HP Deskjet 5550 quit printing red color. Installed new color cartridge HP57. Quit printing red again after 5 pages. Is it a printer problem or cartridge problem?

If the Cartridge and printer alignment is successfull and you are still not able to print in color, mostly the Color print is disabled in your pc

Click on START Button
Click on CONTROL PANEL
Open Printers and Faxes folder
Highlight the Printer icon for Deskjet
Right click on the printer icon and choose Printing Preferences
Under Printing preferences, you will find Printing mode - It must be on BLACK or GREY SCALE, Change to COLOR/ ALL
try printing.

WORKAROUND: Select EconoFast or Draft as the print quality setting in the printer properties. This will prevent the color cartridge from being used. - Or - Try another color cartridge. The color cartridge is used to print grayscale images in Normal or Best print modes, so if one color has run out, the printout will have the wrong tint. With a full color cartridge, the colors can be properly combined to create a composite black. CAUSE: When printing with Normal or Best as the print quality setting, the HP Deskjet 710C or 720C or 722C series printer will use the color ink to improve print quality output, even when printing a grayscale image.

This is typical cartridge problem.Which cartridge changed?This printer can print with the only one cartridge inside it, whatever which.Try this: Open cover put out color cartridge then close cover.If blinking stops replace color cartridge.If blinking continues put out black cartridge and put in color.If blinking stops replace black cartridge, if not stop replace both cartridges.
If this not help your printer has problem in carriage unit and need repair.

The print cartridges might need cleaning.

Here is a link to a page that explains how to clean the cartridges:
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&taskId=110&prodSeriesId=71895&prodTypeId=18972&prodSeriesId=71895&objectID=bpa00226

Here is a link to a page that explains how to clean the cartridges:
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&taskId=110&prodSeriesId=71895&prodTypeId=18972&prodSeriesId=71895&objectID=bpa00226

did you remove the tape covering the print head?

yes, remove the color cartrage and it will print

I had the same problem, the most stressfree (and cheapest in the long run) fix I found was:

Get a Canon MP520, it's super fast for an inkjet, the brand name Canon ink cartridges are much larger in (ml) ink, it comes with FULL ink cartridges, not starters with little in, and has Vista drivers( XP too). The color in is in individual cartridges C, Y M (they don't all get used at the same rate) so you will potentially save lots of money. A Canon brand Black cartridge for $13 prints about twice as many pages as the HP $30 cartridge ... you do the math.  

Oh yeah, it's a scanner and fast color&bw copier too.

$129 at walmart (the cost of about 4 HP cartridges) I am confident that you will never buy another HP printer.  

Hello,

This is Romeet, id like to try and help. Assuming you have windows XP installed,

go to "Start", select " Printers and Faxes"

go to your printer ( HP deskjet 3745 ) and right click it and select properties.

Click on " Print Test Page ", tell me what color does the Printout come in.

B.Regds
Romeet

1st page prints perfect but the 2nd page comes out with very light and skipped printing.