Having bought during some years some HP Printer toners at an incredible price between 66 to 72 CHF and directly from HP website :

 

 

My wife and I decided to make a try of cheaper and generic cartridges from St@r Ink company ( https://starink.ch/ ) a swiss subsidiary from China company … also as it is fully legal to use generic product as specified by the European Law ( REF : no dominant position of printer manufacturers on ink cartridge aftermarket link here )

So checking St@r Ink website: 

 

And making a quick price comparison for the same toner as we were used to bought :

With a price reduction of  to 77,8% on a single toner (and officialy annonced up to 75 % on St@r Ink ) it was ridiculous to not have choosen that option before … 

Then making the orders for new cartidge directly on website , we received them the next day by St@r Ink delivery man directly at our house …

So , so far … Really happy of that quality of service from that company.

Receiving the cartridge quickly and far away more protected and secured then the HP one could be in their delivery box , it was for us the second good surprise and a proof of quality …

Then introducing one of the new cartridges in the printer starts some problems with the HP printer itslef which was blocking the printing of any new documents even if not using the single yellow color replaced with a new generic cartridge freshly provided.

I was expecting those kind of troubles with an HP printer … so no real surprise … and there are always some solutions…

Digging the internet and reading some reddit threads on that kind of issue, the solution emerge from forums on that subject…

HP has simply modified their firmware for not allowing anymore the usage of compatible Ink cartidge.

 » The firmware change introduced a blocking measure resulting from new terms of use. And In practice, the updated printers will only work with official cartridges with an HP chip. And if other cartridges are used, printing will simply not start « 

  » HP declares that it has taken this binding action for security reasons; Citing the risk of malware attacks, he said: « Third-party cartridges that use non-HP chips or circuitry can pose risks to hardware performance, print quality, and security. » The manufacturer adds that these regular updates are also aimed at improving its services, for example alerting the user to a low ink level.  »  

 » One thing is for sure: the issue arose following recent updates to the printer’s firmware, including those released in December 2022 and January 2023. In the accompanying technical notes, HP refers to « dynamic security measures » used to block cartridges using a non-HP chip or modified or non-HP electronic circuitry, » noting that « periodic firmware updates will maintain the effectiveness of dynamic security measures and block cartridges that previously worked. »

So the solution was to revert back firmware before that major update in December 2022… 

First reaction was to search from HP website the previous firmware used by my HP printer:

 

 

 

 

 

 

But the only one provided is the one from December 2022 and no possibilty to download from their site any previous one … ( this is not fair play but was expecting that too)

However this gives precious indication on the eventual name of the firmware which for sure has the same name expect as i suppose a  different date …

 

 

 

Also this executables open an interface giving no special indication on the firmware itself …

 

So there must be another way …

And the solution comes from a bit from HP itself : https://support.hp.com/us-en/document/c03154309

The tricks is to download .rfu firmware ( for remote firmware update ) and upload it somehow on the printers for being applied …

Also Checking reddit for some HP printers, it was mentionned that it could be accomplished by activating ftp printing protocol from Printer interface and allowing from printer menu console the downgrade of the firmware …

Ok so now we have a plan, cheking archive.org and searching for « M180 » as the type of my printer and « .rfu » as the hp firmware extension I will be able to find something…

Bingo :

 

 

 

 

 

 

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