Meaning of "marker supply low" from printer window

Mac OS X: About the Reset Printing System feature ...

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1341?viewlocale=en_US

In System Preferences>Fax & Print, Right click or Control+click on the Printers list Sidebar, choose Reset Printing System.

if you hold option and click the "-" tab it resets the printing system.

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20031215144430486

Safe Boot from the HD, (holding Shift key down at bootup).

Any devices that previously appeared in your Printer List and Fax List will need to be added again after resetting the printing system.

Resetting the printing system in Mac OS X

1. To use the Reset Printing System feature in Mac OS X, follow these steps:
2. Choose System Preferences from the Apple menu.
3. Choose Print & Fax from the View menu.
4. Control-click on list of printers on the left side of the window, then choose "Reset printing system" from the contextual menu. If you don't see a list of printers, Control-click on the text "Click + to add a printer or fax" and select "Reset printing system..." 
5.  As an alternative, if you currently have one or more printers listed, you can Option-click the "-" (Remove printer) button.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1341

Reboot.

Same message on Canon Printers.. with OS Catalina ... Canon support have confirmed that this is an Apple OS issue/Apple generated message and is absolutely nothing to do with Printer Firmware or the printer driver...reinstalling the printer driver will sometimes clear the message but it returns!!! so we need a response from Apple Support to tell us what it actually means!

I suspect it's a software bug and it should report Ink Supply low and should clear when you replenish the Ink but it gets stuck.. doesn't seem to impact printing in any way though.

I haven’t.. my experience with trying to get some support is

Apple support they can’t tell me what the message means.. solution reinstall printer drivers, if that doesn’t help reinstall the OS.. If that fails contact canon.

canon support... it’s a known Apple bug error, they Don’t know what the message means don’t know what it means and they know that it will reappear even after doing what Apple suggest..

if you google the message you will see that this all seems to be post Catalina release related, and is appearing with HP, Canon, Epsom, Brother and other printer manufactures. both Inkjet and laser..

What I did find was this on an Epsom post discussing the communication between printer and a windows environment..

• Marker Supplies Description: The name of the consumable.
• 
  
• Marker Supplies Level: The remaining amount of the consumable, expressed in percent.
• 
  
• Marker Supplies Type: The type of consumable.
• 
  
• Marker Supplies Class: Indicates whether this supply entity represents a supply container that is consumed or a receptacle that is filled. 

So I think it’s Safe to say it’s consumable related, and there is a mismatch or bug that means the printer information is not in sync with the OS so rather than it reporting ink low or maintenance cartridge low it shows this bogus message which is then not cleared when the consumable is replaced and this gets stuck.

there will I’m sure be a config or log file somewhere that stores this “marker supply low” flag which if edited or replaced will reset it.. haven’t found it in the usual places though.. If I could it would be an easy job to create and run a script as a maintenance task to clear it..

There are several similar topics at HP support about this issue; some older, others newer.

A few suggested solutions; some appear conclusive within circumstances they worked.

First topic below is newest. See internal links if this HP issue; other brands, see theirs.

• Marker Supply Low | HP Community - 7346686

https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Inkjet-Printing/Marker-Supply-Low/td-p/7346686

Latest from above thread:

https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Inkjet-Printing/Marker-Supply-Low/m-p/7447697/highlight/true#M841851

• "solved" - re: Out of Marker supply message | HP Support Community - 6120040 (10-20019)

https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Inkjet-Printing/Out-of-marker-supply-message/m-p/7283441/highlight/true#M826745

similar search result examples - among others:

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=HP+ink+cartridge+Marker+Supply+Low&t=ffsb&ia=web

Add firmware: HP offers that suggestion, maybe someone there has newer link for most recent?

PS: noted recent reply above after posting mine.

 Updating or Upgrading Printer Firmware. (for HP laserjet &/or inkjet printers)

Information within this HP support article should be useful with upgrades.

This may (or not) give you some ideas on why Firmware could affect printer.

Good luck & happy trails!🌻☃️

If you press and hold the power button for 60secs.

It will drain the static charge in the printer.

And sometimes it may fix the issue.

Cheers.

Sandytechy20

I am an HP Employee

https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Inkjet-Printing/Out-of-marker-supply-message/m-p/6127526#M626076

After reinstalling drivers etc etc the message re appears, l spoke to apple who advised reinstallation of the OS but I’ve seen posts suggesting that that does not fix and I have better things to do with my life so I’ve simply ignored the message, after many weeks it doesn’t appear to cause any issues..

I went to Vuescan and downloaded it but I have to pay for that and kind of defeats the purpose of me having scanning capabilities that came with the printer for free. Now that I've downloaded that file scanning doesn't show up as an option on the Canon printer. I've deleted all the Vuescan files and I still can't scan anything. I'm so frustrated. I've also deleted the drivers on the printer and reinstalled and still no scanner.

Correct.. it’s an Apple issue, nothing to do with printer drivers, firmware etc.. but as I and others have posted it can be ignored.. there are things that may get rid of the message like reinstalling IOS but it will come back again so a waste of time

I'm not able to print since the Marker Supply Low started showing, so it has either impacted printing capability or it's just coincidence that it happened at same time that I get an 'Offline' message. It has always been fine before. Thoughts?

This thread remains a mystery.. still nobody knows what the message “marker supply low” actually means.. for me it’s clear that it does not impact print functionality in any way on my canon printers but I would still like to know what Actually is the “marker supply” that’s reported to be low.. perhaps the guy writing the code was running low on magic markers!!

Perhaps the Mac thinks the mystery non existent “marker supply” has run out.😊. I haven’t had any issues printing so it could be a coincidence .. BDAqua has made a good suggestion to try resetting the printing system.. I had to do that a few years back when a driver install failed.. it fixed the non printing problem for me.. would be interested to see if this permanently gets rid of the message , it’s one thing I haven’t tried, didn’t think it worth it as other posts suggest the message comes back even after reinstalling the OS..

I'm also having printer issues. I have a Macbook Pro with MacOS Catalina and a Canon Pixma Pro-100. Both purchased within the last 6 months. The black ink shows that it is getting low. The error messages I'm getting are "spool area full", "marker supply low" and printer status shows "operator error, support code 1062". I have not yet replaced the ink cartridges but my last print jobs looked absolutely fine. I've definitely printed less than 100 pages since I bought this printer. Thanks for any insights.

Thanks Digitaloak for all your replies/insights. I'll replace the the black ink cartridge and see what happens. Probably a long chat with apple and canon. That was the case when I first set up printer - hours on phone with the techs from both companies-- all thanks to upgrading to a computer that has Catalina.