The present disclosure relates to a replaceable printing component for use in a printing system having at least one replaceable printing component. The replaceable printing component is of the type sold through a plurality of sales channels. The replaceable printing component includes a radio frequency link for receiving information indicative of a particular sales channel of a plurality of sales channels. Also included in the replaceable printing component is an electrical storage device for storing information indicative of the particular sales channel. The electrical storage device provides information indicative of the particular sales channel for reordering the replaceable printing component.

A method for validating warranty compliance for compatible fluid use of a printing system entails fluidly engaging a replaceable fluid container with a print station. The container includes a smart card adapted to track volumetric credits. Through use, the print station requests that fluid be added to a reservoir from the container. The method continues by ascertaining the presence of the smart card in the reader/writer and reading the smart card to obtain information related to the fluid. The print station operates per the information from the smart card. The method ends by ascertaining the amount of fluid amount removed from the container and writing the withdrawn amount to the smart card as a debit, thereby maintaining printhead operation under warranty.

A system and method for establishing and maintaining date information associated with an electronic device. The system is typically configured to prompt a user to enter or otherwise establish a valid date at some point after power is applied to the system. After establishing a valid date, the real time clock is configured to maintain real-time date/time information. Upon determining that a valid date has been set, the system may subsequently obtain date/time information from the real time clock and store the obtained date and time in the non-volatile memory as the in-service date. The system may be enabled to determine if, subsequent to establishing an in-service date, the user altered the date/time information in a manner that indicated an intent to extend the warranty period beyond the manufacturer specified warranty period. In an embodiment suitable for use in conjunction with a server blade, the system includes a main processor and a service processor that handles low-level functions associated with the server blade. The in-service date information may be stored in a non-volatile memory of the service processor. This non-volatile memory may be implemented as an EEPROM that includes connections or pins supporting an externally accessible bus such as an I2C bus. In this embodiment, the system may further include a readout device configured to connect to the service processor EEPROM through the externally accessible bus to enable a technician to retrieve the in-service date without regard to the functionality of the main processor(s) and system memory.

An apparatus and method that allows information about the product to be transferred to the testing device so that the pertinent tests can be run. After the product is tested and repaired, updated information can be encoded onto the medium and the medium can be stored with the product for later retrieval.