[ILUG] Epson `Parts ... require maintenance or replacement'?

[Brian Foster]

hi!

  at home, I use a cheapo bottom-ish of the range Epson
 USB printer (a Stylus C20UX).  after downloading Epson's
 Linux software, and a few minor tweaks to their /etc/rc
 script, it works fine, and has worked fine for >2 years.

  yesterday, after printing one page of a document, it
 stopped working.  completely.  the green power and red
 "ink drops" light flash alternatively, and the Epson
 software reported “Parts inside your printer require
 maintenance or replacement. Contact your dealer.‟

  blow that.  it's almost a sure bet a "repair" would be
 uneconomical given the age and low cost of the printer.

  comrade Google™ fairly quickly located the _probable_
 cause:  the printer estimates the amount of ink which
 does not adhere to the paper (e.g., lost during head
 cleaning cycles) and when it thinks the "lost" ink has
 filled up adsorbent pads (“waste ink pads‟) it shuts
 down the printer.  (without warning on older, and/or
 low-end models!)  presuming this is what happened ---
 and it sounds completely plausible (IMHO) --- the fix
 is to replace the waste ink pads and then magically
 reset the printer.

  it is possible to buy replacement waste ink pads over
 the internet.  however, neither Epson nor its dealers
 will say how to replace the pads (albeit the hints are
 that it is trivial), and --- more crucially --- will
 also not say how to reset the printer.

  I did find a pair of Russian sites offering what is
 probably the same Freeware program to do magical things
 to Epson printers, including reseting the printer.
 however, it is a Windross `.exe', with  no source nor
 any technical notes available, and hence I simply will
 _NOT_ run it no matter what.  first, I don't have and
 cannot install either DoS or Windross; and second, I
 would never run an unknown `.exe' anyways (not even
 via wine (e.g.)).  so blow that.

  one site does suggest a magic button press-and-release
 sequence at power-up time, which I have _not_ yet tried.
 ( I need to print some documents, so I am inclined to
  try a reset before dismantling the printer to try and
  replace the waste ink pads (which I have not yet ordered
  in any case). )

 so, my questions:

  ①  has anyone ever replaced said waste ink pads before
    on any Epson inkjet printer?  esp. on a C20 or the
    apparently similar C40?  if so, any hints &tc?
    ( and whilst I have the printer dismantled, is there
     anything else I should do or check?  i.e., some
     “routine maintenance/cleaning‟ or something? )

  ②  does anyone know how to magically reset any Epson
    printer, esp. a C20 (or, I presume, a C40)?
    either a magic button sequence; or software which
    runs on Linux (and for which the source is available);
    or at least notes on what needs to be done.  (I'm an
    embedded O/S engineer, and writing h/w-twiddling s/w
    is what I do for a living; given something to go on,
    I should be able to write what is needed quickly.)

  the only Linux/GNU Epson s/w I know of is escputil(1),
 and the version I have (4.0.5(?)) does not document any
 ability to reset any Epson printer --- which is a bit
 surprising, since apparently all(?) the inkjet models
 have a similar “planned obsolescence‟.

cheers!
	-blf-
--
«How many surrealists does it take to    |  Brian Foster      Montpellier,
 change a lightbulb?  Three.  One calms  |  blf at utvinternet.ie      France
 the warthog, and two fill the bathtub   |    Stop E$$o (ExxonMobile)!
 with brightly-colored machine tools.»   |        http://www.stopesso.com