Frequently Asked Questions

What does black printing on our C1660 really cost per page?

With a single cartridge, about 1.87 cents per page: the cartridge is $23.43 and is rated at 1,250 pages. We will not dress that number up — it is a premium per-page cost, the price of buying the smallest quantity of a small cartridge for a compact printer. It is worth knowing before you order, and it is also worth knowing that the same 332-0399 cartridge costs considerably less per page in this store's multi-packs. If black volume on your C1660 is more than occasional, the single is the expensive way to buy it.

How far does 1,250 pages go in a home office?

For the workload a C1660 is built for, a long way. A desk printing a few letters, invoices and reports a day — say 100 to 150 black pages a month — will take the better part of a year to finish one cartridge. Ratings assume standard 5% coverage, so plain text tracks close to the 1,250 figure while pages heavy with logos, shading and graphics draw it down faster. Check the printer's page counter against when you fitted the last cartridge and you will have your own machine's real consumption rate.

Is 1,250 pages a low rating, or is that normal here?

It is normal for this class, and it is better to understand why than to be surprised by it. The Dell C1660 and C1660w are personal color lasers: small machines, small cartridge slots, small fills. The 332-0399 black is rated at 1,250 pages because that is what the slot holds at standard capacity. The trade-off is the machine itself — inexpensive, compact and adequate for light duty. Judged against departmental printers the number looks tiny; judged against the printer it serves, it is simply the standard cartridge doing its rated job.

How do we avoid running out at the wrong moment?

The practical answer is to watch the page counter rather than the print quality — by the time pages visibly fade, you are already at the end. On a C1660 using around 150 black pages a month, a cartridge fitted today is a next-year problem, so a calendar note beats guesswork. When you do reorder, orders ship from IL, PA, GA or CA depending on stock and distance, so most customers are a few days, not weeks, from a replacement.

What is the difference between this and Dell's own cartridge?

This is a compatible 332-0399, built by a third-party manufacturer to meet the specification of the black cartridge the C1660 takes; Dell's own version is the genuine-branded unit at a genuine-branded price. The cartridge type, the 1,250-page rating basis and the machine it serves are the same — what differs is who made it and what you pay. Every figure quoted on this page describes this compatible cartridge.

What backing does a single cartridge carry?

The same backing as everything we sell: a 1-year warranty and 1-year free returns. If the cartridge streaks, fades early or fails, it comes back to us — the terms are on our shipping & returns page. Support runs Monday to Friday, 9 AM to 5 PM CST, and the broader Dell range lives on our Dell page.

Our text is pale down one side of the page but solid on the other — is the black cartridge finished?

Probably not. One-sided paleness on a 332-0399 usually means the toner inside has settled unevenly, not that it has run out. Remove the cartridge, rock it gently from side to side, reseat it and print again — coverage normally evens out. Fading that is uniform across the whole page is the genuine end-of-life sign. A sharp mark repeating in the same spot on every page is something else again: a fault, and faults are what the 1-year warranty is for.

How do we keep a spare 332-0399 in good shape if it may sit for most of a year?

Leave it sealed in its box, stored flat in a cool, dry drawer away from sunlight and radiators. The toner inside is a dry powder with no solvent to evaporate, so time on the shelf does not use it up. Mark the delivery date on the box so the oldest spare is always fitted first, and when its turn finally comes, rock the cartridge gently a few times before installing it so the fill is evenly distributed from the first page.

Can a half-used black cartridge move from one C1660 to another?

Yes. The 332-0399 belongs to the cartridge family, not to the individual machine — the C1660 and the C1660w take the same black cartridge, and a part-used one simply carries on where it left off in whichever printer it sits in. Handle it by its body, keep it in its bag while it travels between desks, and print a test page after the move. Its remaining life travels with it, so judge it by print quality rather than by which machine it started in.

The black gives out in the middle of a document — what is the cleanest way to swap it?

Pause the job, pull the spent 332-0399 and seal it in the bag the new cartridge came in. Rock the replacement gently, pull its seal tape out fully, and seat it until it sits firmly. Then reprint only the pages that had already started to fade rather than the whole document — the pages printed before the fade are still good. Keep the old cartridge for a few days in case any question comes up, then recycle it.

About This Dell C1660 Black Toner Cartridge (332-0399)

One compatible black toner cartridge for the Dell C1660 and C1660w, Dell part number 332-0399, rated at up to 1,250 pages for $23.43 — about 1.87 cents per rated page, stated plainly because a single small cartridge is the premium way to buy black toner for this machine. It ships from our IL, PA, GA or CA warehouses and carries a 1-year warranty with 1-year free returns.