Printer ink seven times more expensive than Dom Perignon

[kuk]

From The Register

Printer ink seven times more expensive than Dom Perignon
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Printer manufacturers are ripping off consumers by overcharging for printer cartridges, according to a study by the Consumer Association's Which? magazine.

Which? slams the cost of printer ink. A Colour HP cartridge, for example costs £29 or (put another way) 1.70 per millilitre. That's seven times more expensive than the cost of vintage champagne, it points out. A 1985 Dom Perignon costs 23p per millilitre.

Worse still, many printer cartridges give premature warnings that they are running out of ink.

Epson cartridges contain a chip that stop them working when ink runs low. The company says this is a measure to protect consumers from damaging their printer or product sub-standard prints.

But, after bypassing this system a Which? researcher was able to print many more pages at accepted quality before the ink ran dry. In one instance the researcher printed 38 per cent more pages during the tests. The least amount of extra pages he was able to print of on an Epsom printer was 17 per cent.

Last year an Office of Fair Trading investigation ruled that vendors should provide greater information about the cost and yield of replacement ink cartridges. The OFT has recommended that action be taken to develop a benchmark for ink cartridge measurement within the next year.

For its part, the Consumer Association advises consumers to steer clear of brand name printer cartridges and pick cheaper alternatives instead.

And it's not just consumers who are in the dark about the true costs of running a printer.

Forty five per cent of respondents to a survey published today by Kyocera Mita believe that printer vendors provided "very little" information about the running costs of their products, while a further 11 per cent feel that printer vendors "deliberately obscure" the costs of owning their products. Only five per cent of respondents consider that vendors were open about the true costs associated with their products.

Tracey Rawling Church, Head of Marketing at Kyocera Mita, commented: "The results of the survey show that the lack of information on TCO at the point of sale is not just a problem for consumers, but for business users too.

"Purchasers feel that they are being duped by vendors who provide very little information about the true cost impact of their products. With lifetime costs varying between different manufacturers by as much as 60 per cent, businesses can ill afford to make the wrong decision when selecting a printer fleet," she added.

Ink costs are truly very prohibitive. I just replaced my old and trusty HP 850C for a new Canon due to exorbitant ink costs. Wouldn't they make more money if they sold cheaper cartridges/tanks, stomping on grey market products?

 

[Spikey289]

Only one problem. They say use the non branded ink. I work somewhere that sells those and they blow! They never seem to work and are just junk.

 

[beer]

I've gotten remanufacturered HP cartridges that do the exact same quality and run 1/3 the price for a given quantity of ink. Between that and refills, it's acceptable, I guess.

I want a cheap laser though.

 

[dighn]

ink refill works great for me. almost identical quality to factory ink and it seems to last longer than the original...

 

[Kevin]

Actually, those ink refills will void your warranty. Canon seems to have the cheapest ink, but their carts are small. Lexmark is the worse though. They have some color carts that are $42. You can get a brand new printer for $50 and it comes with both the color and black ink...

 

[brunswickite]

I hate printing cuz it costs so much, i alaways use the computer lab, or work

 

[Liviathan]

I just don't print.

 

[Cyberian]

Originally posted by: Kevin
Actually, those ink refills will void your warranty. Canon seems to have the cheapest ink, but their carts are small. Lexmark is the worse though. They have some color carts that are $42. You can get a brand new printer for $50 and it comes with both the color and black ink...

You are probably technically corect, but if you remove the refilled/OEM cartridge before you take your printer for service, I don't see how anyone would know.

 

[stonecold3169]

Originally posted by: Cyberian

Originally posted by: Kevin
Actually, those ink refills will void your warranty. Canon seems to have the cheapest ink, but their carts are small. Lexmark is the worse though. They have some color carts that are $42. You can get a brand new printer for $50 and it comes with both the color and black ink...

You are probably technically corect, but if you remove the refilled/OEM cartridge before you take your printer for service, I don't see how anyone would know.

Clogged heads on an Epson printer perhaps? And I don't know about inkjets, but I know laser printers are DEFINITELY checked to see if 3rd party toners have been used, sometimes so far as chemical testing. Repairs on one of the bigger models costs aton of money, and something obcene like 1/5 of all laser printers that go bad is caused by 3rd party toners.

 

[ReiAyanami]

never buy generic refills from frys

 

[isekii]

i use generics for my epson and i've been keeping my Epson 880 running for about close to 2 years now i think.

Black in cost me like 3 bucks a pop and color ink 4 bucks a pop.

I print photos with it too and it's just like oem carts

 

[Kevin]

Originally posted by: stonecold3169

Originally posted by: Cyberian

Originally posted by: Kevin
Actually, those ink refills will void your warranty. Canon seems to have the cheapest ink, but their carts are small. Lexmark is the worse though. They have some color carts that are $42. You can get a brand new printer for $50 and it comes with both the color and black ink...

You are probably technically corect, but if you remove the refilled/OEM cartridge before you take your printer for service, I don't see how anyone would know.

Clogged heads on an Epson printer perhaps? And I don't know about inkjets, but I know laser printers are DEFINITELY checked to see if 3rd party toners have been used, sometimes so far as chemical testing. Repairs on one of the bigger models costs aton of money, and something obcene like 1/5 of all laser printers that go bad is caused by 3rd party toners.

Actually, I don't think manufacturers guarantee the print heads too. But the ink can damage them by being too think or thin...

 

[Booster]

I'm not using ink. I'm gonna tell you something... Never buy inkjet printers! They're useless! Their cartridge can print no more than what? 250 pages? LOL. I got an HP Laserjet 6L printer I bought in 1997 (in fact, it wasn't me who bought it that long ago, but it doesn't matter). I been printing huge amounts of stuff on it. It's cartridge can print up to 6000 pages in economy mode. It's still on it's original cartridge it was shipped with and it's used daily.

Total maintenance cost:

1. Toner to refill the cartridge: $5 (refilled it myself twice, can hold up to 3 refills, so I can still do it one more time).
2. $25 - to replace the paper feeder mechanism which started to feed multiple sheets at once.

That's it, $30 in 6 years. Could be only $5 hadn't the printer been so crappy. Next time I'm going with Canon, I heard they rarely have that problem.

 

[Cyberian]

Originally posted by: stonecold3169

Originally posted by: Cyberian

Originally posted by: Kevin
Actually, those ink refills will void your warranty. Canon seems to have the cheapest ink, but their carts are small. Lexmark is the worse though. They have some color carts that are $42. You can get a brand new printer for $50 and it comes with both the color and black ink...

You are probably technically corect, but if you remove the refilled/OEM cartridge before you take your printer for service, I don't see how anyone would know.

Clogged heads on an Epson printer perhaps? And I don't know about inkjets, but I know laser printers are DEFINITELY checked to see if 3rd party toners have been used, sometimes so far as chemical testing. Repairs on one of the bigger models costs aton of money, and something obcene like 1/5 of all laser printers that go bad is caused by 3rd party toners.

Once again, you may be totally correct.
I spent 25+ years working on IBM/Lexmark Copiers and printers.
I was done there in 1998 and if there were chemical tests to determine toner type I was not aware of them.
And , yes I know what repairs cost on larger laser printers.
I was charging $170/hr with a 2 hour on 'mid-range' lasers minimum when I left IBM in '98.

Do you have these big lasers at your work?

 

[Ryan]

Who in the hell spells out percent after numbers, and who in the hell spells it like that?!!?!

 

[stonecold3169]

Originally posted by: Cyberian

Originally posted by: stonecold3169

Originally posted by: Cyberian

Originally posted by: Kevin
Actually, those ink refills will void your warranty. Canon seems to have the cheapest ink, but their carts are small. Lexmark is the worse though. They have some color carts that are $42. You can get a brand new printer for $50 and it comes with both the color and black ink...

You are probably technically corect, but if you remove the refilled/OEM cartridge before you take your printer for service, I don't see how anyone would know.

Clogged heads on an Epson printer perhaps? And I don't know about inkjets, but I know laser printers are DEFINITELY checked to see if 3rd party toners have been used, sometimes so far as chemical testing. Repairs on one of the bigger models costs aton of money, and something obcene like 1/5 of all laser printers that go bad is caused by 3rd party toners.

Once again, you may be totally correct.
I spent 25+ years working on IBM/Lexmark Copiers and printers.
I was done there in 1998 and if there were chemical tests to determine toner type I was not aware of them.
And , yes I know what repairs cost on larger laser printers.
I was charging $170/hr with a 2 hour on 'mid-range' lasers minimum when I left IBM in '98.

Do you have these big lasers at your work?

At work we have several of the very high-speed xerox copier machines, we're talking 75+ pages per minute (at a copy shop). On these highspeed machines, even using non-zerox paper is supposedly warrenty voiding.

However, the info I had gotten is possibly false scare tactics sent down to us from HP. We have a couple of full sized laserjets here, and we were told that with HP's new completely organic toner methods that it was relatively easy to check for 3rd party usage, and that if it were ever found that HP would not cover service on anything it would come in contact with (such as the biggies, like the fuser). Again, this is quite possibly drivel, but we surely never tried to mess with them on the issue

 

[Cyberian]

Originally posted by: stonecold3169


At work we have several of the very high-speed xerox copier machines, we're talking 75+ pages per minute (at a copy shop). On these highspeed machines, even using non-zerox paper is supposedly warrenty voiding.

However, the info I had gotten is possibly false scare tactics sent down to us from HP. We have a couple of full sized laserjets here, and we were told that with HP's new completely organic toner methods that it was relatively easy to check for 3rd party usage, and that if it were ever found that HP would not cover service on anything it would come in contact with (such as the biggies, like the fuser). Again, this is quite possibly drivel, but we surely never tried to mess with them on the issue

Once again, my experience is from much earlier and you are probably correct.

I worked on the IBM 3800 series - which Xerox models do you use in your shop?

 

[Viper GTS]

Originally posted by: stonecold3169

Originally posted by: Cyberian

Originally posted by: stonecold3169

Originally posted by: Cyberian

Originally posted by: Kevin
Actually, those ink refills will void your warranty. Canon seems to have the cheapest ink, but their carts are small. Lexmark is the worse though. They have some color carts that are $42. You can get a brand new printer for $50 and it comes with both the color and black ink...

You are probably technically corect, but if you remove the refilled/OEM cartridge before you take your printer for service, I don't see how anyone would know.

Clogged heads on an Epson printer perhaps? And I don't know about inkjets, but I know laser printers are DEFINITELY checked to see if 3rd party toners have been used, sometimes so far as chemical testing. Repairs on one of the bigger models costs aton of money, and something obcene like 1/5 of all laser printers that go bad is caused by 3rd party toners.

Once again, you may be totally correct.
I spent 25+ years working on IBM/Lexmark Copiers and printers.
I was done there in 1998 and if there were chemical tests to determine toner type I was not aware of them.
And , yes I know what repairs cost on larger laser printers.
I was charging $170/hr with a 2 hour on 'mid-range' lasers minimum when I left IBM in '98.

Do you have these big lasers at your work?

At work we have several of the very high-speed xerox copier machines, we're talking 75+ pages per minute (at a copy shop). On these highspeed machines, even using non-zerox paper is supposedly warrenty voiding.

However, the info I had gotten is possibly false scare tactics sent down to us from HP. We have a couple of full sized laserjets here, and we were told that with HP's new completely organic toner methods that it was relatively easy to check for 3rd party usage, and that if it were ever found that HP would not cover service on anything it would come in contact with (such as the biggies, like the fuser). Again, this is quite possibly drivel, but we surely never tried to mess with them on the issue

I do support for corporate level monochrome & color HP laserjets, & the policy is basically that:

1) We do not replace defective 3rd party toner cartridges (duh)
2) We do not cover damage caused by 3rd party toner (ie leaking toner, carousel damage in color printers, etc.)
3) Use of 3rd party toner does NOT void the printer warranty

It is technically illegal for a company to base warranty coverage on tie-in sales (Source), & toner/ink are covered.

Viper GTS

 

[JellyBaby]

What does an entry level color laser printer sell for these days?

 

[Angrymarshmello]

Originally posted by: kuk

Ink costs are truly very prohibitive. I just replaced my old and trusty HP 850C for a new Canon due to exorbitant ink costs. Wouldn't they make more money if they sold cheaper cartridges/tanks, stomping on grey market products?

Um, what are you talking about? Make more money? Ink cartridges have a 50%+ profit margin on them. They subsidize the small profit margin they make on printers by charging out the ass for cartridges. Cheaper tanks? Um, take a look at your next "new" cartridge. The manufacturers recommend that you recycle your cartridge to help "save" the environment. Most of the time the manufacturers buy back the existing cartridges from the companies that run the "recycling cartridge effort", or even are the ones that actually do the recycling. Your "new" cartridge more than likely is a used up one that has been recycled. I don't know the exact percentages but I'd think it would be at least 35%.

Those grey market products are crap from my experience and from the experience of the thousands of customers I've sold ink cartridges to in my 4+ years of retail. You try it once and you never go back to it. The grey market products make up such an insignificant portion of the actual market share it's not worth the effort to crush them.

 

[BatmanNate]

We have three xerox 4635's at work, and a small army of HP 5si/5180's. I don't even own a printer at home.

 

[Cyberian]

Originally posted by: Viper GTS[/i
I do support for corporate level monochrome & color HP laserjets, & the policy is basically that:

1) We do not replace defective 3rd party toner cartridges (duh)
2) We do not cover damage caused by 3rd party toner (ie leaking toner, carousel damage in color printers, etc.)
3) Use of 3rd party toner does NOT void the printer warranty

It is technically illegal for a company to base warranty coverage on tie-in sales (Source), & toner/ink are covered.

Viper GTS

Do you guys still support the III, IV, and V Si models?
I think that was my all time favorite H-P, except for the (almost) original II!

 

[stonecold3169]

Originally posted by: Angrymarshmello

Originally posted by: kuk

Ink costs are truly very prohibitive. I just replaced my old and trusty HP 850C for a new Canon due to exorbitant ink costs. Wouldn't they make more money if they sold cheaper cartridges/tanks, stomping on grey market products?

Um, what the hell are you talking about? Make more money? Ink cartridges have a 50%+ profit margin on them. They subsidize the small profit margin they make on printers by charging out the ass for cartridges. Cheaper tanks? Um, take a look at your next "new" cartridge. The manufacturers recommend that you recycle your cartridge to help "save" the environment. Most of the time the manufacturers buy back the existing cartridges from the companies that run the "recycling cartridge effort", or even are the ones that actually do the recycling. Your "new" cartridge more than likely is a used up one that has been recycled. I don't know the exact percentages but I'd think it would be at least 35%.

Those grey market products are crap from my experience and from the experience of the thousands of customers I've sold ink cartridges to in my 4+ years of retail. You try it once and you never go back to it. The grey market products make up such an insignificant portion of the actual market share it's not worth the effort to crush them.

Bingo. Again, spouting only info from HP, on the entry level models (I'm countng the $100-$150 models) hp makes a small profit. Beyond there, they start just breaking even or even losing money. The new autoduplex cheapie inkjet, the 6122 or something along those lines, at retail for $179.99 they are losing money on it.

However, with features that are typically expensive (autoduplex) it gets their name out to buisnesses if they can sell a fleet of them to a buisness that is just starting up. Then, when it's cartridge replacement time, they ream them $30 for each HP branded black inkjet cartridge, at a 97% profit or some other huge figure (I do believe it's well over 90%). Also, companies like Hp are primarily research companies. HP is currently in the top 10 most patent owning companies of the world. They make mucho dinero off of charging those generic manufactorers to use their general design. So, even if you buy generic, you're still paying HP, and you even save them the effort of filling previously used carts

 

[DaiShan]

Does this mean on the next episode of "Cribs" we can expect all the balla's and rappers to be drinking printer ink? Can I expect Jay z to be sipping on a phat printer cartridge in his next video?

 

[LikeLinus]

Anyone know good replacement/3rd party Ink Carts for an Epson 785EPX Photo Printer?