New Printer same price as ink for the old printer.

[W1GUH]

Yea, the prices finally met. My old (ca 2002) HP7500 needed ink, so I looked up the $$$$ and the total was $90.00. GAK!!!!

Then, I looked at Canon printers and found the MG5220 All-In-On at Best Buy for the same money. No-brainer, especially since the old HP had no "real" driver for Vista & it's ink is going up and up.

The Canon's just fine (does it really matter at that price, since it's also a scanner and a copier). Installation was totally glitch-free.

One thing that happened, though, is I F'ed up kinda. I got it home and started installation and GRONK!!!!! I only found 4 ink cartridges (Supposed to be 5...BTW a complete re-inking for this printer is about $72.00). So back to Best Buy in a not-too-good mood & it took the guy a while to figure out to do. Well, no, he was doing the right thing. Opened up a new box to get the cartridge...and guess what?

This printer is one of those where the print heads are not on the cartridges, but are on a different unit.

As it turns out, I had the fifth cartridge all along. It's different than the other four and is packaged differeintly. BLUSH!!! So...if you get a printer like that, be aware of this quirk. Yes, I apologized profusely to the good guy that was so patient with me!

[NQ6U]

I was in the same situation a few months back. I ended up buying a Brother HL-2140 laser printer for $20 less than it would have cost me to buy cartridges for my color inkjet printer. Grayscale only, of course, but I've found that I don't really need color all that often.

[KJ3N]

...... but I've found that I don't really need color all that often.

Most people don't need color for 90% of what they do.

[KC2UGV]

I've noted that with the consumer grade printers. That's how they get you, hook, line, and sinker. They must bet that most people aren't too bright. My HP LJ1100 is still cranking pages out though... And the toner isn't too expensive (About 60-70 depending on where you go, and it does 5000 or so pages).

[kb2crk]

well i just retired my old HP PSC1310 printer. it would have been around 50 bucks for the ink cartridges. i found a kodak printer scanner copier for 79 with free shipping direct from kodak. it is also wireless which makes it easy to print from any computer. in the house. the old HP was listed as a network printer but every time vista updated i would catch hell getting the other computers to use it. when the black runs out it will be 10 bucks for the ink and the color is 15. the kodak is the psc 5250.

[WØTKX]

Printer cartridges are today's photographic film. Subscription models work the best, just ask Comcast.

[W3WN]

It's the Gillette theory of marketing:

Give away the razor.
Make your money on the razor blades.

[ad4mg]

www.4inkjets.com (http://forums.hamisland.net/www.4inkjets.com)

Been using their remanufactured cartridges for years. Only once have I ever had an issue, and a phone call resulted in prompt, free delivery of a replacement. Costs are usually 1/3 of new OEM stuff.

[n2ize]

I got sick and tired of replacing ink cartridges on my HP printer. I also got sick of manually refilling them every week. So, for about $75.00 I bought a "Continuous Feed Ink System". It's been a few months and it works like a champ. When the ink in the reservoirs starts to run low I just add the appropriate colour ink to the reservoir. The think has so far paid for itself. It's been months now since I last had to buy or refill a cartridge.

[n6hcm]

interestingly enough, this works better for older printers ... newer printers and cartridges have chips built in which make it difficult to get remanufactured cartridges ...

[W3WN]

interestingly enough, this works better for older printers ... newer printers and cartridges have chips built in which make it difficult to get remanufactured cartridges ...
Yeah, how 'bout that. Interesting coincidence, isn't it? :evil:

I've been told that some inkjet cartridges have a date code embedded in them, and if the printer realizes it's "too old" it will claim the cartridge needs replaced, even if it's full and there's nothing wrong with it.

[ad4mg]

Yeah, how 'bout that. Interesting coincidence, isn't it? :evil:

I've been told that some inkjet cartridges have a date code embedded in them, and if the printer realizes it's "too old" it will claim the cartridge needs replaced, even if it's full and there's nothing wrong with it.
My Officejet 7310xi uses cartridges with chips in them. The remanufactured cartridges work fine, the only difference being that the 600 TB proprietary HP printer software can't tell how much ink is in them. BFD ... 95% of my printing is done running Ubuntu on the computer. The very well behaved HP printer driver for Linux doesn't give a whit about how much ink is in the cartridges.

[HUGH]

You should find those Canon cartridges can be refilled at home as long as the ink is top quality. I only do this with the black cartridges, whether filling or using cheap replacements, because otherwise I found the colour balance went wrong when I came to print some photographs. I'm sticking to Canon, the printer seems to allow all sorts of auto-servicing and cleaning as well as producing good pictures.

[n6hcm]

I've been told that some inkjet cartridges have a date code embedded in them, and if the printer realizes it's "too old" it will claim the cartridge needs replaced, even if it's full and there's nothing wrong with it.

i have this going on downstairs with my hp oj pro ... it still prints, but i'm sure it'll stop sometime soon unless i replace the y cartridge.

[KA5PIU]

Hello.

Resetting the chips seems to be an option.
http://www.misterinkjet.com/hp45_15reset.htm

[kb2crk]

well the new kodak printer broke on wednesday, 2 days after getting it. it then took until today to get through to their customer service and it ended up being in chat.
i will be getting another new printer in a couple days to replace the new but broken printer. they did make a mistake of sending me a survey on their customer service. i answered it accurately and concisely. it is bad when you explain in an email the exact problem you are having and that you went through their trouybleshooting steps and the reply email tell you to try it all over again. it was quite obvious that my email was not read. if it had been i would have had instructions on how to return the damn thing for replacement.

[W1GUH]

well the new kodak printer broke on wednesday, 2 days after getting it. it then took until today to get through to their customer service and it ended up being in chat.
i will be getting another new printer in a couple days to replace the new but broken printer. they did make a mistake of sending me a survey on their customer service. i answered it accurately and concisely. it is bad when you explain in an email the exact problem you are having and that you went through their trouybleshooting steps and the reply email tell you to try it all over again. it was quite obvious that my email was not read. if it had been i would have had instructions on how to return the damn thing for replacement.

"it is bad when you explain in an email the exact problem you are having and that you went through their trouybleshooting steps and the reply email tell you to try it all over again."

Uh-huh. It sounds, tho', that whoever you spoke to did some good. Congrats!

Aside about Kodak printers....Wonder if Kodak is working on a printer that uses special ink to make prints as stable and long-lasting as a Kocachrome slides? Seems a niche waiting to be filled.

I was also thinking about a printer that would "print" transparencies in 2x2 mounts. But dunno about that one. With the current crop of flatscreens and projectors, traditional slide shows are probably rapidly becoming obselete.

[kb2crk]

it is bad when the phone number disconnects before getting anyone and the chat server says try again later. of course the 2 emails were not read. i did get a separate survey for how the chat help went and again i made a honest and appropriate feedback. after getting it through their head that the issue was a messed up paper feed (i could see the feedworks hanging up and tearing the paper) they said they will send a new one out. the new one will come with a return shipping label for the old one and it will be packed and sent back. i wish i had purchased it at a store as i could have exchanged it quickly and easily.