Hey Lexmark, Is It a Timebomb?

When several years ago my faithful HP 1320 printer finally failed, I replaced it with a new Lexmark MS415dn that seemed like a decent quality product at a reasonable price. In fact, this printer has been working reliably and just fine since then --- until about a week ago.

My printer failed with a message indicating there is something wrong with supplies: "Check status/supplies". However, looking into the "View supplies" menu, everything was marked "OK". The black cartridge was at 64%, the imaging unit even at 87%. Enough paper was in the tray and nothing was stuck in the printer.

My first guess was the toner cartridge - maybe the display was wrong and the cartridge was already empty. Replacing it by a new one boosted the "View supplies" display of the black cartridge to 100% but nothing changed in relation to the printer not wanting to print anything.

Jobs left in the print queue over night may eventually print correctly - or not. Mostly not. This got annoying as a printer somewhat is a commodity item in a home office that is simply expected to work.

Today, I finally found some time to dive into this problem in more depth. After several hours of checking network connections, drivers, firmware etc. for all devices involved, I started suspecting the firmware and checked whether there is an update of the installed version LW63.TL.P638 (June 2017). Indeed, there was a new release LW71.TL2.P025 (October 2018). Using the update via the printer's web interface, the new firmware was soon up and running.

To my surprise, the firmware did not simply fix the problem but rather elaborate on it a bit more. The message was now "32.52 Replace Unsupported Cartridge". That did clarify something, except that this error occured with any cartridge I would place in the printer - including the old Lexmark original toner.

After a few more paranoid thoughts, I decided to go back to the older firmware version LW50.TL2.P543 (October 2015) and to my not really extreme surprise, the printer started working again. The downgrade did erase a few configuration parameters, and the web interface lost a few settings, but everything needed was entered manually rather quickly.

In essence, it looks like Lexmark has introduced an illegal timebomb into their firmware - just as HP did in 2016 (see here) and Lexmark had tried before (see here). It has also been reported that Samsung followed the same idea of blocking third-party toner cartridges (see here). Epson did it just now in October 2018 (see here).

So, did I stumble upon a timebombed reaction to the US Supreme Court decision of 2017 (see here) or is this just yet another Lexmark attempt to bully customers into "original" toner? This practice is illegal in the EU (see here).

In any case, I very happy I do have my printer working again, and I will definitely not consider upgrading to a new firmware unless it is guaranteed that my present toner cartridges will continue to work.