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InkJet Printers Lying, Or Just Wrong?
akkarin writes in about a study reported at Ars Technica on how accurate ink-jet printers are when they report that cartridges are empty. Not very, it turns out. Epson came out on top of the study (and Ars rightly questions how objective it was, given that Epson paid for it), but even they waste 20% of the ink if users take the printers' word for when to get a new cartridge. On average, the printers in the study wasted more than half the ink that users bought.
There's actually a free software that's available that can be used to reset the chips in several brands of ink cartridges. I'm not sure if you need any type of hardware, but I've heard good things about it.
It allows you to reset the numbers and use the remainder of the ink, before it makes you replace it.
If you ask me, the feature that stops you from using a cartridge after the ink is too low, is pretty ignorant. I think it's obvious when the ink is completely out, so why not let the user decide?
"Please, shut up. Just when I think you can't say anything more stupid, you speak again." -Archie Bunker.
Yes.
I've found 'extra' ink in both my Epson and HP inkjet printers. I'd use refill kits, but the cartridges tend to leak over time, and refilling takes a lot of time and effort. In the meantime, for Epson printers, just go with the el cheapo compatible cartridges from places like Inkco. Epson C88 cartridges are $5 a pieces, as opposed to to ~$25 for branded cartridges.
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Get a Color Laser then.
Inkjets are so 1993
I've been a long time fan of Canon photo printers, in fact I just bought a Pixma Pro9000. Their ink tanks are clear so if you doubt what the printer is saying you can eyeball it for yourself. So far it's been very accurate about remaining ink level.
The problem is that the printer manufacturers are now caught in this model. Nobody dares go back to charging the "real" price for the printer and the ink, as their printers would immediately seem more expensive to the average customer.
In an ideal world the model would be unsustainable, as third party ink manufacturers would undercut the official ink packs. But the printer manufacturers have consistently abused their market position and IP law to prevent third party ink manufacturers competing on equal terms. Your average consumer doesn't even know he can get cheap alternatives, and life is increasingly difficult for even sophisticated consumers as the printer manufacturers build in IP-protected electronics into ink cartridges.
All in all, it's clearly bad for consumers and the kind of thing the competition/anti-trust authorities should be investigating.
Laser is significantly better at the moment. Cost per page is about 10% that of inkjet, and it's a lot faster. Photo's aren't so hot, but are about the same as an inkjet in photo draft mode - big reason is that the DPI is lower (1200 on my color laser) and it only has 4 colors instead of 6 or 8. This is why I use my little Kodak 4x6" photo printer for photos (which is thermal transfer) and an internet print shop for larger quantities / enlargements of photos.
I'll never ever buy an inkjet ever again. With my laser, I never have banding, never have "cleaning cycles," etc. It just works.
They grab that tube, start at one end of the brush, and just hammer that brush, covering it to the last bristle with toothpaste.
Is the cleanliness of the teeth proportional to the amount of paste used? No.
Are sales driven by encouraging people to use more product? Yes.
Why does the 'corporate we' seem so surprised when we occasionally wake up and realize that vendors are trying to cajole more sales?
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
One of the biggest problem I have with lasers, aside from photo quality, is that paper handling isn't so good as compared to an inkjet. Inkjets can print on a variety of different media - envelopes, glossy photo paper, card stock, etc. Most inexpensive lasers have very poor paper handling in that they have an inability to print on anything thicker than thick bond or thin card stock. More expensive printers have no problem, but then they are not cost competitive with an inkjet.
Also, cheap lasers tend to wear out quicker than inkjets, in my experience.
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Don't you see, you don't buy the ink, you license it. Once the license runs out, you have to renew, and by ignoring the "out of ink" warning you are no better than the pirates costing the industry $10000000000000000000000000.
Wow, this has been one of those things that really piss me off for quite some time. While it is true that the laser jet printers do better than inkjets they ALSO LIE and ARE DESIGNED TO FAIL.
For example; I bought a laser two years ago (from a company that rhymes with hell). I bought it because I needed to print letters to clients and do things like print checks. Nothing heavily graphics intensive nor really heavy duty text work either.
So here is what I discovered with my 'efficient' laser printer; My '5000 page' toner cartridge prints about 1000 pages. Pissed, I decided to open one up as they are about $100 for a new one.
Lo and behold it was still full of toner. Somehow, as the printer printed the quality of the prints degraded as the toner 'ran out' a little more with each print. At the time I figured this was because there was no toner but the proof was now in my hands (and all over my desk for that matter) so I decided to investigate further. It seems that these toner cartridges use chips to tell your pc that its running out each time you print.
Now, I'm not electronics guru, so I don't have a machine I can actually read the chip with, but I am under the impression that this chip also purposefully degrades the quality of your prints as it counts down your toner level. To test that theory I ordered some refill kits off of the web.
First thing I noticed after doing the chip replacement was that the quality of the prints immediately improved. I printed for several weeks, noticed the quality go down again, replaced the chip (no toner added in there yet...) and viola worked beautiful. When that chip said it was empty I opened the whole thing up again and took a look. This time it was indeed very low, but not empty. I poured in the new bottle of toner and put in a new chip and went back to work.
I usually order 3 chips for each bottle of toner I purchase . Currently I get about 4000 pages per bottle of toner. My refill purchases cost me $29 for two bottles of toner and six chips (on chip comes with each bottle and I add the other four to the order) Let's see$200 vs $29 for two 'cartridges' worth of prints... hmmm.... yeah I'll refill. Add to that the fact that the purchased carts don't get the same mileage as the refilled ones with extra chips to replace the old ones.
I guarantee I will never buy another 'rhymes with hell' printer again.
Caveat emptor indeed.
Prospecting Stinks. Stop Wasting Time on Cold Calling.