Are inkjet printer manufacturers try to get all of us ?

[SingSing]

All the new Pixma's have a build in chip so you can't use generic ink anymore.

When the first generation HP and Fujitsu inkjet came out, the print was poor, and tiny bit of water can ruin the print. We supported them, and thus the product development.

Lately, Epson, HP, and now Canon, is trying all they can to stop us using generic ink! Epson just settle the class action suit, but that's not going to stop them.

Ink likes black are basically universal, there are nothing special about it.

Worse of this, is we are paying for the chips they embedded in the cartidge to stop us using generic ink, and also encourage them to charge us the same money for even lesser ink in the cartridge.

So, hold on to your older model of inkjet printers.

[jtoolman2000]

Most of not all chips on EPSON printers have been hacked in one way or another.

That's why you can obtain 3rd party carts for most of them from various companies. It will not be too long before the same occurs for the pixma series.

[oldandinthe way]

The Epson class action suit was based on the chips reporting empty when significant ink remained.

[MJA]

can someone calculate the price of a barrel of ink

[MOVIEGEEK]

HP,Epson,etc make money on the refills not the actual printers...that's why they want you to use their products.*
Sort of like the wireless companies:they make money on airtime charges...not on the phone.

*I don't like using their ink cart. either,they're way overpriced.

[kschang]

One more reason I stick with HP's: at least their carts contains a LOT of ink for the same price compared to other folks' carts. And there are generics available for theirs.

I used to own a Sharp fax machine. Great little thing until the holder won't register the cart any more. The carts are TINY (a little larger than those Canon ink tanks) and they want 20+ for it. It MAY print 200 pages, if you're lucky. So it's refill, refill, refill. In comparison, the HP tank holds roughly 3 times as much ink (possibly more) for just 1/3 more price (about 33).

[neomaine]

Exactly why I went with color laser. Won't touch ink-jets again.

[BJ_M]

can someone calculate the price of a barrel of ink

85$ a gallon - so $4675 a barrel


http://www.inksupply.com/epsoninks.cfm


except for Ultrachrome Colors -- $384 a gallon (8 colors needed also) - so $21,120 a barrel ....

[pchan]

Need to be careful of the inkjet combo with scanner. That darn thing won't work without ink. Better off buying a standalone scanner.

[BJ_M]

my epson inkjet scanner works with out ink in it .... i just use the scanner part ..... maybe all of them dont work this way though

[SingSing]

One more reason I stick with HP's: at least their carts contains a LOT of ink for the same price compared to other folks' carts. And there are generics available for theirs.

I have a HP inkjet and a HP AIO. Bothe of them takes HP67 cartridge with 19mL at $19.99. The new HP21 cartidge cost $14.99, and have only 5mL of ink. These two cartridges serve the same functions, because quite a few HP printers can use either one of these.

So, HP just increases the price of ink by 285% !

[DarrellS]

Before my HP Deskjet 812c bit the dust after 5 years of service, I only bought 1 or two sets of cartridges a year. Usually during the holidays.

When I bought the HP Photosmart 7850 in December, I was using two or three color cartridges a week, backing up my music and DVD collection (probably $500 worth of ink). The photo grey lasts three times as long as the color so you can't just buy the cartridges in sets like with the old printer.

The package says you can make like 200 prints but I assume that is using the worst quality print on the 4x6 photo paper that they give you. I haven't printed on any of those yet. I probably get about 20 prints on 8x10 paper per color cartridge if I'm lucky.

[JerryB]

All the new Pixma's have a build in chip so you can't use generic ink anymore.

When the first generation HP and Fujitsu inkjet came out, the print was poor, and tiny bit of water can ruin the print. We supported them, and thus the product development.

Lately, Epson, HP, and now Canon, is trying all they can to stop us using generic ink! Epson just settle the class action suit, but that's not going to stop them.

Ink likes black are basically universal, there are nothing special about it.

Worse of this, is we are paying for the chips they embedded in the cartidge to stop us using generic ink, and also encourage them to charge us the same money for even lesser ink in the cartridge.

So, hold on to your older model of inkjet printers.

hi,
Just thought add my 2 cents.. smile....
The companies tried that in Europe a couple of years ago but the EU put a stop companies using chips that makes it for consumer to refill or get substitute cartriges..... and I hope Some progress will be made along these lines....

But as far as ink from third parties being the same as name brands ...... no it not!!! there a lot of little difference..... the size of the ink particles themselves, the emulsion agent that involved... they deal a lot with color quality, hardness, reliability.... the choice of using third party ink or the name brand ink will a lot depends on what kindof color projects you do and how important the color quality..... and how criticle one is...!

[tug_hill2]

Hello Forum Members, I gave up on Ink Jet printers quite some time ago as I had a BAD TIME with a Canon Bubble Jet printer. - - - - A Really BAD time...!

I ended up junking the Canon BubbleJet printer - - Then spending $3,500 on an HP 4500 Color Laserjet. This model was the first Consumer based Color Laserjet and is still working.

Currently you can get an HP Color Laserjet printer model for under 500.00.


p.s. Canon still owes me the $25.00 rebate on that printer . . . .

[kschang]

One more reason I stick with HP's: at least their carts contains a LOT of ink for the same price compared to other folks' carts. And there are generics available for theirs.

I have a HP inkjet and a HP AIO. Bothe of them takes HP67 cartridge with 19mL at $19.99. The new HP21 cartidge cost $14.99, and have only 5mL of ink. These two cartridges serve the same functions, because quite a few HP printers can use either one of these.

So, HP just increases the price of ink by 285% !

I can't find the HP 67 listed... :P

I just checked... I'm using HP20, which the tank comes with a whopping 28 mL of ink. AND I can refill those. 8)

[festmaster]

What kills me is the Epson R200 (now R220) printer that makes excellent CD/DVD prints for only $99. A set of Epson carts costs $70, almost the same as a new machine. Many reliable sources of third party cartridges sell the same set for $12. Therefore, if you can run two sets of 3rd party carts successfully it doesn't matter if they ruin the printer. You are still ahead. As to the other comments on the volume of Epson ink, I agree. I use the R200 almost exclusively for DVD and CD prints and the occasional photo yet I go through 3 sets of carts per year. I have always used HP printers for my primary printing and never goe through more than two sets per year.

[kschang]

On the other hand, some of these refill outfits are just, bull****.

Had a friend who said he ordered 3 Canon BJ21 (?) carts for his fax machine. He said it ordered it through phone, and the guy sent him three, like buy 2 get one free or something. We tried all three and found only ONE to be working properly. The other three weren't feeding ink to all the nozzles, so it came out missing horizontal lines. At first we thought it's just a cleaning issue, but it persisted after like 5 cleanings. So we kept changing carts until we found the third one to work. My friend understands now why ordering from somebody you know nothing about may NOT be such a good idea.

[adam]

The Epson class action suit was based on the chips reporting empty when significant ink remained.

You're correct. The original poster must be talking about a different Epson suit. It was not a class action lawsuit. It was actually Epson who tried to sue a 3rd party ink manufacturer because they manufactured their ink cartridges in such a way as to circumvent the chip in the printer that locked out generic ink cartridges. They argued that it violated the DMCA. The court found in favor of the ink manufacturer and ruled that Epson's use of such a chip is an illegal tie in to their trademark. They then ordered Epson to cease using the chip. Lexmark lost an identical lawsuit as this one as well. HP lost a class action suit on similar grounds many years ago.

SingSing have you actually verified that these Pixma printers include such a chip? So far every manufacturer that has tried to do this has been unsuccessful. There's several Appellate cases which say that you just can't do this, and there's several more that say that if you try you can't prevent the generic ink manufacturers from circumventing it. This sounds like a false alarm to me.

[ranchhand]

Good thread here... got a question; I had an Epson C80 injet two years ago. Discovered the chipped cart trap. As of a year ago at least, there was a chip resetter that could be purchased if you want to fill your own. Then Epson got wind of that, and started changing the set code on each chip with each new batch so it wouldn't work, as well as repositioning the position of the chip slightly so that the resetter would not make contact when the cart was inserted. I figured (accurately) that each standard 250 pack of paper was costing me $240 to print with Epson ink. I literally set the printer next to my garbage cans with a note of explanation to whoever wanted it.

I have an i960 that uses ink from Ink4art.com with great results at a 2/3 savings. Interestingly, they are using Canon logo and labels on their carts, so they must have some kind of deal with Canon.

So - please inform me. Is Canon doing that now? Chipping it's carts so that generics can't be used?

[CrayonEater]

This is exactly why I bought an HP 2200DN laser. It took me a year to get through the starter toner cartridge. I've already saved the cost of the printer in ink, or close to it. And it's fast.

[SingSing]

Is this a better printing solution ? : http://staples.shoplocal.com/staples/Default.aspx?action=browsepagedetail&storeid=2503...ailerid=-99906

[Tom Saurus]

I have been buying Ritek DVD-R's for months, leaving the surface blank, except for writing the bare minumin with a DVD Marker to identify the DVD, in aticipation of getting the printer to print on them. Reading all this, is making me think, maybe I better learn to be artistic and use markers and try to draw fancy text on them myself. I was thinking of getting an Epson, but if I can't get Generic Ink to work in it, there doesn't seem to be a reason to buy one. I have been trying to get an Epson R220 but noone sells them in my area. The Radio Shack had a Epson R300, but it would be nearly 300 bucks with tax, so that was too expensive for me to afford.

So my basic question is, if I track down an Epson R220, can I use Generic Ink in it? If the answer is no, I can live with it. I will just invest in some new markers for writing on DVD's with. Thank you in advance for any information you can provide me with. Does anyone know of any online instructions to teach me how to drawing text with dimmension, so I can make it look 3D? If the ink is too expensive, maybe I better stop getting the DVD-R's with a printable surface, they really soak up the ink in my markers, making them dry up alot quicker.

[festmaster]

So my basic question is, if I track down an Epson R220, can I use Generic Ink in it?

Yes, generic ink will work. I have used 4 sets of generic cartridges for my R200 and the only difference between it and the R220 is an improved disk handling tray on the latter.

[Tom Saurus]

festmaster: Thank you very much for the reply you gave me to my question. I have been looking for a Epson R 220 since October of last year. I am buying one from a shop in a Village close buy. I have asked them several times for this printer before and they referred me to the Epson R 300 Series and never mention they had one of these in stock. Now after finding out that Future Shop has it, the local place tells me, we've had the Epson R 220 in stock and we've had them since November. I am scratching my head wondering what is up with that. I didn't want the Epson R 300 because of the price, it would be nearly $300.00 with the tax on it, and it just seemed to be "overkill", having features, I didn't need or even want.

I've sent some money up town to purchase it, and to get some generic ink at another local shop, and the guy there is giving me a really good deal. I even bought a 16 foot USB cable, to hook it to the computer. Thanks once again, I am going to mostly put text on the DVD, I am curious does the Epson do a good job of rendering text onto the surface of the blank DVD-R.

[overloaded_ide]

If buying a Canon printer with chips check around yourself to be certain it can be refilled, it probably can be. I found the info for mine on the net.

I have the IP4200 with chips on the tanks and as I understand it I can simply refill the carts whenever I need to. BUT the ink monitor won't reset to show me ink levels, I think I have to turn it off or something.
I am supposed to get an error message after refilling which I ingore and the printer prints normal after that.
So every so often you look at the carts and make sure your not getting low or running out. Not a big deal I do that anyway on my other printers.

I have not had to refill the IP4200 yet, but I found the same info several places and also from an ink dealer I buy from.

$62 total for my printer, no way I will buy 5 ink tanks at retail
Basically the way I look at it is anyone that buys $70-$80 cartriges because they are worried generic inks will ruin a $60 printer is nuts.

Who ever said all the inks are the same is wrong. BLACK can be a pigment ink or a dye ink depending on the printers. My Canon I850 is Pigment black and dye colors. My IP4200 has a large Black tank which is pigment ink, also a small black tank which is dye ink. Colors are dye inks.
I can use the same inks I bought for my I850 in the IP4200 but I need one extra Black dye ink for the one tank.

Other brands may differ on the dyes and pigment inks, maybe even by models in the same brands.

I been using ink-refills-ink.com ink in my I850 and been happy with it. They seem fast and helpfull as well as friendly when I call or e-mail them. Seem to know alot about printers too if you have questions, and can tell you what types ink you need for your model as well as if/how it can be refilled.
They have about everything including refillable tanks for the R200 Epsons. I need to buy a set of those still myself for mine.

[jtoolman2000]

$300 for a R300???? It should be like $160 at the most. They are triying to screw you sideways!
I just baught a R320 with colkor monitor and new version of the disk tray ( works PERFECTLY!! ) and paid $198 at staples.

Get your carts for any R series at www.megatoners.com Cost only a couple of $$ each color. Results for me have been excellent for Photos, Graphics of DVD/CD printing.

[Tom Saurus]

jtoolman2000: Since I live in Canada, about $249.00 before taxes would compare close to your $198.00 in Maryland, U.S. Then there is the 15 percent tax and on July 1st that will be 14 percent tax. The strange thing they tell me they have had the R220 in since November, and I have asked ever other month about getting that model and they kept saying we just have the Epson R 300 or R 320. I am glad they have it in stock, despite whatever the reason was they didn't seem to have it. I would of had to pay atleast $50.00 bucks to hire someone to take me to the city to get it. I like to shop locally anyway. Thanks for your input.

festmaster: What is it like living in Rick Flair Country? It must a virtual whoo- whoo fest down their. I have watched alot of wrestling over the years and he refers to living in Charlotte, N.C. often.

[trossin]

Save money and throw your printer away (ok recycle it). I stopped using my printer to print photos as it was a pain to do and the corner drug store's non-sale price is cheaper and the results are better (and last longer).

The business folks call the pricing game with ink the Gillete Razor model. Give the shaver (printer) away and over charge for the blades (ink). HP makes most of their money off of ink.

[zzyzzx]

Anyone here ever refill a laster cartridge with one of those toner kits?

[SingSing]

Yes, I did, and is that messy or what! put on an old shirt, and put down a drop cloth.