# IE6 prints blank webpage

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ie6-prints-blank-webpage/231301>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [February 26, 2004, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ie6-prints-blank-webpage/231301 "2004-02-26T16:19:02Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\
**Post date:** [February 26, 2004, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ie6-prints-blank-webpage/231301/1 "2004-02-26T16:19:02Z")

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I can’t find the fix at Microsoft. Netscape prints a web page, but IE prints it blank.  
Thanks

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**Author:** ![CookingWithGas](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cookingwithgas/32/485_2.png) [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)\
**Post date:** [February 26, 2004, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ie6-prints-blank-webpage/231301/2 "2004-02-26T17:54:43Z")

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Any web page, or just one particular URL? If the latter, post the URL.

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**Author:** ![brix11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c37758/32.png) [@brix11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brix11)\
**Post date:** [February 27, 2004, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ie6-prints-blank-webpage/231301/3 "2004-02-27T16:35:52Z")

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Check the Preferences and make sure that you have background printing turned on. If you don’t and try to print a page with white text on a dark background, guess what you get…blank paper.

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**Author:** ![kellner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c2a13f/32.png) [@kellner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kellner)\
**Post date:** [February 27, 2004, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ie6-prints-blank-webpage/231301/4 "2004-02-27T16:49:06Z")

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If that is only a problem for specific sites it is possible that the author wanted to prevent printing for some reason. Using stylesheets you can define different styles for different media. This can be used to turn a colored page to plain black-on-white for better legibility or similar things. However you can also use it to prevent some (or all) elements from being rendered in print.

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**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\
**Post date:** [February 27, 2004, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ie6-prints-blank-webpage/231301/5 "2004-02-27T21:18:55Z")

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> [@CookingWithGas](#):
>
> post the URL.

That would be [http://www.fes.follett.com/](http://www.fes.follett.com/)

Updating IE 6 with SP 1 fixed it.  
Now, anybody know why WIN98 would have no desktop icons or status bar except in safe mode?  
🙂  
Thanks