Low cost printing on the Samsung CLP-315 Laser Printer


I enjoyed this article on resetting the print count stored in the 24C64WP 2-Wire Serial EEPROM chip of the Samsung CLP-315 Laser Printer.

It works by tying pin 5 SDA to ground during boot up, causing 0 page counts to be read from the chip, then releasing pin 5, printing a color page test if you want to reset color counts or a black page if you want to reset black page counts.  The 0 is then made a 1 and written back to the EEPROM.   When you power cycle again, reset is saved.

Cool.  Thanks Brian

Brian's video:
http://youtu.be/077GLsEMV2E

How to open / disassemble Samsung clp-315 color laser printer:
http://youtu.be/zNiSua7yTnE



http://rumburg.org/printerhack/#reset-procedure
Reset Procedure

After printing a few more pages (and giggling like a child to the wife), I was able to refine the reset process a bit. Here are the steps to perform the reset:

Open the printer and solder a wire to the SDA pin of the EEPROM (see video below)
Power up the printer with this line held to ground until it finishes initializing
You can use chassis near the USB port is an easy spot to ground to.
The printer will take longer than normal to initialize; don’t be alarmed
Disconnect the SDA line from ground
Print the demo page by pushing The Button until you see a slowly blinking green light (about 2 seconds)
Print the configuration page by pushing The Button until you see a rapidly blinking green light (about 6 seconds)
Turn off the power
Turn on the power, and wait for it to initialize
Print the configuration report again
All your base are belong to us
Notes

One thing worth noting; my printer still has its original toner cartridges which are “chipless”. Retail replacement cartridges have a chip with its own EEPROM that has a unique identifier and stores its own count. Since I don’t have toner cartridges with these chips, I don’t know (but I suspect) that a different approach or additional steps may be necessary to reset the counts.

You may be able to tape off the exposed pads on the toner chips before performing this procedure and get the same effect, but I haven’t got the chipped cartridges to test with. (nor will I be buying any for $150!) YMMV.

Demo Time!

Conclusion
It took some time to get there, but I think it was worth the effort. This printer is now happily kicking out full-color pages for 2¢ versus a whopping 15¢ (ouch).  Life is good. Enjoy!

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