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Printer Businesses The Almighty Buck

Getting Around Printer-Manufacturer Abuse 555

Posted by timothy from the probably-violating-some-law-somewhere dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Here's a guy that demonstrates how printer companies abuse their clients. He found that Lexmark cartridges are a perfect replacement for Xerox ones, with only minor modifications to the printer. It's well illustrated with may photographs."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Getting Around Printer-Manufacturer Abuse More

Getting Around Printer-Manufacturer Abuse

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  • I think it's simple... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 07, 2004 @05:55AM (#8489921)
    Don't use it if you don't like it. It's not like there are only 8 brand of printer. Oh wait...

  • What do you want to bet (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Russellkhan ( 570824 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @05:59AM (#8489926)
    ...That Xerox tries to sue this guy to take down the information?

    Not sure what law they'd pull out of their hat for the job, especially since this guy is not US based, but this just seems like it's raining on their parade a bit too much for Xerox to not pull out the lawyers.

    • They're already on to him... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Zone-MR ( 631588 ) <slashdot@@@zone-mr...net> on Sunday March 07, 2004 @07:04AM (#8490086) Homepage
      They already tried to take the information down... ... they submitted the site to SlashDot ;)

    • Re:What do you want to bet (Score:5, Funny)

      by yulek ( 202118 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @09:22AM (#8490330) Homepage Journal
      ...That Xerox tries to sue this guy to take down the information?

      the world's gone mad. now Xerox is going to sue someone for copying something?

    • Re:What do you want to bet (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Zeinfeld ( 263942 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @10:30AM (#8490488) Homepage
      ...That Xerox tries to sue this guy to take down the information?

      Apart from the obvious jurisdiction issue (Xerox could still file suit in the US, might be tricky enforcing judgement, it is not clear that this is illegal even under DMCA. The DMCA explicitly allows reverse engineering for discovery of interface functions.

      Sure the courts bent over backwards on the DVD/CSS thing to outlaw a program sold as a DVD copier. It is far from clear that a pure DVD player would be illegal. When the patents expire in 2015 it will be 100% legal to sell players without the zone encoding of playback restrictions.

      What is going on here with Xerox and HP is a 'razor and blades' business model. Some management guru wrote a book about them thirty years ago and ever since then people have tried to copy the model - even in areas where it simply does not fit.

      With a razor there is a major advantage to having a new, sharp blade. If someone could make an electric razor that good there would be no competition. Actually you can make an electric that good - if you keep replacing the blades...

      If you look at the Canon printers they make a whole series where you can fill up the ink from stock. They also make refil cartridges at a fair price and the basic cost of the printer is the same as an HP.

      The big problem with canon printers is finding a place that stocks them. The computer stores would much rather sell a printer that gives them a refil cartridge sale.

      • Re:What do you want to bet (Score:5, Informative)

        by daviddennis ( 10926 ) <david@amazing.com> on Sunday March 07, 2004 @11:03AM (#8490594) Homepage
        I echo the endorsement of Canon as a company that plays more fair than the competition. For one thing, when I bought my Canon inkjet, it had full-use cartridges included, unlike HPs which have special partially-filled ones. They also have separate cartridges for each colour, so you can buy the individual colour when it runs out with no problem. Finally, the printer seemed to be a cut above the competition in durability.

        But I have no trouble finding/buying Canon printers. Fry's, Best Buy and CompUSA all stock them, no problem.

        Incidentally, I highly recommend my HP Color LaserJet 3500 - it's much cheaper per page even though you eventually have to replace the toner cartridges at huge cost.

        D

        • Re:What do you want to bet (Score:5, Informative)

          by lythotype ( 446239 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @11:58AM (#8490863)
          I would like to also chime in with a note that Canon ink cartridges are made of a clear plastic, which means you can be assured that when the ink monitoring software warns you that you are low or out of ink, you can trust it. If you don't, just raise the lid and take a look for yourself.

          Another thing, I think, that makes the price of newer Canon ink tanks cheaper is that there are no electronics on the tank itself. The printer doesn't actually "talk" to the tank. The printer uses a detection scheme that uses light to figure out when the tank is low/empty. Without the electronics involved, production has to be cheaper.

          All this also makes it easier to refill the tank with 3rd party ink.

      • ...When the patents expire in 2015 it will be 100% legal to sell players without the zone encoding of playback restrictions...

        Assuming that:

        1. DVDs are still of any importance by then and not obsolete.
        2. New controls (with new patents) are not in place.
        3. Someone doesn't bribe Congress to extend patents as was done for copyrights.

  • HP (Score:5, Insightful)

    by karevoll ( 630350 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:00AM (#8489929) Homepage

    Unfortunately, HP has different connectors on the back of their cartridges across their product line, which makes it impossible to use cartridges which doesn't officially support your printer.

    Yes, I know that there might be valid reasons for this (e.g different and better features regarding to ink-economy etc), but why isn't it possible to enable some kind of "legacy-mode" to enable us to use any DeskJet print cartridge across HP's product line?

    • Re:HP (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jcupitt65 ( 68879 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:44AM (#8490042)
      Part of the reason is that the cartridge you buy is just the ink + nozzles. There is a large chunk of hardware controlling the writing engine (the thing that decides which dots go where), and the design of this is intimately linked to the print head design. So you can't stick any print head into any printer.

      Of course, another part is business: different printer models have different business models behind them. Are they cheap upfront, but more expensive on consumables (typical for a consumer printer), or more expensive upfront but with lower running costs (typically a business printer)? Making the print heads incompatible allows the market separation that in turn allows these different strategies.

      Companies get ragged on for 'ripping off the consumer' over print head costs. But you can see it as a choice too. You can choose to buy a $100 printer with great quality (but admittedly expensive parts). Or you can spend $500 up front (nearer the actual cost of the device) and get a printer which will be more durable and will have lower running costs. 10 years ago your only choice was option #2. Now you have option #1 open to you if you want it.

      • Re:HP (Score:3, Insightful)

        by C10H14N2 ( 640033 )
        I paid $5,000 for an HP Laserjet fourteen years ago. It still functions flawlessly. The price, while largely due to economics of scale, was also due to the difference in materials. It was designed for high-volume business use, essentially the only market for the machiens at the time, for 5-10 years of full-time service. By contrast, the toner cost about a hundred bucks, or about 1/50th the cost of the printer.

        Now that every 12 year old demands a laser printer or high quality inkjet, printers use much cheap

        • Re:HP (Score:3, Interesting)

          by geoswan ( 316494 )

          Do the math, people and stop yer bitching.

          I question your math.

          Somone pumping out 500 pages a month, on an inkjet, would go through a lot more than 6 refills. Inkjets generally claim that a cartridge is good for 500 pages. So, correcting the frequency of refills, your price per page is more like ten cents a page.

          Any printing with graphics, or colour, will be even more expensive.

          The figures the manufacturer's claim for 500 pages are open to question too.

          • Re:HP (Score:3, Insightful)

            by C10H14N2 ( 640033 )
            Look, I'm not friggen Consumer Reports. In general terms, the price per page over the total lifetime of the machines is minimal. Sure, if you're printing nothing but full color photos, you're going to suck through ink. DUH. The point is, consumer-grade printers have basically become disposable. That's part of the pricing model. Even if you changed your cartridges ever month, over three years, that's $1,500. If that was 500 pages per month, that's still $0.08 per page. HP estimates 833 pages per HP45 black c

      • Re:HP (Score:5, Funny)

        by Epistax ( 544591 ) <epistax@@@gmail...com> on Sunday March 07, 2004 @11:59AM (#8490873) Journal
        I just buy a new printer whenever I run out of ink.
        It costs less.

  • Unfortunately (Score:5, Interesting)

    by SisyphusShrugged ( 728028 ) <meNO@SPAMigerard.com> on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:02AM (#8489939) Homepage
    Unfortunately these kinds of abuses are prevalent throughout this industry, this specific one brings to mind the advert with for OfficeDepot, I think it is, where the guy reads out the cartridge numbers like it he is reading out lottery numbers.

    It is annoying that standardisation has spread through the majority of hardware issues, but still remains stubborn when it comes to printer cartridges.

    • Re:Unfortunately (Score:5, Insightful)

      by BiggerIsBetter ( 682164 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:23AM (#8489998)
      And razor blades. That's the reason for non-standardisation - printers are cheap now, and they make the money selling cartridges. Don't expect standardisation any time soon.

      • Re:Unfortunately (Score:4, Insightful)

        by value_added ( 719364 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @07:41AM (#8490162)
        Here's a thought. I've recently gone back to paying premium prices for "premium" razorblades. Why? The reasons probably run the gamut between cuts on my face and wishful thinking, but I'm convinced that the generic brands sold in supermarkets are not identical.

        Yeah, we've all heard the "made on the same assembly line yada yada" argument, and indeed that may be perfectly valid in a number cases (or valid to the degree it makes any difference). But anyone who has experience in manufacturing knows that the process isn't necessarily as simple as it's made out to be here. Put another way, even top tier manufacturers put out "budget" brands that by definition skimp on materials, quality, etc. to bring down the cost so that the product can be sold at a cheaper price.

        • Re:Unfortunately (Score:3, Informative)

          by Fnkmaster ( 89084 )
          I pay for premium razor blades too (Mach 3 Turbo) because I've found they last longer and do a much better job at shaving without slicing and dicing my face. But what I put on my face is a different ball game from what I use to print - toner is a commodity product, and assuming it doesn't gum up or otherwise not meet the basic physical standards of toner, I really don't care who made my toner cartridge.

          Also, with respect to budget brands, your description is a massive oversimplification. In fact, budget

  • third party toner and ink (Score:5, Insightful)

    by codeonezero ( 540302 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:03AM (#8489943)
    First off didn't read the article yet...but I can tell you that despite the bad practices of printer manufacturers, using third party stuff could void your warranty.

    In this case, we have a tektronix (before xerox bought the printing division) that was damaged because someone moved it before properly letting the wax ink dry.

    We had a xerox authorized rep, come and take a look at it, telling us how to try to fix it and telling us she suspected that the problem was two fold. Someone had moved the printer before letting the wax dry out into a solid, so that the wax liquid had gotten into some of the nozzles...and also she said that the damage was probably caused by our use of third party wax ink cartridges.

    Something to do with the ink in the tektronic being a patented (term?) chemical mixture meant to work in a certain way when it was heated. Although you can use third party ink for it, it is not the same type of mixture and thus can have unexpected side effects.

    So short answer is make sure you know what you are giving up by using third party stuff, as it may end up voiding your warranty and possibly ruining your printer (in this case an expensive $1,000 or so printer).

    Sure for a cheap inkjet it probably doesnt matter, as if it breaks it's cheap to replace.

    • Re:third party toner and ink (Score:5, Insightful)

      by arkhan_jg ( 618674 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:49AM (#8490053)
      (please ignore the previous one, missed the preview button!) but I can tell you that despite the bad practices of printer manufacturers, using third party stuff could void your warranty. That's flat out untrue, despite printer manufacturers' attempts to the contrary. The only situation under which they are not required to support you under warranty is when the fault is actually IN the third party component. Of course, this means that whenever a repair technician comes out, they will invariably diagnose the fault to be the cause of the third-party component, as you discovered, even when it's something else entirely. Of course the ink is patented; but it's still just basic ink, and any reputable supplier will make stuff as good as, or better, than the original manufacturer. My personal advice is to replace any third party toner with some near-empty-but-some-left cartridges before they come to visit. You'll find the number of times your tech blames the problem on your cartridges way down. Failing that, when you suspect the problem is nothing to do with the toner, (i.e. it's anything other than a splotchy print issue) write to to their legal department pointing out that you feel they have invalidated your warranty illegally. Threaten to take it up with trading standards or whoever else is responsible for business standards in your neck of the woods. Kick up a fuss, and there's a fair chance they'll fold. If they don't, then it's probably not worth the legal costs to chase it. Just let that inform your business decisions in future, and let the orginial company know that's why you're no longer purchasing from them.

      • Re:third party toner and ink (Score:5, Interesting)

        by jrumney ( 197329 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @07:20AM (#8490111)
        Of course, this means that whenever a repair technician comes out, they will invariably diagnose the fault to be the cause of the third-party component

        At a company I used to work for, we had a high-volume Ubix laser, which kept having problems with paper jams. Eventually the Ubix engineer blamed it on the fact that we were not using Ubix branded paper. We reluctantly switched to the overpriced paper, and the jams continued, but Ubix continued to refuse to honour the warrantee if we switched back to non-Ubix paper.

      • Of course the ink is patented; but it's still just basic ink, and any reputable supplier will make stuff as good as, or better, than the original manufacturer.

        Fair point in general, but actually not the case with Tektronix (who made the particular printer the original poster was referring to). These chaps make high-end colour printers that don't just squirt CMYK ink onto the page - they actually generate "ink" of the desired colour on the fly by melting tiny amounts of coloured waxes together, then applyi

        • Re:third party toner and ink (Score:4, Insightful)

          by BasilBrush ( 643681 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @09:11AM (#8490309)
          It's easy to imagine that another company trying to replicate the Tektronix wax formula would end up with something very nearly the same, but it will almost certainly solidify very slightly more quickly - or very slightly more slowly - than the official shizzle, increasing the risk of congealed wax ending up in unwanted places and clogging the mechanism.

          Maybe. But if the setting rate were that critical it seems to me that the ambient temperature of the air might be enough to ruin the process too. I'd suggest that any talk of special formulas and precision setting times is just company propaganda.

        • I have to say as a recovering Textronixer that when the thing worked, it worked beautifully. I have not seen any printer that could make full color graphic printouts that nice.

          On the other hand, the thing almost never worked right. Aside from the 10 minute (yeah) warm up cycle, it had to go through 5 minute "re-warm" cycles to print big jobs.

          Oh, and it couldn't handle a wide range of paper stock.

          Oh, and the web server interface for configuration has wide open security holes in it. (firewall your printe

    • Re:third party toner and ink (Score:5, Informative)

      by ljavelin ( 41345 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @09:18AM (#8490322)
      also she said that the damage was probably caused by
      our use of third party wax ink cartridges

      Reminds me of the time I installed a non-Factory radio in
      my new car. The car wouldn't start, so I had it towed back
      to the dealer. Bad solenoid in the starter, but then they
      claimed that my new RADIO caused an electrical fault in the solenoid. I thought it sounded VERY fishy, and since I had a roadtrip to make in the next two days, I told them to "just #$((# replace it".

      I had them replace the starter and I -KEPT- the core (old part) for
      personal inspection.

      After opening it up, I saw that the pushrod of the solenoid was manufactured a little suished - like a press mistkenly whacked it and distorted it - clearly a manufacturing error. Wrote a nasty-gram with a photo of the part ... and the repair turned into being a freebee (except for my time and effort, of course).

      Lesson learned: if someone tells you it's not covered by warrenty because YOU did something wrong, don't believe them.

    • Re:third party toner and ink (Score:5, Interesting)

      by jellomizer ( 103300 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @09:25AM (#8490333)
      I work for an Authorized Xerox/Tektronix Repair site for the 840 - 860s, 3rd party ink can really mess up the printer. (I have seen stalactites and stalagmites of Wax (Well it is a resin) Ink forming all around the printer. and heads getting clogged where they normally don't get clogged, The 3rd Party Ink has a slightly different melting temperature and/or Cooling temperature. Which can ruin the printer because it is fairly well timed for the use of the original ink. If you think you can just put in some "Tek" ink in the printer when you need it repaired, we can normally tell that you used 3rd party ink before (Sometimes we let it slide (but give you a warning afterwards) or sometimes we can't. When you use 3rd party ink the ink when dried is more flexible then the original stuff. The 3rd party Ink is actually different stuff and can cause major (and expensive problems with the printer)

    • Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act (Score:5, Informative)

      by pherris ( 314792 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @10:53AM (#8490553) Homepage Journal
      codeonezero (540302) [slashdot.org] said:
      "... she said that the damage was probably caused by our use of third party wax ink cartridges. ... So short answer is make sure you know what you are giving up by using third party stuff, as it may end up voiding your warranty and possibly ruining your printer."
      The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act (15 U.S.C. 2302(C)) states:
      "No warrantor of a consumer product may condition his written or implied warranty of such product on the consumers using, in connection with such product, any article or service (other than article or service provided without charge under the terms of the warranty) which is identified by brand, trade or corporate name ... ."

      Simply put, the warrantor can not void a warranty because of the use of an aftermarket part. Furthermore the warrantor must show that an aftermarket part caused the damage in question that they wish to void the warranty over. While this act was passed to protect automotive aftermarket part manufacturers I'm guessing it could be applied to this situation. Maybe someone with Westlaw access could check.

      Check out "Understanding the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act [ftc.gov]" for some more information.

      Of course getting a manufacturer to obey the law and not try to weasel out of their obligations is something completely different.

  • back to.. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by pixitha ( 589341 ) <.acidrain. .at. .pixitha.com.> on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:03AM (#8489944) Homepage
    this just reminds me of how they give you those "starter" ink cart. when you first buy the printer, some tell you, some dont...

    had a brother fax machine at work once... "this is a sample toner cart. that will only make around 40 faxes" wtf? cheap ass brother...

    nothing too new i guess....

  • I want my dot matrix back (Score:4, Interesting)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:03AM (#8489947)
    I remember buying my Epson 880 thinking "I only print once in a while, it doesn't matter that the cartridges are $40 bucks a pop, I'll buy one a year tops". Boy did I feel dumb (and taken) when I found out the ink drys in about 3 months or so. It ticks me off I can't find a decent 24 pin dot matrix (not counting high end check printers) new anymore. Used just doesn't cut it, by the time I get ahold of 'em they've been run into the ground (usually the paper feed mechanism jams ever 4 pages or so). The printer market is probably the best example in history of the market working against consumers. Maybe some gov't regulation is called for. Europe did it I think. At least they should do something to keep all those printer cartridges out of land fills. It's ridiculous to needlessly waste resources so companies can sell more product.

    • Epson C42UX (Score:3, Informative)

      by Barbarian ( 9467 )
      I had one of these, and I thought it would be great, given that you just buy ink cartridges, instead of the whole head every time. I was also wrong---don't use it for a week and it starts to dry up. Take a 3 week vacation and the printer is shot--and there's no way to remove the ink head assembly or to clean it, so basically it was a wasted printer. I'm currently using a Lexmark X125 (multifunction fax-style printer) that uses the same cartridges which the article showed. About the same price for ink as

      • Re:Epson C42UX (Score:3, Informative)

        by Evil-G ( 529075 ) *
        Take it to an Epson Express service centre, if the printer is under warranty, then they'll repair it for free. If they can't repair it within a reasonable time, they'll give you a replacement.
    • I highly recommend hitting some thrift stores in your area. If you have a Salvation Army, or some such 'reachout' store, you can find some beauties.

      I just bought an Epson wide format for 5 bucks that was donated by a place that switched to inkjets (FOOLS!)

      They are harder to find now that inkjet and laser are cheap and plentyful, but they are out there. I recall a trip to the Salvation Army warehouse in Minneapolis in the mid 90s where they had a 40+ foot wall of dot matrix printers. They also had pee-stained underwear, I recall with disgust.

      Hell, the store in my small town here has two lasers, an inkjet, a dot matrix, and an Apple IIgs with all the trimmings (disks, monitor, and an Imagewriter II - the best dot matrix ever :) The printers are 5 dollars, the IIgs is 30!

      You can't go wrong with an Imagewriter.

      They also have pee-stained underwear, microwaves with dials, candy from dead people's houses, and what I think may be the world's largest bra.

      Fun for the whole family!

    • Re:I want my dot matrix back (Score:4, Insightful)

      by prockcore ( 543967 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @07:20AM (#8490110)
      Boy did I feel dumb (and taken) when I found out the ink drys in about 3 months or so

      So get a laserjet. My HP LaserJet4L has lasted me for over a decade now. The damn thing runs forever, and toner doesn't ever go bad, so if you only use it twice a year, a single $60 toner cartridge will last you forever.

  • Nomrally the other way around (Score:5, Informative)

    by inflex ( 123318 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:04AM (#8489949) Homepage Journal
    Normally I found that Lexmark cartridges are insanely prices compared to the other brands which shows up furthermore in the price-per-page comparisons you often see.

    Personally I've gone for the 4-cartridge Canon systems for inkjet and a HP 2200D Laser for the normal stuff (using refurbished toner cartridges - a mere $118 rather than $269 - complete with warranty).

    This guy certainly proves that a little bit of searching around sure saves a LOT of money.

    The whole printer-ink system reeks of things like the Debeers diamond cartel.

    Now, I wonder how long this guy's WWW site will stay up :-?

    • Re:Normally the other way around (Score:5, Informative)

      by texwtf ( 558874 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:25AM (#8490002)
      After a bit of researching I also picked up a canon (i550 model). How refreshing to see the ink cartridges are just that - not cartridges + printheads + drm chips.

      The print quality is very good for the price (US $110 or so for the 550) and the inks are sold separately _for each color_ to save you money if one color runs out faster than the others. If you are really a cheap bastard you can use third party ink refilling kits without worry, but I've found the quality to be slightly better using the real canon inks.

      Best part - a manufacturer original black ink cartridge costs $15 at normal retail. Try finding that for your lexmark or xerox or hp. There are third party knockoff cartridges even cheaper, but they may not print as well on e.g. glossy photo paper.

      The i550 is slightly cheaper than the real "photo quality" ones that have special photo color inks in addition to the regular cmy ink. If you are a real photo quality nut you probably want one of those.

      I would buy another one in a heartbeat. Screw all those greedy customer screwing "but look how cheap the printer is" bait and switch bastard manufacturers.
      • After taking a lexmark inkjet out back and having an Office Space session with it I purchased the i550. It is hands down the only ink jet printer I've ever owned that I am satisfied with:

        * Ink is inexpensive
        * Cartridges can easily be refilled if you want to.
        * No DRM, no false "your ink is low" messages
        * It has never ever jammed on anything.
        * It's very quiet compared to the HP, Lexmarks and Xeroxes I've owned in the past.
        * It is built like a tank (especially compared to Lexmark which is built like a cereal

  • nice hack (Score:3, Interesting)

    by The Clockwork Troll ( 655321 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:05AM (#8489951) Journal
    This is a nice hack but I fail to see the evidence of "abuse" on the part of either manufacturer. Maybe the more expensive brand has a better warranty that the parts costs subsidize? Maybe the cartridges are nearly the same form factor but one brand goes through a more rigorous quality assurance process?

    The lack of compatibility certainly gnaws at the engineers in us but it's hasty to assume that the cost to make them compatible would have been zero, especially when you take into account intangibles such as warranty, service, support, etc. Maybe it's just MuVo 2 (4GB compact flash)-type opportunism but the article doesn't bear that out on its own. More research is due before simply calling it "abuse".

  • its too bad.. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by grendel_x86 ( 659437 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:06AM (#8489953) Homepage
    That no one creates a standard for ink carts. If you want to make a cart for someones printer, fine, go for it, they all use the same exact cart, just ink quality will be different.

    REmember when computer-parts were proprietary, did it help anyone? Did it make them 'better' no, it made them more expensive, and more of a pain in the ass.

    But this will never happen, most inkjet companies make most of their $$ off of the ink, not the printer (think the gilette razor blade scheme, or xBox, but w/o the bonus secondary use)

    • Re:its too bad.. (Score:3, Insightful)

      by karevoll ( 630350 )

      I think we all agree that making a standard for ink cartridges will be a positive thing. When Joe Sixpack enters a store, he can tell the sales clerk he wants a "black ink cartridge", and it wouldn't matter which one he bought, it would fit in his printer anyways.. But since this is what the customer wants, why doesn't the printer manufacturers give us excatly that?

      The answer lies in the fact a rather large percentage of the revenue is generated by the sale of printer cartridges. Think along the lines of

  • Interesting (Score:3, Informative)

    by cballowe ( 318307 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:09AM (#8489961) Homepage
    So... I just checked an ink vendor and the lexmark cartridges they had (same model numbers from the story) were 2x as expensive as the Xerox ones. Nice to know that you're not locked in to the vendor, but beyond that - I think I'd find the Xerox cartridge a better buy. (The vendor was Laser Monks [lasermonks.com])

  • A cartridge conspiracy (Score:5, Informative)

    by dtio ( 134278 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:12AM (#8489972)
    Article from the Chicago Tribune (free reg needed): http://www.chicagotribune.com/technology/chi-02102 2ink,1,1030029.story

    A cartridge conspiracy

    By Phillip Robinson
    Knight Ridder/Tribune
    Published October 22, 2002

    Ford and Chevron have partnered to design a new SUV. They claim it will run smoother and longer on a gallon of gas than any other SUV in the same class.

    However, you'll have to use a special Chevron Premium gas that costs 30 percent to 70 percent more than typical gas. It's up around the $3- to
    $4-a-gallon level. Use any other gas from any other station and a microchip in the tank will detect the difference and prevent the SUV from starting.
    That protects you from poor performance and possible damage to the finely tuned engine. In fact, trying to use any other gas can sometimes void your warranty.

    Relax. It isn't true. In cars, that is. (My apologies to Ford and Chevron.)

    But it is true in computer printers.

    Time to stop relaxing.

    Some of the biggest inkjet printer makers are implanting chips in inkjet cartridges. These chips monitor the ink supply and let you know when you're getting low. They can even freeze the printer when the cartridge is empty. Supposedly that can permanently damage the printer.

    So far, not so bad. Pretty much all cars have a fuel gauge, and all printers should, too. I loved when Lexmark added ink supply monitors to its software, so I could see how much was left. Few things are more annoying than getting halfway through a vital document only to run out of ink.

    If and when you do find the cartridge, let's hope it isn't your first time buying replacement ink. First-timers are typically shocked at what they have to pay. That $100 inkjet printer may need three $35 cartridges to get back in a printing mood.

    No wonder HP makes more profit on "consumables" such as ink than on anything else. No wonder Dell wants into the business. No wonder there's a busy
    "recycling" and "remanufacturing" business in discount ink cartridges.

    A growing number of companies refill used cartridges, and then sell them - often on the Internet - for 30 percent to 50 percent less. That saves you a lot of money and saves dumps from piles of dead cartridges.

    But the remanufacturers won't be able to put a new chip in this latest cartridge design. Or be able to set the old chip back to recognizing "full."
    Once that cartridge is empty, it's kaput. No recycling, no savings. The chip "squeals" on any attempt to reuse.

    Some inkjet printer owners use their own refill kits to save even more money on ink. These kits are available even in some standard stores. They include a syringe, large bottles of ink and instructions. You fill the syringe and
    then inject your cartridges. There's the danger of a mess, and of voiding the warranty, but there's also the prospect of saving 80 percent to 90
    percent.

    Smart chips in cartridges will also be able to terminate this savings. Once a cartridge is detected as empty, the chip can refuse to recognize it again as full.

    It's called "lock in." Many tech companies are looking for ways to lock their customers in, to make it difficult or impossible for customers to
    switch to using other suppliers in the future.

    Of course, they don't advertise it that way. And many of their engineers and marketers may honestly not believe it that way.

    They'll talk about the quality of the ink they make. How it's as much a part of the printing technology as the hardware and software. How you need all three working together to get the full performance. How they want to protect
    you from bad prints, and the clogged inkjet tubes and broken printers that cheap ink can cause.

    And you know, they're sometimes right. Cheap ink can make cheap-looking prints. No-name ink can clog those tiny jets in your printer.

    But shouldn't you be the one to make the decision about which to use? Do you want the company "protecting" you ag

  • Getting Around End-User Abuse (Score:5, Funny)

    by dj245 ( 732906 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:12AM (#8489973) Homepage
    Xerox: Hello, Lexmark support line.
    Caller: Yes I'd like to return my printer for new print heads but it has some... minor modifications.
    Xerox: You put a viynl sticker on it?
    Caller: Not exactly...
    Xerox: You wrote the name of your company or business in large letters on the printer to discourage looting?
    Caller: Not quite.....
    Xerox: Then what?
    Caller: I snapped off some plastic bits, by erm, accident.
    Xerox: These wouldn't happen to be the print cartridge grabbing bits would they?
    Caller: Why yes! They just so happen to be, coincidentally.
    Xerox: No support for you! Call back, one year! (dialtone)

  • This compares low-yield vs. high-yield. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by HaraldNH ( 756958 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:12AM (#8489974)
    Please note that the Lexmark 12A1970 is a low-yield cartridge, that is it contains about half the amount of ink compared to the Xerox 8R7881 he is replacing.

    Now, comparing the Lexmark 12A1975 (the high-yield variant), we se that this has a list price of $40.99, compared to the Xerox part at $41.99. At amazon.com, you get them at $36.88 and $37.88 respectively.

    I actually like that fact that Xerox doesn't seem to ship the low-yield variant.

    • But if you refill the cartridge, you're better off with the low yield model because it's cheaper and it has the same heads, so as long as you don't let it run out of ink, you'll get just as much life out of it for half the price.

      I have an HP Photosmart 7350 printer, it takes a C6657a cartridge which costs $35. Cheaper HP printers take a c8728a cartridge which is $20. What HP doesn't tell you is that the two cartridges are exactly identical except that the 28a has 8ml of ink while the 57a has 17ml. When
    • ...and will keep doing so till it dies natural death. The only difference between "low-yield" and "high-yield" cartridges is that "low-yield" are sold half-empty anyway.

      I actually like that fact that Xerox doesn't seem to ship the low-yield variant.

      Spend $20 on low-yield, $30 on 3 "double" refill sets till cartridge dies. Cost: $50, print: 6.5 cartridgefuls of ink.
      Spend $40 on high-yield, $30 on 3 "double" refill sets till cartridge dies. Cost: $70, print: 7 cartridgefuls of ink.
  • I have a Lexmark Z23, admittedly one of the cheapest printers they make. The 36 dollar cartriges dry out in a month, it takes about 3 pages of full color to unplug the nozzles, and it has ass-tacular paper handling skills. On the plus side, it continually tries to commit suicide by knocking itself off my desk. (Let today be the day!) Nobody loves you, and you're ugly and worthless. Bad Printer, BAD!

    Lexmark, Ink. (pun intended) should be beaten with a rubber hose until they drool on the floor.

    I have a old Canon BJ-200, that while the quality is not of Lexmark on its best day, I could plug it in right now and it will work - the carts never dry up. Ever. I am fully confident that the fossil record will show this.

    I also have a old Panasonic KX-somthing or other that is noisy as hell but will print my obiturary, I'm sure. Which will most likely be soon, as I can't afford food after buying Lexmark supplies.

    Anyhow, if Xerox and Lexmark are using similar carts, that is pretty much a big flag to avoid both companies like a strip bar named 'Fish n' Chips'.

    Oh, you might be tempted, but there is something they're not telling you.

  • lexmark is crap (xerox is probably as well) (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Indy1 ( 99447 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:27AM (#8490008)
    every lexmark printer i've had to work with (and believe its been a quite a few) has been a cheap piece of crap. Most inkjets are pretty cheesy too. And the scary thing is, you can get quality lasers (samsung ml-1710) for under $100 if you shop hard. No funky multi-meg drivers required either.

  • Another tip (Score:4, Funny)

    by Oyvind Eik ( 638873 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:30AM (#8490012) Homepage
    He could probably also make som decent savings by cutting down on the exclamation marks!!!

  • Don't buy Lexmark (Score:5, Insightful)

    by vandan ( 151516 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:31AM (#8490014) Homepage
    Do we not all remember the stories about Lexmark and the DMCA ( ie Lexmark are sueing manufacturers of compatible toner under the DMCA ).

    Lexmark products are also low quality and high priced. I'd prefer to buy from Xerox myself.

  • 3rd party Continuous Ink Systems. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Night0wl ( 251522 ) <iandow@gm a i l.com> on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:35AM (#8490023) Homepage Journal
    I found a rather nice solution to the cost of cartridges and "refil" kits. 3rd Party CIS systems.
    My mother works for Head Start, and does a hideous ammount of printing. This of course adds up when you have to buy cartridges all the time, as we all know.

    One day I heard about Continuous Ink Systems. We decided to give it a shot, 99$ for an Epson Photo 820 printer, and 180$ for the CIS kit, and we haven't looked back since.
    It is a bit of a kludge to make the system work, but with a little care it will work, and work hard. As opposed to a contained cartridge, it's a tube fed 6 bottle setup. 4 oz. bottles of Ink provide hundreds and hundreds of prints. Full color.

    We've certainly saved on cartridges this way, at the cost of some mild frustration from the kit. But in the end it does work.
    • Is Continuous Ink System another name for the inconvenient and inherently ugly hack where you put syringe connected to a bottle outside of the printer?
      I have tested one such solution, and it was anything but portable. It depended on printer being able to support it, worked only on some models, and required modifications involving cutting a hole on one side of printer, so the tubes could get through.
      It did work however, but it is not a solution I would recommend for faint of heart..

      OTOH, while googling, I f

  • Translation (Score:5, Funny)

    by jesser ( 77961 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:45AM (#8490046) Homepage Journal
    It's well illustrated with [many] photographs.

    Translation: the site won't survive 5 minutes of slashdotting.

  • Here in Germany... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 07, 2004 @06:55AM (#8490068)
    ...you can get a new Lexmark for about 30 Euro with (full!) back and color cartridges.

    You print with it until the cartridges are empty.

    Then you drive to Lexmark Germany and throw the now worthless printer without wasting any comments into their front garden and go and buy the next one.

    Someday they'll learn and understand.

    End of story.
  • In the last year I've bought 10 ink and 2 laser printers for a school (and 1 ink and a Laser for me)

    For Lasers I use the Samsung ML4500 because it is easy to refill its toner - a simple plug pops out and in goes the cheap toner. Also at around USD 100 for the whole laser gets you the first 2000 pages anyway.

    For colour inkjets I've used Canon S200/250/300 models as they all have the (same part across many models) bladder-only style refills (no head - the head is a separate part). These are cheap (less than USD 15) for Canon-branded refills and even cheaper for generic brand. No refilling kits needed. If the head goes - I'd probably throw out the whole printer.

    Time is money and I'm happy to refill a Laser toner (if its easy and this Samsung is but not all Lasers are) but all inkjets are so fiddly (from experience of refilling HP, Lexmark and Oki).

    So don't complain about how expensive ink is or how hard it is to refill - look at the whole of life of your purchase including how expensive and how easy it is to refill.

    Also at the school I always reject anyone trying to donate printers to us: this is one thing thats more a burden than a gift ! old monitors are fine !

  • They should be forced.... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by jotaeleemeese ( 303437 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @07:33AM (#8490146) Homepage Journal
    .... to put the price of the ink per unit.

    e.g. "The cost of the ink in this cartridge is xxxx US$ per liter" (or gallon or whatever applies).

    Then it would hit the public the big scam that all this is.

  • Discontinued Printer (Score:3, Informative)

    by sakusha ( 441986 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @07:43AM (#8490165)
    I looked all over the web for the Xerox XK40c, AFAIK it has long been discontinued. None of the current Xerox multifunction color printers use inkjet, they're all color lasers now. No wonder the ink carts are so expensive, they're legacy supplies. Toner is cheaper.

  • Variables involved (Score:5, Interesting)

    by rjasmin ( 104868 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @07:45AM (#8490170)
    As always there are two sides to this:

    One is the fact that ink is too expensive, and manufacturers know that. Price of really cheap printers is intentionally as low as it can be, and by using proprietary ink cartridges, manufacturers are only protecting their investment. They sold you a cheap printer, and hope to get their money back on cartridges. It's not just the cartridges. Ever wondered why most of the printers are shipped without printer cable?
    A printer cable can cost as much as $25 for a 3m cable, and yet the real price of the cable must be under $1 in bulk. Talking about profit...

    The other side has it with print quality. Printer HAS to know, because of the way it's designed, what kind of ink is in the cartridge. Electronics has to be able to direct correct amount of ink at the right time. Replacement ink usually has different physical properties (boiling point, composition, amount of pigment), and the printer has no way of detecting what really got through to paper surface. So with different cartridges you will get different quality and even different colors on paper.

    • Printer Cables (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Detritus ( 11846 )
      I always thought that the lack of a printer cable was just a way to make the retailer happy. The retailer isn't making much of a profit on the printer, but cables are almost 100% profit. USB cables are ridiculously overpriced.

  • It's not abuse (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Julian Morrison ( 5575 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @07:47AM (#8490173)
    It's a desperate attempt to hang onto profits despite their product becoming a commodity.

    They're trying to push the market uphill, by charging heavily for something that was cheap to make (the cartriges), and sooner or later the market will rebound. At which point the profit margins will fall out the bottom of the printer industry, all but the big few will go bust, and innovation will slow to a trickle.

    Of course, if it hadn't been for the patent system totally distorting the market, they could never have pulled this stunt to begin with -- but had that happened, you would probably still be using dot-matrix.

  • Canon, too, in my case (Score:5, Interesting)

    by MickLinux ( 579158 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @08:00AM (#8490197) Journal
    My mother in law owns a Con S450, which started generating the error code (flashing orange/green) ...-o-o-o-o-o-o-g-... repeatedly.

    Looking it up on the web, we found this [fixyourownprinter.com] (google cache [216.239.37.104]) and this [fixyourownprinter.com] (google cache [216.239.37.104]).

    I'll let people make their own opinions, so that I don't accuse them ... but it seems to me applicable to this topic.

    Anyhow, we don't have a fix, nor much expectation of getting one.

  • Expensive cartridges subsidise cheap printers, (Score:5, Insightful)

    by glenalec ( 455692 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @08:39AM (#8490247) Homepage
    as other posters have mentioned.

    In Aust., they were selling unbelievably cheap moble phones several years back (might still be, I don't live there ATM) but you had to sign up to a rediculously expensive usage plan. Eventually the Govt. made the companies print an expected cost over 1 year of normal use on all advertising.

    A similar regulation for printers might solve what is esentially the same problem in a different consumer sector.

    Or we could just keep it in mind and calculate it ourselves. Are we not geeks?! ;-)

  • RFID and consumer lock-in? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by whovian ( 107062 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @08:51AM (#8490268)
    If they really wanted to, couldn't manufacturers embed a passive RFID tag inside the body of the cartridge to ensure "their" printer only uses "their" brand ink?

    I think for that to happen, they would however need a way to make the cartridges non-refillable.

    • Re:RFID and consumer lock-in? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by SharpFang ( 651121 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @09:17AM (#8490320) Homepage Journal
      RFID are ranged devices.
      Scenario 1.
      Put 3rd party cartridge into printer, place original, old cartridge on top of the printer. The printer works, receiving ID from old cartridge, drawing ink from the new one.
      Scenario 2. two printers of different brand, each with original cartridge, on one desk. One printer receives ID from 2 different cartridges and thinking you try to cheat it like in scenario 1, locks up.

      Of course if it was implemented on-chip in the cartridge, read through wires...

  • Nothing new here (Score:4, Interesting)

    by dcavanaugh ( 248349 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @08:58AM (#8490283) Homepage
    Back in the days when dot matrix was the only game in town, ribbons were exhorbitantly priced, with little "features" to ensure a revenue stream to the manufacturer. The first workaround was ribbon re-inkers. You could place a little block of felt near the ribbon intake and put a few drops of ink onto the felt every so often. Ultimately, generic knock-offs solved most of the problem.

  • 35 Exclamation Points!!! (Score:3, Funny)

    by 955301 ( 209856 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @09:06AM (#8490301) Journal
    Wow!!!! He sure was happy to get that hack to work!!! He must've shorted his hand across the transformer a couple of times!!!

  • More common (Score:5, Interesting)

    by N8F8 ( 4562 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @09:08AM (#8490305)
    When I ponder the ink cartridge issue in my head I try to relate it to the auto industry. With manufacturers oursourcing their pars more and more, the chances of two products from competing products containing the same or very similar parts increases. On the one hand the manufacturer is trying to determine the value of manufacturing a component over its lifetime. On the other hand the consumer wants the parts as cheaply as they can get them. Either way the R&D and engineering that want into designing the component should be reimbursed. Same thing with drugs. Same thing with art.

    But then again the gas and fuel filling recepticles on cars are universal. But in that case the engineers in one industry (automotive) were makeing their product compatible with a system designed by another industry (petroleum). Maybe a company should come along and supply really good ink at commodity prices. Maybe printer companies wouold then have an incentive to standardize. Of course they would also probably have to char 5X for the printer or just plain get out of the printer business.

    • Re:More common (Score:3, Insightful)

      by vidarh ( 309115 )
      No, printer companies wouldn't have an incentive to standardize, on the contrary - it would give them extra incentives to ensure their models couldn't handle the ink manufactures. What you are missing is that "printer companies" are really INK DISTRIBUTORS. They lose money on all the low end and many of the high end models - what most of them make their money of is ink and toner cartridges.

      To make your comparison valid, the oil companies would have been manufacturing cars that they dumped at below cost pr

  • Ridiculous price policies (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Animedude ( 714940 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @09:59AM (#8490405)
    They way printer manufacturers try to sell cheap printers only to then make money by selling the ink has gotten really ridiculous. Let me tell you an example: Somebody I know has a small PC shop in addition to his normal job. Some weeks ago, he got an offer from one of the sellers he gets his hardware from about a pretty cheap Lexmark printer (Z65pro IIRC, some color ink printer with integrated 10/100 print server). They offered the printer to him for about 60 Euros, including a "high capacity" color ink cartridge. Since this was pretty cheap, he ordered fifteen printers and then sold them to some of his customers who were looking for a cheap printer to go with their new computer. Some of them also wanted an additional ink cartridge, just in case. My colleague then looked what a new original Lexmark ink cartridge for this printer would cost - 70 Euros!

    End result: he ended up buying ten additional PRINTERS, stripped them of the ink cartridge (which he then sold to his customers) and sold the printers, without ink cartridge, for a few Euros each on eBay. It was actually FAR CHEAPER to buy a WHOLE NEW PRINTER than to buy an additional ink cartridge.

    Instead of buying ink - just throw the printer away and buy a new one ...

  • Speaking as an author... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Garwulf ( 708651 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @10:39AM (#8490511) Homepage
    Speaking as an author who actually does have to deal with 500 page manuscripts on a regular basis, I've learned quite a bit about printers. I started off with a dot matrix when I was in university, and then, when I was moving to my apartment in Kingston, had to choose between a laser and an inkjet.

    I'll freely admit, even now, that a dot matrix is much more economical than an inkjet. But, for the purposes of writing, they're just too slow. I don't have the time to have my printer occupied for an entire day printing out that book that I'm sending off to the publisher. So, the dot matrix was cancelled out immediately.

    When I did my research on the inkjets, I learned one important thing - the inkjet printers sell for less than they cost to make. Every time an inkjet printer is sold, it's at a loss to the company making it. They make their money off the ink. I'm not sure if it's honest or not - I imagine if you're just going to be printing out the occasional webpage, it doesn't matter all that much. For a writer, though, it would be a disaster.

    On to the laser printer. At the time I bought, the lasers were printing at least ten pages per minute, and the toner cartridges lasted (and still do) for around 3-6,000 sheets (I use a Brother). I can't complain about the print quality at all. As an author, the laser was the logical choice.

    But here's the thing - I'm an author, but most people aren't. There are a lot of casual users who don't use that much paper with their computer at all. It takes them a year to print out what I would print out in a month. To them, a dot matrix or a laser printer is overkill.

    I wonder, however, just how many people bother to do the research that I did before deciding which printer to buy.

  • AdWords (Score:3, Funny)

    by moosesocks ( 264553 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @10:50AM (#8490547) Homepage
    Thanks to this story the AdWords column is now displaying text ads for Xerox

    Ironic, no?

  • Same thing with phone batteries... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mark0 ( 750639 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @11:10AM (#8490632)
    I have Panasonic cordless phones -- two phones with one battery each, and one spare battery recharging in the base station. The Panasonic batteries were expensive and hard to find, but I found an identical, generic battery at Sears. The battery didn't fit -- until I removed an extraneous bit of plastic with a Dremmel tool. Works like a charm...

  • Ink Jet Mfgrs suck! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by gone.fishing ( 213219 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @11:12AM (#8490644) Journal
    I really hate the fact that the cost of replacement carts can and often do exceed the cost of an inexpensive printer. I don't do a whole lot of printing anymore because of the excessive cost of these danged carts.

    When you buy replacement part for a car, you have several choices. You can buy parts from the OEM, you can buy parts on the secondary market from after market manufacturers and you can buy parts from rebuilders. There are advantages and disadvadvantages to each. You know those advantages and purchase accordingly.

    It used to be the same with replacement parts for printers but with the DCMA and other regulations, it is now more or less a thing of the past. It is wrong. The manufacturer is now able to say "One of the things that you do when you buy this printer from us is you enter into a relationship with us for as long as you own the printer." This is not what I expected. I wonder what's next - will they develop a printer that only works with the paper they make?

    I've contemplated buying a printer and modifying it so that I can easily refill it using syringes filled with ink. But I understand that Lexmark, HP and others have started building in "smart chips" that kind of count the ink that the cart dispenses. These chips then simply shut down after a perscribed amount of time. I don't know how true this is but I think I'll try this with my $35 Lexmark just to see.

  • Laser printers, too (Score:3, Informative)

    by mokiejovis ( 540519 ) on Sunday March 07, 2004 @12:17PM (#8490947)
    Interestingly, this is also true in the laser printer realm. I got sick of paying ~$35 every two months or so for an ink cartridge, so I started looking for a decent personal laser printer. I settled on the Lexmark e210 because it's fast, cheap, and uses USB. Though I don't have to replace the toner often, it's still expensive (about $70 a pop!) and I didn't feel like shouldering the expense. That's when I discovered that the Samsung ML1210 takes the EXACT SAME toner except for a minor difference [caltech.edu]. The Lexmark toner has tamper-proof screws; the Samsung doesn't. So, you make your slight modification to the printer, you buy one Samsung toner cartridge, and then dump toner in whenever you need more.

  • "Abuse"? Nice. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dmorin ( 25609 ) <dmorin@g[ ]l.com ['mai' in gap]> on Sunday March 07, 2004 @12:31PM (#8491033) Homepage Journal
    I hope the "we should be able to use any cartridge in any printer" people do win the battle. And then when printer prices skyrocket back up to 10x what they are now we'll wonder what happened.

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