Trouble With Tray 1 HP Printers

There are several issues with tray 1 on HP laser printers, but this problem in particular I get the most. The customer says the printer is prompting them to load paper in tray 1, when they don't want to use tray

1. You have to get up and go over to the printer and press go or on-line to print the job to get it to print. The first thing I have to ask is "Does it happen only on specific jobs?"

The first thing you must look at is the paper settings in the specific program you are using. Also check your driver settings. If all looks good on that side there are settings on the printer that you can configure. They are really quite simple to configure but if you don't have the information it will drive you nuts.

Paper size and type:

Make sure your paper size and type on your driver is the same as the printer is configured to. If you want to check this you can print a configuration page and that will tell you if there is a mismatch.

Press [Menu] until the Information menu appears.

Press [Item] until the Print Configuration Page mode appears.

Press [Select] Prints Page


Press the SELECT button to open the menus. Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the Information Menu then press the SELECT button. Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the Print Configuration Page and then press the SELECT button.

Now that you have printed a configuration page you can check the sizes. If the tray says it is a different size that what is loaded you may have the tray adjustment guides out of position. There also could be a size detection lever on the tray that is broken. Assuming all is set properly it may be in the printer configuration.

When your printer says to load paper in tray one it could be that someone configured it wrong or it somehow reverted to the wrong configuration.

All Hewlett Packard laser printer paper handling menus are very similar. There are basically two different types. The older model configurations and the newer model configurations.

Older Models such as HP LJ-4000, 4050, 4100, 5SI, 8000, 8100, 8150 and more.

On this type of menu when the machine is asking for tray 1 you have tray 1 set as a cassette. What ever size it was set up for is not there and it is calling for it. If you would like to change this so that it only pulls from tray 1 when you put paper in tray 1, set it as follows.

To change control-panel setting so paper only pulls when paper is in the tray

1 Press [Menu] until the Paper Handling menu appears.

2 Press [Item] until the Tray 1 mode appears.

3 Press [-- Value +] until First appears.

4 Press [Select] to save the selection. An asterisk (*) appears next


to the selection in the display, indicating that it is now the default.

***Example*** TRAY 1 MODE= *FIRST

Newer models such as HP LJ-4200, 4250, 4350 and more

EXCLUSIVELY: Sets the printer to pull paper only from the tray that you selected and not from another tray, even if the tray you selected is empty.

To change control-panel Tray Behavior setting

Press the SELECT button to open the menus. Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the Configure Device then press the SELECT button. Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the System Setup and then press the SELECT button.

Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to Tray Behavior setting, and then press the SELECT button.

Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the USE REQUESTED TRAY setting then press the SELECT button. Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the EXCLUSIVELY setting and then press the SELECT button. An asterisk (*) appears next to the selection on the display, indicating that it is now the default.

Next use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the Manual Feed Prompt setting then press the SELECT button. Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the Unless Loaded setting and then press the SELECT button. An asterisk (*) appears next to the selection on the display, indicating that it is now the default.

Paper Handling Menu, Tray 1 Size and Tray 1 Type = *ANY

To change control-panel Tray 1 Size setting

Press the SELECT button to open the menus. Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the Paper Handling Menu then press the SELECT button. Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the Tray 1 Size and then press the SELECT button.

Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to *ANY setting, and then press the SELECT button. An asterisk (*) appears next to the

selection on the display, indicating that it is now the default.

***Example *** Tray 1 Size = *ANY

To change control-panel Tray 1 Type setting

Press the SELECT button to open the menus. Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the Paper Handling Menu then press the SELECT button. Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to the Tray 1 Type and then press the SELECT button.

Use the UP ARROW button or the DOWN ARROW button to scroll to *ANY setting, and then press the SELECT button. An asterisk (*) appears next to the

selection on the display, indicating that it is now the default.

***Example *** Tray 1 Type = *ANY

This should solve the issue of tray 1 prompting you to load paper. Just remember if you choose tray 1 in your driver or from the desk top it may still prompt you so double check the jobs that caused this and make sure you're selecting the proper cassette.