How to downgrade firmware on HP OfficeJet Pro 8610 to allow using old or refilled cartridges – UPDATE (HP official fw fix)

UPDATE 13.10.2016: HP finally surrendered after massive complaints of customers and released official firmware updates disabling the blocking mechanism for older and non-genuine cartridges. For more information and link to official firmware fix click here. Direct link to official 8610 firmware is here. The following article is kept for reference as it was the only way how to solve the issue with non-working OfficeJet printers for about one month after the blocking mechanism previously built to HP firmwares was triggered by the right date.

hp_cartdidge_orig_neorigPrinter manufacturers really want you to buy their genuine, overprices ink cartridges and toners. Even though US Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act and European rules on fair competition make it clear that printer manufacturers must not block using non-original inks and toners, and even warranty must not be void just by the mere fact of using non-original material, It’s becoming increasingly difficult to use alternative print material. For HP OfficeJet Pro 8610, some automatic firmware upgrade caused that many older and non-original or refilled cartridges stopped working, being marked as damaged. Some Brazilian folks posted a video on Youtube with a guide how to downgrade the firmware, and most important, published a link with the particular firmware version that makes the printer recognize the cartridges as valid! This is an English version of the manual how to do it:

  1. Find the IP address your printer is connected to (Ethernet or wireless, disconnect printer from USB if you had it connected that way)
  2. Download the firmware, netcat and the batch file with the template of the command (Warning, many Windows antivirus software consider netcat as malware, hacktool because it indeed often is used as part of malware. You need to whitelist nc.exe in your antivirus/anti-malware in order to proceed, or download another version of netcat/ncat that the AV software accepts.)
  3. Edit in NOTEPAD or other editor the BAT file 8610_FW_1416_DOWN.BAT to reflect the real IP address of the printer
  4. (Windows only:) Run the BAT file (on recent Windows perhaps needed to right-click and Run as administrator. It pushes the firmware file farad_base_pp1_FDP1CN1416AR_nbx_signed.ful by netcat (nc.exe) directly to the printer port 9100. (If you have Linux or Mac OS X just open the command and modify as needed and run it in the Terminal as usual.)
  5. display_printer_during_fwdowngradeCross fingers and wait a few minutes. After a while the printer should sound the turning off sound, display should get green and a counter with a progress bar would show up on the display while the firmware is being uploaded and installed on the printer, then the printer should restart and a printer status report should be printed afterwards, hopefully without any further cartridge errors.
  6. Disable any future firmware upgrades on the printer because in this case IF IT FINALLY WORKS DON’T LET PRINTER MANUFACTURER SCREW IT AGAIN. Check also Windows drivers if they are not set to do such upgrade as well.

Suggested reading:

Other articles on this topic:

Edit 14.9.2016: The link posted to uloz.to disappeared, HP or somebody forced removing it. Now the link was updated to the original Portugese link on mediafire. You can also try this mega.nz link: https://mega.nz/#!SB12HLhB and when asked, use this decryption key: !bZmGbp7pM6Qc6-cSzfLAkUdvob7jT5Vsh7sHQxU7NBs

If this manual helped you and worked (and perhaps saved you some money), there is a tiny Paypal donate button which you can use as a way to say thanks :)





Autor

Martin

Pracuji jako ajťák a grafik na volné noze, zejména ale pro brněnskou firmu vyrábějící ekodrogerii. Dále působím v brněnském systému místní směny Rozleťse, Českém zahrádkářském svazu, České psychedelické společnosti, spolku Archetypal a Mezinárodní komunitě dzogčhenu. Chcete mě podpořit? BTC: 37mf2FJR26Ce3DxMkocukJDgB1eVjasnZB, příp. PGP podepsané adresy dalších kryptoměn.

42 komentářů u „How to downgrade firmware on HP OfficeJet Pro 8610 to allow using old or refilled cartridges – UPDATE (HP official fw fix)“

  1. Thank you. This saved my printer. Auto Updates are now off and FUCK HP!

  2. Hi,

    any chance to upload the firmware, netcat and batch file to some other place?
    it seems to be removed

  8. Even I am not affected, this will not be forgiven. Never buy HP and never recommend HP.

  9. I am affected and I will do my best to cause HP as much damage as I legally can by telling people it’s shit and contacting antitrust, environmental protection, and whatever authorities should really look into this scumbag move.

  10. I tried to download the software, but it put so much CRAP on my computer that i had to stop the download. I’m now uninstalling all the damange.

  11. I dont’t understand what „crap“ do you ena and what software. Regarding netcat, the article makes it clear that most antivirus solutions consider it as malware which in this case is a false alarm. THere should be no other software whatsoever present in the package I link to – just the firmware file and a one-line script with pre-filled values how to run netcat with the firmware file. IN the end of the article or in the comment you can download a version without netcat,which you can download separately from any other location, compare the md5/sha1/sha256 checksums etc to make sure the binary is OK, and use such binary.

  12. Hi do you mind explaining what to do with a mac i have no idea :(

  13. Mac OS x should have netcat installed by default. Just open utilities-Terminal and use the command as in the bat or text text file and replace nc.exe with just ‚nc‘ at the beginning of the command. Make sure you change the IP address of the printer in the command to the right address your printer has on your LAN.

  14. Thank you for your help Martin
    I figured out what part i was doing wrong, the problem no is that i keep getting this error :
    -bash: -w: command not found
    im lost LOL

  17. Anybody have the firmware for a HP OfficeJet Pro 6830? The firmware on this site does not seem to work with my printer.

    Hoping to find PNP1CN1521AR.

  19. The issue I am having with my Mac is that terminal returns with

    -bash: farad_base_pp1_FDP1CN1416AR_nbx_signed.ful: No such file or directory

    What should I do?

  20. i tried changing the ip in the .bat file and running it as an administrator on windows 7 and command line closes instantly, nothing is happening on my printer… D=

  21. I get the error
    Error: Invalid local port

    while using a mac.

    What am I doing wrong?

  22. No idea, but good news is that HP finally apologized for what they have done and will release official firmware patch to restore functionality of all cartridges.

  23. Does anyone know where i can find firmware for HP OfficeJet Pro 8620?
    Actually I have but the file is .dmg and as I see should be .ful. or I’m wrong :-) thank you for any advice.

  24. Worked great, thanks mate!
    Just in my case didnt show up the green screen (maybe because the display whas blocked by a message about empty cartridges)

  25. to JJ
    The same with me, the printer is blocked all the time , showing the message „One or more cartridges appear to be damaged“

    I waited for along time after following the above steps , but without success.

    I think you have the same issue I have, can you please tell me what did you do.

  26. S tím ofiko „fixem“ od HP to začalo házet při tisku házet chyby s tiskovou hlavou. Musel jsem skoro po každém papíru restartovat tiskárnu, aby zase tiskla.
    Takže jsem se vrátil zpět ke starému FW – tam vše bez problémů :D .

    EN:
    With the offical HP „fix“ firmware, the printer started throwing errors with the printer head. I had to restart the printer after almost every printed page to make it work again.
    So I’ve pushed to old FW back and it is fine again.. :D

  27. Díky za info, koupili jsme teď do práce ještě jednu tuhle stejnou tiskárnu a tu jsem místo downgradu radši už upgradoval na ten oficiální nový firmware a myslel jsem, že to bude taky OK. Zatím tam jsou ty původní startovací orig cartridge takže s nimi to samozřejmě fungovat bude, ale aspoň vím co dělat jakmile ty dojdou a začnu do té tiskárny tlačit ty neoriginální cartridge, pokud si tiskárna i tak bude stěžovat. Jde tedy tou metodou přes netcat nahrát ten starý firmware i když už byla tiskárna upgradovaná na ten nejnovější? JEště že tak, mohli taky zablokovat úplně možnost tam přes ty PJL nebo jaké příkazy narvat starší fw.

  28. Ahoj, mám stejný problém, ale s tiskárnou HP Photosmart 5610. Dokážete mi nejak poradit?
    Dekuji

  29. Hi Martin
    Can you teach me how to use nc.exe to backup HP8620 firmware to my computer. I got a HP8620 with old version FDP1CN1348CR that I will like to backup, and then used for other HP86xx downgrade, thanks a lot.

  31. Hi there,
    its not working for me. The command prompt opens shortly and that’s it. I run the batch file as admin. Can someone help please? Thanks!
    Jub

  32. Do my computer need to connect to the printer with usb cable?

  34. This is the SECOND time I had to downgrade my HP Officejet Pro 8620’s firmware to 1733AR to get it to recognize my cheapo ink cartridges. I did configure the printer NOT to auto-update firmware a few years back but it would still often display „Upgrade Recommended – A printer update is available for Web Services. Without this update, Web Services will not be available and HP Instant Ink will not work properly. Do you want to proceed?“ I guess I must have hit „Yes“ one unlucky time… Yesterday, I discovered my firmware has been upgraded to 1910AR at some point in the last few weeks, and so, as expected, ONLY when I went to change ink cartridges I got the dreaded error message „Cartridge Problem – One or more cartridges appear to be damaged. Remove them and replace with new cartridges.“

    Anyway, I downloaded ojpro_8620_1733A_08172017.rfu from ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/networking/software/pfirmware
    and then I downloaded nc.exe v1.12 from http://eternallybored.org/misc/netcat/
    This is the magic cmd line which downgraded my printer’s firmware:

    nc.exe -w 100 192.168.1.200 9100 < ojpro_8620_1733A_08172017.rfu

    After 70 seconds the printer screen showed firmware is being upgraded there ("1 2 3 4 5" progress bar). 30 seconds later, nc.exe finished with me getting a flashing prompt back in cmd window. About 90 seconds later the actual flashing process finished at the printer side, with the printer rebooting itself and taking the "non-genuine" cartridges like a champ! Hurray!

    192.168.1.200 is my printer's static IP address on my wifi network. I'm connected to the printer wirelessly – also for the firmware upgrade. 9100 is the port number.

    By the way, for some reason I couldn't get ncat.exe (Ncat v7.80 from nmap.org) to work no matter how many different parameters I tried.

    Needless to say, I'm blacklisting the entire HP corporation from my buy list for a period of 10 years.

  35. Hello,
    could you provide the firmware 1416 for HP Officejet Pro 8620, a link to downgrade to Firmware FDP1CN1416AR or ojpro_8620_1733A_08172017.rfu for HP Officejet Pro 8620?
    Thank you

  36. Por favor si alguien sabe dígame como degradar mi 8610 al firmware FDP1CN1416AR, un link que este vigente se los agradecería mucho

  37. HELP PLEASE !!!! , I need Downgrade HP Officejet Pro 8610 ( to a firmware: FDP1CN1416AR )

  38. as an fyi for anyone else trying to find firmware for a different model printer i found a torrent that has heaps available. I found it by googling other firmware file names referenced in this thread.
    the torrent link is https://en.btdig.com/8d5bbd45e4e7b50999b55bd37b326c9e2fc6ac71/hp-printer-firmware-2020=12=07
    then just edit the batch file to the firmware filename you needed; in my case ‚ftp/ojpro_8630_1733A_08172017.rfu‘
    although worth mentioning i didnt get a progress bar on my LCD display, but after about 30 mins i turned it off and on again and checked the firmware through the support menu and it had been downgraded.
    now rather than a ‚printer failure‘ the printer is showing that one cartridge has failed. I’ve got a replacement on the way to see if that gets it operational again. failing that its going in the bin

  39. Prosím, potřebují downgrade pro HP OfficeJet 8013.
    Moc děkuji

  40. I had some difficulties with the original command from my Windows laptop. I used this command instead and it worked:

    cat farad_base_pp1_FDP1CN1416AR_nbx_signed.ful | nc -w 100 192.168.0.95 9100

  41. I am stuck with my HP 8620 with FDP1CN2022AR, will the old firmware also work on this printer? I just fear of bricking it.

  42. Thanks; this worked with an HP OfficeJet Pro 6978. From macOS, I used `/usr/bin/nc`.

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