They could say that, but they'd be lying. You can't make a true black by mixing other colors, you can only make a sludge representation. Yeah, that's a technical term.

I was leaning toward the PostScript/PCL/language issue but Tony beat me to it. That said, Word shouldn't be using printer fonts either, so in the end, your driver is what should be set up for the specific language. The ink thing makes sense except for the fact you haven't noticed any errors or warnings.

I just installed a new printer here and I'm with you, they're my most hated computer peripheral. My needs are pretty utilitarian, so I jumped on another B&W Lexmark laser, E462dtn, to replace my old Optra Lxn+. The older printer died a few weeks ago, which was a blessing in disguise.