Printer Ink Refills

[JoeyGee]

I won't go into my rant on ink jet printers, the cost of ink, and the reliability of said printers, but I am stuck with my ink jet for now. I know lasers are coming down, but I just don't print enough to justify a new printer. Cost overruns from the "Tools and Methods" Group have cut into the capital budget of the IT group, as it were...

Anyway, I have always avoided ink cartridge refills, I have always heard they never work. Lately, I have heard a few positive comments on getting refills. Maybe it's getting better? Any one done it lately?

[eccentrictinkerer]

We've been using Walgreen's refill service for about 2 years for HP ink cartridges.

Walgreen's has been good about replacing cartridges that didn't work after a refill.

HP seems to have put some firmware that shuts down a cartridge after 2 or 3 refills, IMHO. I guess that explains why ink and toner accounts for the vast majority of HP profits!

[sweensdv]

We've been using Walgreen's refill service for about 2 years for HP ink cartridges.

Walgreen's has been good about replacing cartridges that didn't work after a refill.

HP seems to have put some firmware that shuts down a cartridge after 2 or 3 refills, IMHO. I guess that explains why ink and toner accounts for the vast majority of HP profits!

My experience with HP cartridges hasn't been nearly as good as yours. The last 4 HP cartridges that I took into Walgreen's to be refilled wouldn't take a refill. These were all original OEM cartridges that would have been refilled for the first time. No more HP cartridges for me. The sales clerk at Walgreen't told me that this problem was something they run into all the time with HP cartridges.

[RAFlorida]

I've used the refill cartridges and generally

they are ok. The HP are the ones to avoid thou. I've had Lexmark, HP, and Canon; and of those the Lexmark was easiest. Now I refill my own cartridges, (yes, sometimes a mess) and found that HP just will not allow a second refill. The trick was having to tape off contact 1, then contact 2, and then something else to make the printer recognize the cartridge. What a hassle! But overall, the refills did work for the printers.

[phrog]

I've been using a Canon printer for about four years after hassles with refills and cost for new cartridges of several different brands. The Canon uses four 6's and one 3e. When I compared the price of the black Canon cartridge to a friend's black HP cartridge, I found that I got slightly more ink for $12 than he was getting for $35 with his HP. I was told that the difference in price is that HP has a print head built into the cartridge and that Canon and Kodak do not. Therefore, every time you buy anything other than a Canon or Kodak, you are buying a print head as well as the ink. I don't know that much about printers to say if that is true or not, but I do know about the cost.

I don't know if the current Canon printers use the same type cartridges or not but the ones I use are still much lower than HP. ( about 1/3 as much). To me, it's worth $12 to buy a new cartridge and not worry about the hassle of refills. I will probably always use Canon printers after my experiences with it versus several other brands. (I haven't tried the Kodak.)
Richard

[germdoc]

I have bought generic refills from Amazon and also refurbished cartridges on Ebay. One company I have bought from is OCinkjet.

So far my experience has been positive, though I think that using non-OEM cartidges inactivates the ink monitor, so the printer continually tells you you're low on ink.

Not too long ago I posted a link to Lasermonks, a monastery that supports itself by selling discount inkjet cartridges. Haven't used them, but the concept sounds interesting.

I don't think I will go back to refilling, tried that once, too messy.

[herb fellows]

Love my canon printer, absolutely hate the ink consumption. 5 cartridges at about 14 ea= $70 every 6-8 weeks. I have found a substitute that works well, slightly heaper, esp if you catch a sale. Canon puts a chip on their cartridges, which really bites!

www.ldproducts.com

[tommyt654]

Check e-bay for cartridges, I have an old Canon ip1500 and get 10 cartridges for $21 shipped. Never had a single problem with any of them. I do a lot Photo printing with them and they work fine

[pierhogunn]

I have a high-end epson wide format inkjet printer and I made the mistake of trying a refilled cartirdge

the colors were horrible, not even close

and the amount of ink that just flowed into the bottom of the printer was immense.

for $12 - $14 a cartidge, I'll stick to epson branded cartridges. ( the R-1800 takes 8 of them though) Red Blue Cyan Magenta Yello Matte Black, Photo Black, and a clear gloss optimizer that fills in the low spots on a glossy print)

[alpha]

I have had good luck in buying generic's from www.swiftink.com.


Here is link to resellers ratings:

http://www.resellerratings.com/store/Swift_Ink

[sscherin]

I bought a Okidata color laser display model on clearance for $250..
I ran it for 4 years on the demo toner.. (we don't print more than 500 pages a year)
Needs it's 4 toners refilled now.. $119 and I'll be set for the next 5 years.

Small lasers are now down around $200 but check your toner costs and capacity before buying.
http://www.staples.com/office/suppli...P1606:CL142044

[dbhost]

I have had terrible luck with ink refills, and good luck as well...

For my HP PSC1315, I tried the refills from Office Depot. They simply did not work. Took them back and got my money back, tried the ones from Staples, they worked pretty well...

For the difference in price however, the generic / refill inks aren't worth the risk to me. I don't print all that much, maybe 1K pages / year, so no real cost issue. Obviously not free, but not too expensive either...

As far as reliability issues with Inkjets, I am not sure what problems you are having. I have had way more troubles with laser printers over my lifetime than inkjets ever thought of, and that is coming from a guy with a long IT career... Sure there are certain makes / models I won't touch because of reliability, (Canon springs to mind) but overall, inkjets, particularly HP and Lexmark do particularly well. I have also heard very good things about the Kodak printers, although the Kodak company is having a lot of financial trouble these days...

[LCHIEN]

i used to be a believer in HP inkjets but I'm turned off now - they don't work after sitting , they seem to jam a lot for me, and the cost of ink is huge.

I just use a sub $100 Brother monochrome laser, its soo much cheaper to feed and works very, very reliably, quick and perfect prints.

Photo prints I send to Walgreens via internet a quarter mile away - .19 per print and ready in an hour. No drying, no cutting, no sticking. If they're not right they do them again for free.

I figure photo paper and ink costs run about $1 for a sheet (three 4x6 prints) and the success rate is only about 75% calling for redos and added cost. Takes many minutes and makes a lot of noise.

[LinuxRandal]

As far as reliability issues with Inkjets, I am not sure what problems you are having. I have had way more troubles with laser printers over my lifetime than inkjets ever thought of, and that is coming from a guy with a long IT career... Sure there are certain makes / models I won't touch because of reliability, (Canon springs to mind) but overall, inkjets, particularly HP and Lexmark do particularly well. I have also heard very good things about the Kodak printers, although the Kodak company is having a lot of financial trouble these days...

Well, since this is a thread from 2009, that was brought back from dead, I bet he may have figured out his reliability issues.

[jnesmith]

i used to be a believer in HP inkjets but I'm turned off now - they don't work after sitting , they seem to jam a lot for me, and the cost of ink is huge.

I just use a sub $100 Brother monochrome laser, its soo much cheaper to feed and works very, very reliably, quick and perfect prints.

Photo prints I send to Walgreens via internet a quarter mile away - .19 per print and ready in an hour. No drying, no cutting, no sticking. If they're not right they do them again for free.

I figure photo paper and ink costs run about $1 for a sheet (three 4x6 prints) and the success rate is only about 75% calling for redos and added cost. Takes many minutes and makes a lot of noise.

So many similarities. I had an HP inkjet AIO machine. Ink was expensive, and the printer was a hassle. I had to restart my computer every time I wanted to scan something, and there were a variety of other software and hardware issues. I called tech support when it was barely out of warranty. Punjab in India said he knew exactly what the problem was and he could tell me how to fix it, but I had to pay for the support. That's when I decided to use up the remainder of my ink cartridges and buy something else.

I now have a Brother AIO, and have not had a single problem.

I also send most of my photo prints to Walgreens. Between paper and ink, it costs me about 75 cents to print a 4x6 from home, and the quality is not as good. I print the occasional spur-of-the-moment photo from home, but that's it.