Ink cartridge with memory
First Claim
1. A cartridge for containing ink therein, and which can be detachably mounted on an ink-jet printer having a memory that stores information, in a printer format, corresponding to an amount of ink in said cartridge, comprising:
- a cartridge body; and
a rewritable non-volatile memory mounted on the cartridge body and storing data, in an ink cartridge format, corresponding to at least one of a remaining amount of ink contained in said cartridge and an ink consumption, said ink cartridge format being different from the printer format.
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Accused Products
Abstract
In a printer of the present invention, an EEPROM that carries out sequential access and has a small storage capacity is applied for storage elements mounted on both black and color ink cartridges. Data relating to each ink cartridge, for example, data on remaining quantities of respective inks in the ink cartridge, are stored as 8-bit data in the storage element of the ink cartridge. A print controller incorporated in the printer has an EEPROM, in which the data relating to the ink cartridges are stored as 32-bit data. In the case of no replacement of the ink cartridge, the 32-bit data are used for the subsequent processing. In the case of replacement of one ink cartridge with another, on the other hand, the 8-bit data are used for the subsequent processing. This arrangement of the invention enables the data relating to the ink cartridges, for example, the data on the remaining quantities of the respective inks in the ink cartridges, to be processed accurately even when a storage unit of a small storage capacity is applied for the storage elements mounted on the ink cartridges.
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Citations
12 Claims
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1. A cartridge for containing ink therein, and which can be detachably mounted on an ink-jet printer having a memory that stores information, in a printer format, corresponding to an amount of ink in said cartridge, comprising:
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a cartridge body; and
a rewritable non-volatile memory mounted on the cartridge body and storing data, in an ink cartridge format, corresponding to at least one of a remaining amount of ink contained in said cartridge and an ink consumption, said ink cartridge format being different from the printer format. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)
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Specification