While Lexmark is an excellent printer, and one of the most popular choices for office and even home use, any printer can have problems over time, or, if you are not so lucky, even immediately after you have begun to use it. Unfortunately, Lexmark printer repair can be costly. The good news is that there are several things that you can do to ensure that your printer stays healthy.
To avoid going for repairs, make sure you change your ink as soon as your printer gives you a low ink warning. If you delay and run out ink, the outlet jet resistors could overheat and damage the print head and / or produce output that is not up to the mark.
Also, do not for any reason keep an open cartridge outside of your printer or refill it indiscriminately. Both processes could lead to clogged cartridges which may ultimately damage your printer.
Lexmark Optra laser printers (as well as other brands like Hewlett-Packard) require regular maintenance kit replacement after a specific number of pages have been printed. Lexmark introduced its printer maintenance service kits with the Optra S in the 90's. Currently, most Lexmark printers (apart from the low end, and therefore less complex ones) need service kits somewhere between 150,000 and 250,000 pages printed. You will need to check your manual for the exact page count that shows ‘need maintenance error'.
Problems like unwanted lines in printing and jammed paper are relatively easy to remedy by replacing or adjusting the toner and manually clearing the printer of the torn and jammed pieces of paper. However, for the not so technologically savvy, this could cause a panic attack and a call to the technician. It is important that you consult your manual and the maintenance kit properly before you jump into your print jobs. As mentioned earlier, Lexmark printer repair can be expensive, and the do-it-yourself kind of manual that comes with it attempts to make up for that somewhat.
If you really run into trouble, it would be a simple matter to look up the internet for your nearest customer support or call the numbers that should be in your documentation, but it is really a matter of whether you can avoid the repair cost rather than whether you can avail of the repairing facilities. A quick look at a sample process of self maintenance of your printer: as you power up, hold the GO and RETURN keys until ‘Performing Self Test' appears. You can access the Diagnositcs (or '80 Schedule Maintenance) now. Use the intuitive panel to select Printer Setup and ‘Reset Maintenance Count', and that should remove your printer repair worries unless something really nasty comes up.
