Black and White Blues

Summary: If your color worksheets and charts don't look exactly right when printed on your monochrome printer, it could be because the printer doesn't handle the printing of colors correctly. You can make a simple change on the Page Setup dialog box, and your printouts may look much better, as described in this tip. (This tip works with Microsoft Excel 97, Excel 2000, Excel 2002, and Excel 2003.)

Excel allows you to create a colorful masterpiece on your screen. What you get when you print, however, depends entirely on the printer you are using. Some black-and-white printers do a great job of translating colors into shades of gray. Others, however, leave quite a bit to be desired in their output.

If you are having problems printing color Excel information on your black-and-white printer, try these steps:

Choose Page Setup from the File menu. Excel displays the Page Setup dialog box.
Make sure the Sheet tab is selected. (Click here to see a related figure.) (If you selected a chart or were viewing a chart before starting these steps, there will not be a Sheet tab. In this case, select the Chart tab.)
Make sure the Black and White check box is selected.
Click OK.

You are now ready to print, and you should do so as you normally would. You should notice a marked improvement in your printer output.

ExcelTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Excel training. This tip (2848) applies to Microsoft Excel versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003

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Black and White Blues