I had a problem where there was ink left (this was a solid-ink printer, the ink came in blocks you could easily see), but the page count had run out and it wouldn’t print. So we found the flash memory IC that held the info – it used I2C to communicate. There’s a similar IC on consumer RAM to store the manufacturer info. We swapped it in, hex-edited it so there were a huge number of pages left, and put it back in the printer.
It worked fine!
Then, days later, I noticed that the printer’s web interface let you reset the page counter by just pressing a button in a web browser. So the whole hack had been completely unnecessary :D
I have a funny story about a Xerox printer!
I had a problem where there was ink left (this was a solid-ink printer, the ink came in blocks you could easily see), but the page count had run out and it wouldn’t print. So we found the flash memory IC that held the info – it used I2C to communicate. There’s a similar IC on consumer RAM to store the manufacturer info. We swapped it in, hex-edited it so there were a huge number of pages left, and put it back in the printer.
It worked fine!
Then, days later, I noticed that the printer’s web interface let you reset the page counter by just pressing a button in a web browser. So the whole hack had been completely unnecessary :D