My printer saga. HP Officejet 6500 Wireless

I was about to print some customize wrapping paper to wrap a birthday present only to realise that my PC couldn't print the design to my HP Officejet 6500 printer.

I thought it may be due to the unstable wireless communications. I even tried to reinstall the PC drivers. But ended up with errors.

Then I found out that the printer couldn't even print locally a status report. To make matter worse, I accidentally touch a film strip and it came off from the left side. Took me 30 mins trying to hook it back. Almost gave up. Later I found that ire strip is called the encoder strip that helps the printer cartridges align themselves.

After hooking back the strip, I looks at all the places for jammed paper, but there was nothing. However, by doing that, the printer's error moved from the cryptic code of 0x6100004c to yet another cryptic code.

One of the solutions offered on google search, was to plug the power source directly to the wall. So I removed my power line LAN connection for my router/TV combo. Still not working.

I removed all the print cartridges and r-seated them back but still no go.

I finally took out the print head assembly and clean the print head with some water. Wala. It worked. I haven't turn back on the power line LAN yet.

However, now my drivers on my windows7 x64 are not working and reinstalling them seems to get error at the last step (trying to configure printer). The printer can print and scan now. Just couldn't fax - I don't see the fax driver on control panel any more.

So I guess I'll figure this out later this evening.