PROCEDURE TO SWITCH BLACK INKS ON EPSON 7600 AND 9600 PRINTERS
1. Make sure your printer is not switched on.
2. Open the ink cartridge lever in the ink cartridge bay.
3. Replace the photo black cartridge with the matte black cartridge (or vice versa).
4. Leave the ink lever open !
5. Using the printer control panel go into Maintenance Mode 2 by by switching power ON while
pushing the 'Paper source', 'Cut/Eject', and 'Paper Feed down' buttons.
6 . Press the 'Paper Feed down' button until you see "SERVICE CONFIG" on the display - press
the 'arrow right' button. It then shows 'XXD' in the lower part of the display.
7. Press the 'Paper Feed down' button until you see "NPD" - press 'arrow right' button. A value
of '1' appears in the display.
8. There are 3 possible value settings for NPD:
0
no ink check
1
pigmented ink (there should be s star "*" at this setting)
2
dye inks
9. Change NPD setting to '0' (no ink check) and press "Enter" - a star should now show next to
the '0' value.
10. Switch printer off.
11. Switch printer on.
12. Close the ink lever in the ink cartridge bay.
13. Printer and driver shows the matte black ink is installed (or photo black ink).
You can use the same procedure to switch from matte black to photo black or from photo black to
matte black. What happens is that once you change the ink in that way the printer resets the
'NPD' value back to '1' the next time you switch on the printer in the normal way (non
maintenance mode). At that point the previous black ink, either matte or photo black, has not
been flushed our of the printer. Here is what you need to do to flush the remaining ink:
A. With the 7600:
The 7600 uses approximately 10 to12 ml of ink before the previous black ink is flushed out.
1. Create a 23"x 40" image in Photoshop and fill it with pure black (RGB 0,0,0).
2. Use inexpensive matte paper and print that image at 720dpi.
3. When you look at the finished print you will see that 2/3 of the print is photo ink as it looks
a little bit dull and the rest of the print shows the nice dark matte ink.
4. When this image is done printing the ink line is charged with matte black (or photo black).
B. With the 9600:
The 9600 uses approximately 20-22ml of ink before the previous black ink is flushed out. Use
the exact same procedure as described above but create a larger image: 43"x40". This larger
image is needed to flush the longer ink lines of the 9600:
1. Create a 43"x40" image in Photoshop and fill it with pure black (RGB 0,0,0).
2. Use inexpensive matte paper and print that image at 720dpi.
3. When you look at the finished print you will see that 2/3 of the print is photo ink as it looks
a little bit dull and the rest of the print shows the nice dark matte ink.
4. When this image is done printing the ink line is charged with matte black (or photo black).