Sharp MX2300 printing colours really dark

[Leebs14]

I visited this machine today and it was printing very dark, i cleaned and checked everything and re-calibrated the machine. the quality is actually really good but it is really dark. The strange thing is the internal calibration pages and test prints from the machine all look ok, but when the customer sends a print job (from any application) the print comes out really dark.

Any ideas guys? (they are using PCL6 driver, would a PCL5 driver make any difference?

[bilyahn]

Re: Sharp MX2300 printing colours really dark

When you say you re-calibrated did you do sim 67-24?

[Leebs14]

Re: Sharp MX2300 printing colours really dark

yep i followed the calibration guide in the manual, even using the jig and followed it through. but it still is really dark.

[Akitu]

Re: Sharp MX2300 printing colours really dark

You may need to re-run your halftone pro con, clear the values with sim 44-27 first. These machines are notoriously bad at maintaining their colour quality. In sim 63-11 set it for Def 2 and that will help aid Sharp's weak cyan profile while toning down the strong magenta profile. Do 63-8 after to set the default values as the new target.

When doing sim 46-24 or 67-24 on these machines, repeat the entire process three times for optimal results.

That should help your machine out. Else I would check your default printer exposure settings, someone may have set it higher than the default.

[Leebs14]

Re: Sharp MX2300 printing colours really dark

You may need to re-run your halftone pro con, clear the values with sim 44-27 first. These machines are notoriously bad at maintaining their colour quality. In sim 63-11 set it for Def 2 and that will help aid Sharp's weak cyan profile while toning down the strong magenta profile. Do 63-8 after to set the default values as the new target.

When doing sim 46-24 or 67-24 on these machines, repeat the entire process three times for optimal results.

That should help your machine out. Else I would check your default printer exposure settings, someone may have set it higher than the default.

Thanks, I will try this today and let you know. appreciate your help.

[Leebs14]

Re: Sharp MX2300 printing colours really dark

Thanks, I will try this today and let you know. appreciate your help.

Ok, went back to this machine today and carried out all of the above and it made it slightly better but not much, ended up by choosing custom is the colour section of the driver and increasing the brightness and colour depth and saving it as a profile in the driver settings and it was passable to the customer.

[sharpsetup]

Re: Sharp MX2300 printing colours really dark

You may also try Sim 67-26 and set it to DEF 2. It may help.

[lky1978]

leebs, do you have any official calibration procedure cart for this model?
of course you need special calibration tools like jig and sit chart.
bad dv and drum also can cause "overtone".

[odin]

Re: Sharp MX2300 printing colours really dark

Is the dev overtoned? does the machine indicate errors when you run 25-02?

[Vulkor]

Re: Sharp MX2300 printing colours really dark

Had a similar problem on a MX-3500 with a customer. Turned out they had changed some of the system settings. We had Pm'd it and done the transfer units and all kinds of stuff.

[hellcat]

Re: Sharp MX2300 printing colours really dark

If you say your test prints and everything look fine then chances are you may have settings in the print driver that need changed.


Check under the *Printer Properties* and check the Color tab and make sure the Image type is set to standard and not graphics or something as this will cause it to print much darker.

Another question is it only one 1 computer or all computers? Are you able to take a laptop and hook it up via USB and test drive? Also if a laptop is not avail do you have a smartphone? Download the Sharpdesk Program and use your phone to print with and see what the quality looks like (considering they have wifi).

Just a few option to look into to try and determine if it is the computer or the machine.