Calibrating a Printer

Is this a desk top printer?
Google has a wealth of information by searching color management printer.
If this is a production printer you could try one of the printing online forums such as Print Planet.
A lot of times changing the preferences on the printer will give you the results you want. Try changing the color space from sRGB to Adobe RGB or vice versa.
You can find millions of ICC profile with Google if you want to try that.

Most printers don't have calibration controls (though some do).

So they rely strictly on ICC profiles. Luckily unlike displays, the ICC profile is in use for everything you print.

The best would be to use something like an i1 Pro and create a profile from a printed test swatches. But you'd need x-rites software to do that.

It's even more complicated than that. To calibrate a printer correctly, you need a reflectance meter that has a built-in reference light source (that also needs periodic re-calibration). The best types of these are made so that you insert the paper so the read head is over the area of the page you want to measure. You typically then move a lever that lowers the read head onto the paper and the reading is made.

BUT... that's only the beginning. The paper you use will affect the calibration significantly. If you want really consistent results, you'd want to re-calibrate for each new batch of paper. And... if you insert the paper in different orientations (4 possible ways... "notmal", rotated 180 degrees, or bottom up vs top up), you'll get 4 different measurements because the way the ink hits the grain of the paper will change the measurement results. Also, if you use photo paper vs plain paper, calibration results will be very different. And lastly... any time you change an ink cartridge, the measured results will change so recalibration may be needed. It's nearly impossible to calibrate color laser printers that use powdered toner. Ink jet printers are more calibrate-able but the paper variable is fairly significant. If you use Deluxe Photo Paper for 2 years and the manufacturer changes to Ultra Deluxe Photo paper and stops making the old Deluxe paper, your calibration results will change. I used to work on systems that used dye transfer printers because each roll of dye (8.5x11 inch panels of cyan, yellow, magenta, and black dye on something similar to Saran Wrap) could be characterized and the end user could input the correction factor values without having to recalibrate the entire system. You don't get that sort of data with consumer-grade printers and ink, so you end up having to keep recalibrating whenever there's a variable inserted into the printing process.

You're clearly not used to seeing a properly calibrated printer. The manufacturer ensures that every printer is calibrated in-advance for all use situations. After all, the human eye isn't perfect. Who are you to question the printer? It clearly knows better than you what colors to put down.

Does the print driver have a preference to print gray with black only?
We have a couple of printers that offer that selection.

??? How is THAT going to work? What are you going to use for a light source and how are you going to keep that light source consistent? Any change in the color of light illuminating the page will drastically alter the meter readings. That's why x-Rite makes both reflective and transmissive (for printed page or film/transparency) measurement equipment... they have their own internal calibrated light sources. The only thing that would remotely allow you to use the i1Pro meter is something called a "viewing booth". This device has color temperature controlled lighting. They come in a variety of sizes. To use it for calibration, the room would have to be dark so external light doesn't alter the color temp of the light produced by the viewing booth. You place the page you want to measure on an easel in the viewing booth, turn on the light, long enough that it is stable, darken the room, then you could measure the page. A good viewing booth likely costs as much as an i1Pro meter though it has been a long time since I've priced one.

I think he just ment the panasonic player is bit perfect, why can't he just buy a printer that is completely accurate.

A better analogy would have the printer as to a display, since that's where the bits turn into color, but it wasn't my analogy.

Any idea what this is about?
The I1 Pro (1 or 2) has its own built in light source, Illuminant A in the original, so this makes no sense.
The kit the OP is talking about is an I1Io ($2k?)which is a table for automating the reading of hundreds of color patches in minutes. An alternative is the old Spectroscan/Spectrolino, which can often be found on Ebay for much less.