IMAGE FORMING APPARATUS AND GENUINE PRODUCT DETERMINATION METHOD

摘要

An image forming apparatus includes a toner container information storage section, a toner container information acquisition section, a toner container information readout section, a number-of-refills comparing section, a genuine product determining section, and a toner container information update section. The toner container information acquisition section is configured to acquire an identification code and a number of refills from a toner container. The number-of-refills comparing section is configured to read out, based on the acquired identification code, the number of refills of the corresponding toner container from the toner container information storage section and determine whether or not the number of refills acquired from the toner container is smaller than the read number of refills. If the number of refills acquired from the toner container is smaller than the read number of refills, the genuine product determining section determines that the toner container is a non-genuine product.

主权项

1. An image forming apparatus comprising a control unit and a memory,
wherein the memory implements a toner container information storage section to which respective identification codes associated with a plurality of toner containers and respective numbers of refills of the toner containers corresponding to the respective identification codes are able to be written, and the control unit implements: a toner container information acquisition section configured to acquire, from the toner container attached to the image forming apparatus and including a storage section storing the identification code and the number of refills indicating how many times the toner container has been refilled with toner, the identification code and the number of refills; a toner container information readout section configured to read out, based on the identification code acquired by the toner container information acquisition section, the number of refills associated with the identification code from the toner container information storage section; a number-of-refills comparing section configured to compare the number of refills read out by the toner container information readout section with the number of refills acquired by the toner container information acquisition section; a genuine product determining section configured to determine, based on a result of comparison of the number-of-refills comparing section, that if the number of refills acquired by the toner container information acquisition section is smaller than the number of refills stored in the toner container information storage section, the toner container is a non-genuine product and that if the number of refills acquired by the toner container information acquisition section is equal to or greater than the number of refills stored in the toner container information storage section, the toner container is a genuine product; and a toner container information update section configured to, when the genuine product determining section determines that the toner container is a genuine product, update the number of refills of the toner container stored in the toner container information storage section to match the number of refills acquired by the toner container information acquisition section.