOT print the one simple page I wanted.

If you have an HP printer, beware, your ink cartridges could expire. The message you may see on your monitor is something to the affect of, ink cartridge nearing expiration or ink threshold exceeded. You’re probably thinking, WTH?

HP, in their infinite wisdom, attempted to scam consumers out of more money by embedding a date code on the ink cartridge chip. If this date falls to far outside of the date your cartridge was installed it will not be usable. It doesn’t matter if it’s full, half full or somewhere in between. This of course negates the possibility of refilling the ink cartridge.

The following printers will have their ink cartridges stop working 12 months after the warranty ends date or 18 months after the cartridge is installed, whichever comes first: Color Inkjet cp1160 series, Officejet d125xi, d135, d145, d155xi, 7110, 7130, 7140xi, HP Fax 610. ALL other printers will have the ink expire 24 months after the warranty ends date or 30 months after the cartridge is installed, whichever comes first.

You may or may not be able to follow a prompt available on the screen once the expiration message occurs that will allow you to bypass the issue and continue printing. It depends on the model of printer and firmware that is set in the machine. What do I recommend to get around this? Buy another printer that is NOT HP brand.