Monitoring toner levels in network printers
In this tutorial, we will set up a SNMP monitor to watch the amount of toner remaining in a printer.
Click on the thumbnail pictures provided to view their full version.
Setting up monitoring parameters
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We assume you have followed all the steps to create SNMP monitor already. Now select monitor’s Main parameters tab to continue. Launch the MIB browser (see above how to do that) to proceed. If you haven’t loaded proper MIB files (you would need IANA-PRINTER-MIB and Printer-MIB v2), MIB browser will not show you much useful information (most OID tree entries will be marked Unknown). Download the mentioned MIB files, click on “MIBs” button (lower left corner of the MIB browser) and look whether the required MIBs are loaded already. |
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| If IANA-PRINTER-MIB and Printer-MIB are both present in the list, just skip this step. Otherwise, make sure the downloaded MIB files are placed into %ProgramData%\IPHost Network Monitor\mibs and click “Import” button. Select one of MIB files and click “Open”. Import the other MIB file in the same way, if required. |  |
| Now refresh MIB browser main view by clicking “Refresh” button. To find OIDs related to measuring toner amount, enter word “Supplies” to the right of “Find” label. The browser will only display those entries with the mentioned word present in their names.
We will use “prtMarkerSuppliesLevel(9)” entry. Note: the whole OIDs tree and values of the entries may be different in your case. Select the mentioned entry and click “OK” to return to monitor Main parameters tab. |
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| Now let’s set up monitor so that it triggered an alarm wherever the supplies level (toner amount) is depleting too low.
Open State conditions tab in Parameters/Results pane. Warning state condition is used when the monitored parameter isn’t already acceptable, but the value isn’t that wrong to raise an alarm. Down state condition is used when it is time to raise a real alarm. Please consult your network printer reference for accurate values. In our example, we will trigger a warning when there are less than 20 units of toner supplies left, and make the monitor change to Down state when there’s less than 5. You should choose whatever values are relevant in your case. To learn further how to set up alerts, read Alerting and Actions section of our quick start guide. |
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What to do next?
| Congratulations! You have just created your SNMP monitor to notify you when your network printer is about to run out of toner supply. What to do next? | |
| First, set the polling interval on monitor Main parameters tab accordingly. Most probably you won’t use the default value of 60 seconds (poll every minute) and could raise it, say, to 5 minutes. |  |
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You can modify your newly created monitor; for example, you can monitor how fast the toner is getting used up by changing counter type to “Delta” and setting performance checks accordingly (for example, warn if the toner level between subsequent checks dropped by more than 10 units and raise a performance problem alert if it dropped by more than 50 units). Since default units can differ in every given case, choose proper values in State condition tab, to get alerted when toner level gets indeed low enough. Consult your printer manuals to do so. |
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| Please consult the quick start guide for more suggestions and ideas on how to use SNMP monitors. | |
Related page
Monitoring toner level and paper status in HP printers via SNMP
IPHost Network Monitor 5.4 build 14538 of April 21, 2023. File size: 111MB
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