Ink cartridge and printer using the same

Abstract

In an ink jet printer of the present invention, in order to reduce the manufacturing cost, an inexpensive EEPROM enabling only sequential accesses is applied for storage elements incorporated in a black ink cartridge and a color ink cartridge. The data array of a memory cell included in each of the storage elements mounted on the ink cartridges is determined in such a manner that a second storagearea, in which rewritable data, for example, data on remaining quantities of inks in the ink cartridge, are stored, is accessed prior to a first storage area, in which read only data are stored. Thisconfiguration enables the rewritable data to be securely written into the second storage area even after a power-off operation. The second storage area has two memory divisions allocated to each ink,that is, a first ink remaining quantity memory division and a second ink remaining quantity memory division. Latest data on the remaining quantity of each ink is alternately written into these two memory divisions. Alternatively, the latest data on the remaining quantity of each ink is written into these two memory divisions in a duplicated manner. Each ink remaining quantity memory division has a write complete flag to determine whether or not a writing operation has been completed normally in the ink remaining quantity memory division. This arrangement enables the remaining quantities of the respective inks to be monitored accurately and continuously.

Description

[0000] This application is a divisional application of the patent application for invention with the application number 99801995.X (PCT / JP99 / 06098) and the filing date as November 2, 1999, entitled "An Ink Cartridge and a Printer Using the Ink Cartridge". technical field The present invention relates to an ink jet type printing apparatus, such as an ink jet printer and an ink jet plotter, and to an ink cartridge detachably assembled to a printer main body of the ink jet type printing apparatus. More specifically, the present invention relates to techniques for processing and storing information about the amount of ink held in an ink cartridge. Background technique Ink-jet type printing devices such as ink-jet printers and ink-jet painters mainly include an ink cartridge holding one or more inks and a printer body having a print head for actually performing printing operations on a printing medium. The print head ejects ink supplied from the ink cartridge to a printing med...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

In another application that allows rewritable information about the ink to be written into the ink cartridge, conventional techniques cannot do anything about possible interruption of the writing operation, which often results in incomplete writing

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