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Dell Takes the Low Road Regarding Ink Cartridges
Anonymous Coward writes "Dell released a line of printers today, manufactured by Lexmark. As covered by by Yahoo they '..contain a chip that disables the cartridge if it is refilled and replaced in a Dell printer..' and 'The cartridges are different sizes than cartridges from other printer vendors, including Lexmark, the spokesperson said. This will limit the amount of knockoff cartridges available, but only until someone figures out how to reverse engineer Dell's cartridges.'" In the interest of full disclosure, note that the poster sells knockoff carts.
Saying that Dell taking the low road by preventing the sale of third party ink cartriges would be akin to saying the same of Microsoft and the X-Box. Dell sells printers at close to cost, making up for it because of package deals and the extra sales of their proprietary cartridges. Don't knock them for trying to make their money back.
Have you been stalked by Seth today?
I agree. I bought an hp laserjet 1000 the low end version which I assume was shitty. It rocks.
Even the lowest end laser printers are so much more reliable and faster then the highest end ink jet.
Only 1 paper jam ever with my HP.
My epson ink jet cost only $50 but I blew over $150 over the years for ink.
I still use my original ink cartridge on my laser printer because it can do over 2.5k copies!
The quality of the ink is better as well and the images are sharper.
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Dell has released an extremely cheap printer. This extremely cheap printer uses ink cartridges which create a revenue stream for Dell, but also wear out and stop functioning to spec after a certain amount of time.
Some third party is upset that they cannot refill those cartridges, even though they were not designed to be refilled, and are at the end of their lives.
Consumers have a multitude of options regarding printing technology, at widely varying costs per page. Dell's decision has not eliminated any of the other suppliers or technologies.
In short, unless you manufacture inkjet refill kits, don't worry about this, it doesn't matter and it would change your life in the least.
Try laser. You can get an HP laser jet for $250 or you can go on ebay and get them for cheaper.
They are extremely reliable and the ink never smudges because its fused onto the paper. In an inkjet its sprayed on by bubbles.
Also if you can buy a used HP corporate laser pritner with networking support, you can use linux with it. The higher end department printers are real printers and not winprinters which mean Linux can communicate with them.
I am not the only one who realizes that it's cheaper to buy a new printer than a set of replacement catridges.
So, what do you think happens to the old printer? it gets tossed; and then it gets dumped in a landfill or china - neither is a very good option.
I don't see how does that *not* impact my life.
Besides, environmental issues aside, while cheap, printers DO COST MONEY TO MAKE, and throwing them away because the manufactures decides on a fucked-up business model only drives up the cost eventually.
I really don't like this model the inkjet people has taken on. I mean, I understand it with games consoles, but the analogy don't really compare. It's like if Xbox costed less than your typical came and always came with coupon for a free game of your choosing - or a car that's so cheap you will buy it for the tank of gas that the dealer gives you. It's not a good business model anywhere else, why would the printer people get all drunk over it?
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Ditto on the lasers blowing the inks out of the water. I've got two lasers at home I picked up on my local county online auction. I picked up an Apple 12/640 for $40 and a Lexmark Optra Lxn+ for $68. Both of them are still on the toner cartridge that was sitting in them when I bought them and print flawlessly. The Apple printer had 6800 pages on it and the Lexmark had 32,000 and they sold them for small change. I felt like a thief picking them up from the county warehouse.
Last inkjet printer I bought sits in the closet waiting for it's next set of cartridges. Every time I think I need to print something in color I price the carts and say "nevermind". That's what cheap printers with expensive ink create. A customer who you make nothing (or next to nothing) off of when you sell him the printer and who never can bring himself to pay for the expensive refills.
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It's as easy as that. I usually "buy" (i.e.price) the cartridges first.
My dad ran a laser printer cartridge recharge/refurbish business for a while several years ago. IIRC, a lot of printer manufacturers would also collect these old cartridges to do the same and resell them as used. What's preventing Dell/Lexmark/whoever from doing something like this? There's obviously a market for it, they'd save on manufacturing costs and empty cartridges would stay out of the landfills for a while.
Everyone please come down, this is self-regulating capitalism in action. It is well known fact that there are little to no margins in printers themselves. The way Dell is going to make up what is more than likely a loss on the printer itself is to sell printer cartridges. Think of it as a loan, they sell you the printer at or below cost so the consumer does not have to bite the bullet and pay for the full cost of the printer (And the manufactures profit). Consumers like it that way! People like a cheap upfront cost!
It is the exact same way with cellphones, look at the cost of a unlocked (gsm) cellphone compared to the cost of getting the same phone under contract with a cellphone provider that locks you into the use of that one provider. Granted, some people do go for the unlocked phones, but the vast majority are fine with a locked phone from the provider because it is the same phone but much cheaper. Same with DirecTV who eat a loss of somewhere around $200 for each reciever they sell. Oh, and it only works with DirecTV.
If there was a market for printers that used some sort of universal cartrage, someone would make it thanks to capitalism. If you want something close get a laser, there is much less focus on consumables in that market, but of course you are going to pay a much higher upfront cost. (I have a laser and personally I wouldn't use anything else)
If you don't like it don't buy an ink jet printer, and/or make the market known for a inkjet printer that is not subsidised and uses an open design for cartriges, but frankly gripping at length at how Dell is trying to screw the consumer with a perfectly legitiment business model (And one that most consumers like) is not productive and gets quite tiresome.
The cheaper the printer the more it costs per page. Period, it's not just a function of laser vs inkjet. A high output multi drum digital colour copier will print out what looks like shiny magazine (national geographic/cosmo) looking output for a few pennies a page, best of all a machine like that will only set you back thirty grand or so. Think of a lexmark/dell printer as a Polaroid camera(ya'll do remember polaroids, right?) and don't stress over the whole thing.
You know as well as I do that many people look at the printer price, not some complex calculation of cost per page, pages per cartridge, cartridge price and # of pages over printer lifetime, at least not when this big red sign "SALE: Only XX.99$" is beaming towards you.
:p), or my printer to accept paper of any color, and not only paper with a hidden "printer" watermark.
Personally, I would consider "ink" as a commodity product. Just like I expect my car to run on gas from any petrol station (assuming right octane at least
I don't have a problem with the business model though as long as it is clearly labeled. "Can only be used with [brand] ink cartridges. Third-party cartridges or ink refill is not possible. Attempts to circumvent this is illegal under the DMCA and punishable by [whatever it is]." in red. That should kill sales pretty quick...
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
How can a few onces of ink cost $30 - $40????????
"The market" can work things out if the consumers have the information. You can imagine a series of printers that cost more but take "commodity" ink being popular with some people while some people like the "minimum up-front cost" Dell/Lexmark path.
Nutrition labels, car MPG labels, appliance Energy Star labels ... these are all cases where a little government arm-twisting gives us a much more competitive and responsive market.
The theme is: use transparency to bring to the surface costs being shifted to the consumer. If they still choose to consume ... so be it. This same great strategy is the basis of yesterday's article about
requirng labels on copy-restricted materials.
Think, write, think, edit, think...then post.
if they would be even halfway creative and use the ROM on the chip for something useful, such as storing color or viscosity information about the inks. This would enable companies to periodically reformulate their inks (to increase longevity, saturation, or even just due to manufacturing variation) while preserving perfect matching from cartridge to cartridge. They could also license this to third parties to enable the sale of quadtone, hextone, or true six color inks (instead of the usual light cyan and light magenta, the other two inks might be orange and blue, or spot colors). This would add real value, but instead this technology is being used for the singularly unimaginative use of vendor lock-in. It might not be good for third-party drivers (such as Gimp-Print), but if printer vendors used these chips for useful purposes, it actually would benefit users.
People actually should be careful about third-party cartridges and refill kits; some of these are very bad, and if you're not careful with refill kits you can cause problems either by introducing air bubbles or debris. Some printers (Canon and HP that I know of) include the print head with the cartridge, and the head isn't designed for a very long life; the quality will probably degrade after a few refills. Epson printers use a long-life head technology, but the flip side is that if you damage the heads, you're either looking at an expensive repair or a new printer. Refill kits are also messy. However, that really should be for the user to decide.
So, what happens when Dell realizes they're not making enough money on printers and discontinues them?
Where are you gonna get ink?
Why buy from Dell when it's just a remarked Lexmark? Just buy the Lexmark, the ink/toner will be much more widely available, and probably less expensive.
Nothing to see here; Move along.
Most people are missing the biggest problem with Dell not having compatible cartridges. Right now, if you run out of ink while printing your paper/report/projet that is due TOMORROW you can simply pop over to the nearest office supply store and get a new ink jet cartridge, or if it's late you can go to the 24-hour super Wal-Mart since even they carry HP/Lexmart/Canon ink jet cartridges. If you get a Dell and you run out, what are you going to do? Order a new one that will be shipped at best overnight and pay the overnight shipping charges on a $30 cartridge? Or will you decide to wait a week while UPS Ground delivers it? Either way you are heavily screwed. Dell is going to make some big enemies when people find out they can't buy a replacement cartridge locally.
" Every time I think I need to print something in color I price the carts and say "nevermind" "
I do the same thing. To take it further, I often opt to not print at all, and instead just scribble down what I want off the screen onto a post-it. If I didn't have a nag in the back of my mind about the cost of ink every time I hear my printer doing the hula, I would print a helluva lot more stuff out. So, in a way, having expensive ink makes me more environmentally friendly. (tongue in cheek)
To get back on topic, Dell and the low road, what exactly would you have them do? Despite people knowing about the money being made on the ink, the first theing they consider when buying a printer is the cost of the printer. Dell can't exactly reverse the trend of the existing market just because they now have their name on a printer. If Dell decided to do the "normal" thing... by charging enough to make a profit on the hardware, then selling the ink for the profit that it is worth, how would they get their printers into the market? People would look at the price of them and say... "um, no".
- a regular cartridge with no lockout chip ($129/$99/$35)
- a "use and return" cartridge with lockout chip ($99/$75/na).
I feel pretty certain that Dell wants to keep you as a cartridge customer, but they aren't locking you in. Oh, and only one of the four printers is an inkjet. The others are lasers. Even better, the inkjet does not include this technology. Bottom line: Dell is getting into the laser printer cartridge refilling business. No wonder the OP is complaining.Right but the legalese will appear in a similar case to this when someone reverse engineers the chip and b00m we have a DMCA case.
This is good though, because its another rediculous invocation of the DMCA that will eventually lead to the court challenge that brings it down.
I beg to differ. This attitude was right in 1994 maybe - that most people print a few pictures and then quit printing.
However, "many" if not "most" people today find themselves having to use their printer for much more than this.
For example, I'm a university student. I have to print not only papers and multiple drafts to take to class, but also many library catalogs offer journals in full-text online form now.
Between all the uses of my printer that are required, I use a ream of paper every month or so. Not many compared to even a small office.
When (like with a Lexmark I tossed into the trash) I can't even get 200 pages out of a cartridge, and am told that a replacement will cost $30 to $50, just for the black, and probably as much for the colour, that's just ridiculous. Would I pay $100 or $200 for a printer to have $10 or even $15 cartridges, rather than a $40 printer that costs that $30 to $50? Hell yeah. However, consumers are increasingly either not given the choice, or are not well informed. Most consumers who buy a new printer don't know to check the ink cost first. Or, worse, the printer with the features they need only comes with expensive ink.
Myself, I'm holding onto my Canon BJC-610. Recently, the refill cartridges I use have been discontinued, and I was able to buy 10 of each black and colour tanks (4 tanks total) for about $4 each on clearance. The name-brand Canon cart is $14 or so, which is still a bargain compared to most. However, I noticed my last trip to Circuit City that this printer is no longer listed in their ink catalog at all. Staples still has the ink, but I am getting the eerie feeling that Canon would rather not support an affordable ink supply anymore.
After that happens, I guess I'll just have to go feral in looking for ink supplies.
-- If it ain't broke - overclock it more.
Well, first off HPs suck. I don't know how they got the reputation that they were so good, but my experience has been they don't last. I've had 3 of them, including one I bought for a rather expensive $350 around 5 years ago. It stopped working after a year. The next HP bit it too.
So I bought a Lexmark Z51 - it did decent printouts and it still works. But the ink is quite expensive.
But Canon - I got an s800, and it prints out beautiful pictures. Then it stopped working after only a year! Damn. But it turned out my kid had stuffed a pencil in a rather delicate part of the printer's anotomy, and once a pencil-ectmy was performed, the printer was all better! Able to survive a hostile environment. Plus the ink is really cheap. So there you have it - cheap, durable, and excellent output. And no Carly.
No, I don't trust in god. He'll have to pay up front, like everybody else.
I'm surprised Dell does this. They don't have the infrastructure to have a relationship like this with the customer - and they won't be able to get stores to stock yet another set of ink cartridges(also, this wouldn't be consistent with Dell's way of operating). So how are customers (especially consumers) going to get their parts in a cheap[1] and timely manner?
[1](well, this is ink and thus a bit expensive... but fedex on single cartridges would make it that much worse)
I'm not in the US, so it doesn't directly affect me, but apparently, the chip is meant as a form of copy protection (preventing you from producing a working copy of the ink cartridge). In order to produce a compatible ink cartridge, you'd have to "crack" the protection on the printer or the cartridge. In the US, the DCMA prohibits anyone from circumventing copy protection, so putting these chips is meant to give the cartridges the same protection that CSS does on DVDs. Some of the cartridge manufacturers employing this scheme are using this argument to prevent producing clone cartridges.
What you're missing is that these cartridges contain a chip with copyrighted information stored on it in encrypted form - decoding that information to make a 3rd party cartridge is what violates DMCA.
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And does Dell sell that on their webpage also?
It will be most interesting to see what Dell has to say when the chips get reverse-engineered, considering this is how Dell / Compaq etc. got their start back in the day (reverse engineering IBM BIOS)
Funny, people in my office still use the term 'IBM-Compatible' when talking about Intel based PCs. Are printers next?
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