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jamesohagan Author

Level 1

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Color troubles printing to HP Color Laserjet 2600n

We are a school with a networked environment that includes about 40 Macbook Pros and 60 iMacs. Included in there are several eMacs and PCs. Over the past several weeks, our HP Color LaserJet 2600n printers have begun to exhibit printing where rather than the normal color printing, there appears to be added black toner on the print jobs. The PCs and eMacs are not exhibiting this problem at all, thus I eliminated the fuser possibility. I looked more at a potential driver issue.

These 2600n printers are shared out to the MBPs and iMacs via Workgroup Manager. They connect to these printers via Bonjour for printing. We do have an 802.11n wifi network with multiple SSIDs but no matter if it is cnonected over SSID or over wired gigabit ethernet, the problem still exists.

I tried printing via IP address, but the computers would not readily recognize the printers during setup, and when I manually selected the driver, the computers could not connect to the printer.

So, I am trying to figure out why all of a sudden these print jobs are exihibing severe color issues.

iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.7)

Posted on May 5, 2011 9:58 AM

70 replies

Sep 28, 2011 1:23 PM in response to Daniel Ball

Daniel Ball wrote:

Well I am tired of waiting on HP for a fix. I still want them to fix this problem, but in the mean time here is a package I made.

Install it at your own risk, but shouldn't break anything.

Just be sure to read the comments when installing! When setting up the printer you may see two drivers, don't pick the 1.3.0.261 driver. Pick the plain "HP Color LaserJet 2600n" driver.

I just took a look at the scripts in you package and I feel I must issue a WARNING to all who might want to use your package. Your scripts will remove all installed printers. That may be fine if the user has only the HP printer you are trying to fix. It could create a lot of extra work for anyone that has more than one printer queue.

Sep 28, 2011 2:21 PM in response to Matt Broughton

I said to be sure to read the comments when installing......open the package and read the warning.

Here is what is says:

Having issues with printing black or a dark haze over graphics when printing to the HP 2600n on 10.6.6 --> 10.7.1???

Issue seems to happen if you have the printers firmware updated to the latest of 20070716 and installed the HP Apple 2.5.2 printer package or later. Any 2600n driver after 1.3.0 seems to be faulty from my testing.

**WARNING**

Installing this package will remove all printers from your computer**

**NOTE**

You may see two drivers available "HP Color LaserJet 2600, 1.3.0.261" and "HP Color LaserJet 2600n". Pick the "HP Color LaserJet 2600n" driver. DO NOT USE DRIVER 1.3.0.261.

To check your driver, after setting up the printer double click the print queue then select Printer Setup from tab bar and see if the driver version is 1.3. If so you should have successful printer again!!

Package will make changes to the following:

/Library/Printers/HP

/Library/Printers/PPDs

/private/etc/cups/printers.conf

/private/etc/cups/ppd

Sep 28, 2011 3:14 PM in response to Daniel Ball

Daniel Ball wrote:

I said to be sure to read the comments when installing......open the package and read the warning.

I plead guilty to not having read the Read Me file in the package. My apologies if I offended you. However, you can never issue too many warnings if you are going to wipe out all of a user's printers.

Sep 28, 2011 3:42 PM in response to Matt Broughton

Ha ha!! Caught you!! Knew you didn't read it!! PO'd me at first.....caught me at work at a bad moment!!....lol No problem!

Also if you seen in that script you can revert the ppd and printers.conf back from the backup thats made if the user is familiar with the command line. Most likely they won't be, but its there if needed I hope.

Well I do see a problem though will have to update that....I forgot to test mv -R for the ppd directory. Don't need the -R.

Sep 28, 2011 4:30 PM in response to Daniel Ball

Updated Links for new package…..updated wording in read me and fixed the script that runs to make a backup copy of the ppd folder found in /private/etc/cups/

http://www.mediafire.com/?wiyyt85b97xh6g5

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/18068810/HP2600n_Fix.zip

Sep 28, 2011 5:00 PM in response to Daniel Ball

Daniel Ball wrote:

Ha ha!! Caught you!! Knew you didn't read it!! PO'd me at first.....caught me at work at a bad moment!!....lol No problem!

Looks like we caught each other at just the wrong time. I saw your second post about having a new download link. I decided to take a look at it even though I don't have the HP LJ 2600. I was busy doing some other work myself when I took a quick break to check out the package. After checking out the contents, I pulled the scripts and had a look. All I saw was a big red flag -- how dare he do that -- and I posted my reply before even thinking about anything else. I know better than that.

It was only after I finished my other work that I rememberred that you had very specifcally told people to be sure to read and follow the instructions. Oops.

I just noticed you rememberred to set the sticky bit on /Library in the updated packaging. I've missed that before too. 🙂

Oct 7, 2011 12:18 AM in response to Daniel Ball

Sadly, after installing, it doesn't worked for me. The only driver I can get is the infamous 1.3.0.261. I tried to add a new printer with no result, a restart was, also, unsuccessful.

However, I can see a new folder named ppd_old in /etc/cups.

Using a iMac with Lion 10.7.1

Oct 7, 2011 7:57 AM in response to luis manuelfromsevilla

Hmmm........try holding option down while you click the - sign in the printer System Preference. This will reset the printing system. Then try and add the printer again. When selecting the driver there should be two.

Can try running the package again and see what happens.

Oct 7, 2011 11:46 AM in response to Daniel Ball

Still no luck. Same 1.3.0.261 driver. I tried to install again, after the reset, but I got the same result.

Could it have something to do with the system language (spanish)? I don't think so, but...

Oct 7, 2011 11:58 AM in response to luis manuelfromsevilla

Wouldn't think so but not sure!

If you Get Info on the 2600 driver in /Library/Printers/PPDs/Contents/Resources/ What is the date of the driver? Should be Sunday, May 2, 2010 4:38 PM

How many HP Color LaserJet 2600 drivers do you installed in there? Might be others under English.lproj or something as well.

This happened to me when I was trying to figure out the issue, but I made this package and installed it on a couple of machines and didn't see the issue again. Was hoping the package was complete then. Not sure what would cause that. If the driver is in place it should find it.

Oct 7, 2011 12:56 PM in response to Daniel Ball

The date is the correct one; and there is an English.lproj folder, but there are only HP officejet and Photosmart drivers in there.

However in printer prefs I am only able to choose between 1.3.0.261, generic PCL printer or select software.

Inside printer's folder there is an hp folder with an laserjet/ 2600Series/ various plugins.

Oct 7, 2011 7:24 PM in response to luis manuelfromsevilla

Well the only thing I can think of is the following:

If this is your only printer......

- Backup and delete /Library/Printers/hp and any other folders except PPDs folder.

- Then under /Library/Printers/PPDs/Contents/Resources/ backup and delete everything in there except the Enlgish.lproj. Go under English.lproj and backup and remove everything in there.

- Reset Printing System by holding option and clicking the minus button in the Printers System Preferences.

- Then run my package and try again.

Oct 8, 2011 11:10 PM in response to Daniel Ball

I tried everything but i got the same result. The strange thing is that, with only one driver in the folder, I still can chose between several printer models when I choose "select printer software" under the driver tab.

There is, now, only one color LaserJet; but is the 1.3.0.261. I left everything as it was before.

Oct 19, 2011 6:59 AM in response to jamesohagan

This is FIXED Finally!!! Here is the link to the new Driver from HP. I have my beautiful printer back!

http://support.apple.com/kb/DL907

Oct 19, 2011 9:32 AM in response to AcousticDi

The 2.7 version of the package has been out since early August and still has the same 1.3.0.261 driver. Mine printed fine as well for a little while with this package, but it re-appears.

Only good fix for me was to revert to older HP software that my package does:

http://www.mediafire.com/?wiyyt85b97xh6g5

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/18068810/HP2600n_Fix.zip

Color troubles printing to HP Color Laserjet 2600n