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Printer Hardware IT Technology

HP Invents A New Way To Print 436

Posted by Zonk from the i-thought-we-were-a-paperless-society dept.
Sushant Bhatia writes "Forbes is reporting that HP is introducing new technology in its inkjet printers that should help the company and consumers save time and money. If successful, the strategy may alter the economics of the printer market. The new inkjet platform, which will initially be geared toward the high end of the market, will incorporate the print head in the printer itself rather than in the ink cartridge. It means cheaper prints for consumers (about 24 cents per photo print) and faster output. HP says it has more than halved the time it takes to print a 4-inch-by-6-inch photo, to 14 seconds. The press release from HP has details on the new technology."
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HP Invents A New Way To Print More

HP Invents A New Way To Print

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  • Photolithography (Score:5, Informative)

    by Short Circuit ( 52384 ) * <mikemol@gmail.com> on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:41PM (#13045894) Homepage Journal
    Print-head-in-printer has been around for a long time. The advance they've made is using photolithography for more of the construction process.

    • Re:Photolithography (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Egonis ( 155154 )
      Exactly my opinion!!!

      Epson has been doing this for like, 8 years or more!

      How is this an 'invention'??? Did they buy Epson so they now have bragging rights?

      • Re:Photolithography (Score:3, Insightful)

        by mnmn ( 145599 )
        They will just jack up the ink price further to make the final price even again. Makes me think the whole reason the head was on the cartridge was to make thirdparty cartridges difficult to make or copy.

        We should all be exclusively using laserjets anyway, why is anyone happy the inkjet technology has a new lease on life?

        • Re:Photolithography (Score:4, Interesting)

          by bev_tech_rob ( 313485 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @04:16PM (#13047308)
          $.24 per copy??? Shoot, I can just put my photos on a CD-R after cleaning the pictures up and print them out at Walgreens for .19 a photo, and they look better! Have seen very few inkjets approach 'photo quality' output.

        • Re:Photolithography (Score:4, Interesting)

          by gasp ( 128583 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @05:10PM (#13047965)
          Actually, I believe the reason for integrating disposable printheads with ink cartridges is largely driven by maintenance requirements and support costs. Inkjet print heads clog up and are somewhat finicky, especially over years of intermittent use. It's far easier to have users change the printhead when they change the ink cartridge.

          I'm very aware that Epson has been using non-disposable printheads integrated into the printer. This is in part why Epsons are generally more favored by high-end users. However, letting your Epson sit for a couple months or more can easily make it unusable, and cleaning the nozzles with alcohol can ruin them. (A glycol solution is available that does a great job.)

          I had an Epson CS880 that I modified with a homebrew CFS ink system to avoid paying for new ink carts, it worked great, but I had to clean it often especially if nothing was printed for several days. I had to soak the nozzles overnight once after not printing for a month. Eventually after another period of disuse I couldn't get the nozzles all working again and had to toss the whole printer.

          I replaced it with an Epson SP-R300 and a new CFS system (not homebrew-this model has chipped carts) and now have my server sending a 6-color test page to it each night to prevent nozzle clogs. It's great printer, except for the whole cartridge-chipping thing. It makes using a CFS a lot more complicated, and cheats non-CFS users out of using all the ink in each cart.

          As for using laserjets, you gotta be kidding? Show me a $100 laser printer that can print photo quality color at over 5000dpi. With my CFS-modded R300 (~$400US) I can print 4x6 photos for about 16 cents each.

        • Laserjets are worthless for photos. (Score:5, Informative)

          by RedBear ( 207369 ) <redbear@redbearn e t . com> on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @05:12PM (#13047983) Homepage
          They will just jack up the ink price further to make the final price even again. Makes me think the whole reason the head was on the cartridge was to make thirdparty cartridges difficult to make or copy.

          We should all be exclusively using laserjets anyway, why is anyone happy the inkjet technology has a new lease on life?

          Where I work we have a $2,400 HP color laser printer. I also have experience with a color laser printer at a local university that I'm sure cost about twice that much. Both are absolutely worthless for printing photos. Any $50 inkjet photo printer can kick their ass for photo printing, not on speed or cost but on how the prints look. The worst inkjets I've ever seen didn't print photos as badly as the laserjets do.

          Graphs and charts? Sure, go color laser, if you can afford the initial investment which will be around $500 at a minimum. Laserjets are great with big blocks of color, and cheaper over the long run. But a $99 Epson inkjet that uses Ultrachrome inks will get you an archival quality photo print with incredible color gamut and accuracy, and should last 70-200 years depending on what paper you use. If you print 8x10 or larger most of the time it's also cheaper than using a commercial photo printing service.

          For monochrome and non-photo color business printing, laserjets all the way. For home and business photo printing there really isn't an alternative to inkjet besides dye sublimation, and dye-sub printers are expensive and very inflexible, plus studies show that dye-sub prints fade almost as fast as most inkjet prints.

          It's all about using the right tool for the job.

    • Re:Photolithography (Score:3, Informative)

      by davecb ( 6526 ) *
      Indeed, my wife's four-year-old Canon has separate print heads and ink cartridges. That was nothing new...

      • Re:Photolithography (Score:5, Funny)

        by Reaperducer ( 871695 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @03:11PM (#13046452)
        So did my Commodore MPS-802 in 1985.

        I think the big story is that HP's invented a combination Wayback Machine and Reality Distortion Field.
      • Which is the reason I have always preferred HP to Canon. It's been a long time since I bought an inkjet, so maybe now Canon makes something that doesn't suck balls, but my old Cannon was a POS. With combined ink and printer heads, an ink replacement gets you new heads, which means no worrying about unclogging the old ones. The stupid Canon continued to streak lines across the page even with new ink cartridges. "Innovation" is not always a good thing.

    • Re:Photolithography (Score:4, Funny)

      by parvenu74 ( 310712 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:56PM (#13046180)
      So not only do the /. editors run story dupes, so does the PR team at HP... brilliant!
    • Canon's Replacable Print Head [bcentral.com]

      I don't know why on earth one would want a permanent print head when you can get one that is both removable and separate from the ink.

    • Re:Photolithography (Score:5, Insightful)

      by gessel ( 310103 ) * on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @04:22PM (#13047391) Homepage
      ...woo hoo... what an advance:

      Merrill's Steven Milunovich believes the new technology makes HP more competitive, and that "the foundation for longer-term price competition is evident." In a research note, he said that competitors may be pressured to introduce similar photolithographic capability. While HP claims to have a years-long head start with the technology, Milunovich says it may take that long for HP's new technology to trickle down to mainstream price points. - Forbes

      Oh yeah, do that research Forbes... later heard to say "duh... what's google?"

      Canon [canon.com] Full-photolithography Inkjet Nozzle Engineering (FINE) uses a high-performance 1,856-nozzle print head that ejects precise, consistent droplets as small as 1 picoliter, resulting in beautiful photos with virtually no detectable grain.

      Frobes might also have check Amazon for those prices:

      Refills of HP's new color Vivera ink cartridges will sell for $9.99, while older color ink cartridges can run $30 or more.

      Canon BCI-6BK Black Ink Tank [amazon.com] $9.99.

      It'd be one thing if maybe the exact key words weren't so easily googled...

      Fact checking, a lost art.

      Canon's print head is not "built in" to the printer, meaning they've even developed a non-disposable printer too! Of course that's done really well for them...

      Survey results [arrivenet.com] show that 85.6% of respondents reported they would most likely purchase an Epson printer, while no other vendor reached even 7%.
  • now if they could just lower the price on ink cartridges. 45 bucks to refill my ink is a bit steep.
    • By taking the print head out of the cartridge, this does make the carts cheaper.

    • Re:cheaper ink??? (Score:3, Informative)

      by eclectro ( 227083 )
      now if they could just lower the price on ink cartridges. 45 bucks to refill my ink is a bit steep

      RTFA. They are coming out with a lowend printer that will have black and color cartridges at $15 and $18, with the printer costing $50.

  • All Carley's Fault (Score:5, Funny)

    by AKAImBatman ( 238306 ) * <`akaimbatman' `at' `gmail.com'> on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:41PM (#13045907) Homepage Journal
    I blame Carley for this concept seeing the light of day. If she hadn't left the company so abruptly, such innovation technology would have been soundly buried, the employees sacked, and the tech developed by a competitor. Instead, HP is producing equipment based on this!

    It used to be that you could count on HP to produce absolutely nothing of interest and sap up every failing tech company on the market. What is the world coming to?

  • My prediction (Score:5, Insightful)

    by njfuzzy ( 734116 ) <{ian} {at} {ian-x.com}> on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:42PM (#13045908) Homepage
    HP makes their money off of ink, not printers. My prediction is that this will allow them to produce cartridges more cheaply, but they will still charge as much for them.

    • Re:My prediction (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jfengel ( 409917 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:47PM (#13046002) Homepage Journal
      I think it's more likely they'll produce them for a fifth as much, and charge half as much. They'll still look great compared to the competition, the actual price per photo goes down, and they make a bundle.

      • Re:My prediction (Score:4, Interesting)

        by afidel ( 530433 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @03:11PM (#13046445)
        Why would this make them cheaper than the competition? Canon and Epson already integrate the print head into the printer rather than the cartridge. Of course HP's argument was always that you got better and more reliable output by recieving a new printhead each time you reaplced the cartridge, not sure how they will deal with their own PR (similar to Intel and the Mhz myth).

    • Re:My prediction (Score:4, Insightful)

      by peculiarmethod ( 301094 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:52PM (#13046105) Journal
      Which keeps them from supporting internal advances in quality ink. What I will pay for is sun resistant ink with a shelf life of at least a 100 years. And I want it cheap. Enough of this disposable "they will pay and pay" model.

    • Re:My prediction (Score:5, Insightful)

      by buckhead_buddy ( 186384 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:52PM (#13046109)
      Putting a part that's subject to significant wear and tear into the printer itself suggests to me that their goal is making the printer a disposable device that's consumed and replaced just like printer cartridges are.

      The photolithography tech in the printer sounds interesting (and probably heavily protected with patents) but it sounds like the value to a consumer like me may not be significant when all costs for purchase and replacement are considered over a three year term (or thereabout).

    • Re:My prediction (Score:3, Interesting)

      by krgallagher ( 743575 )
      " HP makes their money off of ink, not printers. "

      Which is why the print head reads a chip in the ink cartrige and fails to print if it is not genuine HP ink.

    • Re:My prediction (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Deathlizard ( 115856 )
      Not exactly.

      If this tech is anywhere close to Epson and their built in Printheds, they will be making money on both.

      Epson's built in Printheds was the stupidest idea I ever saw, at least consumer wise. Yes it would print well, but I hope you dont stop printing for more than a week or so, becuase once that printhead clogs it time to toss the printer away and buy another one.

      The best design I've seen so far is the Canon designs. They Practicially encouraged refilling on those cartrages, they would last jus

  • The Best Way To Print... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by nokilli ( 759129 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:42PM (#13045909)
    ...is to not print at all. I haven't had a printer for a decade now, and those two or three times that I've missed it were easily remedied by a trip to a Kinko's or some such similar service.

    I have to believe that with the greater reliance on web and email for communications, along with bigger and better monitors, that most of the rest of you will cease missing their printers as well within the next few years.

    So HP invented a new way to print, just it time for nobody to care.
    • Interesting point. I'm wondering now: does Kinkos offer a means of remotely printing, i.e. you upload an EPS (for example) to their website, choose the location and number of copies, and have them waiting for you when you arrive to pay for them and leave?

      If not, this sounds like it could be a good business opportunity.

    • Printing changes (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jfengel ( 409917 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:52PM (#13046118) Homepage Journal
      Except that people use printers diffrently now than they used to.

      The biggest change is that you really can print photos at home now. Ten years ago that wasn't practical. People like having physical copies of their photos for an album, and you just can't replicate that with a screen. There are services that let you do it online, but a lot of people like the control that they get from having it right there: they can choose the paper and do a lot of tweaking right at home.

      In addition, new kinds of paper have opened up new opportunities to use your printer: bumper stickers, tee shirts, even tattoos. You can't get those at Kinko's.

      So I'd hardly say that nobody cares. In fact with the digital cameras many people care more than ever. (Not to mention that most schools still won't accept your homework on a CD-ROM.)
      • ...new opportunities to use your printer... even tattoos.

        Dude, if you can fit your arm through the line-feeder of a typical inkjet printer, you seriously need to hit the gym.

        (I keed, I keed!)
      • people who print their photos on a printer are stupid unless they print them one at a time over a long period of time.

        I usualy order rolls, or equivilant amounts as a roll I should say, at a time. I can get them on line for as little as 15 cents a print with a better quality than on my home printer. printer costs are about 30 cents a picture at home.

        I usualy use iPhoto 5 for my pictures though because it is 19 cents a print and it is much more convinient to do it in one application than upload them 15 at

      • Re:Printing changes (Score:3, Informative)

        by Gulthek ( 12570 )
        The biggest change is that you really can print photos at home now. Ten years ago that wasn't practical. People like having physical copies of their photos for an album, and you just can't replicate that with a screen.

        Sure, but that's why I use internet photo printing services. Home printing sounds convenient and easy, but it invariably isn't unless you have a nice color laser printer. Inkjets still have the problem of limited cartridge lifespan whether you use the cartridge or not!

        When I want ultimate c
      • If you hand someone a disc with hundreds or thousands of jpg/mpg/mp3s of their family, and they can show it with the automatic slide-show program in their video player (today, DVD), with music or sound on a huge screen, and then copy it for the entire family for basically nothing, forever.

        Nonsense; Printing services have bumper stickers and more.
    • Still totally unrealistic for businesses, but nice try.
    • I don't print too much at home now, but I print lots at work. At home, the main thing I print is maps with directions to places I am about to drive, because I'm too cheap to buy a GPS. I think that might account for 80% of my home printing.
    • I have to believe that with the greater reliance on web and email for communications, along with bigger and better monitors, that most of the rest of you will cease missing their printers as well within the next few years.

      As soon as my grandparents in rural Montana get broadband connections...

      I was about to say they'll need computers, too, but then I realized that first part will never, ever happen, so, until someone mandates high-speed internet access for everyone in the US like they mandated telephone

      • As soon as my grandparents in rural Montana get broadband connections...

        Depends on where they are. You can get DSL in the Thompson Falls/Noxon area which is pretty rural.

        Satellite is also available everywhere in Montana, unless you're on the north slope of a mountain.

        Hell, even dial-up is acceptable for e-mail communications w/smaller (JPG) pictures.

        In your case, just upload the photos using Shutterfly, Walmart or some other service that will snail-mail them to where ever you want.

        -Charles
        (In sem
    • That's the way I try to do it, don't have a printer. But I don't use Kinko's. 2002 is the last time I went. I had my income tax in PDF format on a floppy disk. (Didn't want to pay the "efile" premium.) Kinko's asked $10 for them to do the work, or I could rent one of their computers at such a high rate I could easily spend more than $10 if it took too long to load the document and wait for the printing. Either way, there was an additional charge per page, something like $0.50. Was high compared to $0

  • Informative Article (Score:5, Informative)

    by vmcto ( 833771 ) * on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:42PM (#13045911) Homepage Journal
    Nice article about the new system and printer here. [letsgodigital.org]

  • Print head in the printer itself? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Alyred ( 667815 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:43PM (#13045929)
    How is this "inventing" a new way to print? Hasn't Epson been doing this for years in their printers?

    I know when I replace my printer cartridge on my Epson I just replace the ink, unlike the old HP I used to have where I replaced the head every time.

    Of course, this might be a new thing for HP to sell new printers, as when the ink dries in the head the whole printer has to be replaced. One of the downsides that we've always had to deal with in an Epson.

    -Alyred

    • Yes, what IS new about this? STARTED this way. (Score:5, Informative)

      by Ungrounded Lightning ( 62228 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:57PM (#13046213) Journal
      How is this "inventing" a new way to print? Hasn't Epson been doing this for years in their printers?

      Heck: The first inkjet printer I ever dealt with was back in the early '70s, when they had just been invented. It was a prototype with a spinning drum holding the paper, a carriage with the ultrasonic-driven spitters, and three bottles hooked to the carriage by flexible tubes.

      Quite an advance at the time. B-)
    • "as when the ink dries in the head the whole printer has to be replaced"

      I see this a lot in the comments in this article. Ever try a taking wet cotton swab to the head, or failing that, a swab dipped in alcohol? Always worked for me. Haven't owned an inkjet for a few years though, so maybe that trick doesn't work any more.
    • Cannon has as well. I prefer to replace the print head everytime since it controls the quality of the print. It's a step back as far as i'm concerned. For the consumer it's just yet another part they have to rememeber to replace and the model of the printer/print head when they go to the store.

  • Digital Images (Score:2, Funny)

    by mfloy ( 899187 )
    Being able to produce your own photos inexpensively from your digital images could worry businesses that print photos for you. If this tech hits the mainstream it could change the digital photo industry.
  • This is nothing new, hp already has some printers with the printhead separate from the ink. Instead of worrying about replacing ink, you now have to worry about replacing ink and then every few ink changes replacing print heads as well.

  • Welcome to the 80's (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    incorporate the print head in the printer itself rather than in the ink cartridge.

    Which is how every OTHER manufacturer of inkjets makes their printers. Way to innovate, HP.

    So now with HP printers, it'll be just like epson: "Your print head is clogged? Throw away the printer". At least with HP if the 'head' clogs you throw away the cartridge and replace it with a new one.

  • Ouch (Score:5, Funny)

    by Spackler ( 223562 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:44PM (#13045955) Journal
    So now will the whole printer expire instead of just the ink cartridge?

    • In short: yes.

      You'll still have to buy cartridges (for roughly the same price as today no doubt, that is, around a kajillion dollars per cubic inch of ink) but if the head is exhausted, you can kiss $150 bucks bye-bye and get yourself a new printer.

      Slick scam eh?

      • Re:Ouch (Score:3, Funny)

        by ndansmith ( 582590 )
        Or you can pay the low price of $185 to have the head replaced by a professionally trained technician at an HP certified repair facility.
    • why is this marked "funny"? Inkjet printer manufacturers employ all sorts of dirty tricks to bilk customers, I'm sure this is what HP is planning.

      (everything is better with lasers!)
  • HP needs to make their driver problems the top priority instead of putting so much engineering effort into printing speed. Most people at home would be happy with a printer that last 5-6 years, printing at normal speed.

    • Or they could just be smart and put Postscript/PCL in everything. Printers shouldn't NEED drivers. At most a simple definition file that enumerates the capabilities of the device. I've got a Laserjet 1300 that supports postscript. If I want to, I can literally do:
      cat somefile.ps > /dev/lp0
      and it will print it. No driver involved at all.

  • Ink Prices? (Score:5, Funny)

    by abcxyz ( 142455 ) * on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:45PM (#13045964) Homepage
    Most of the complaints against HP printers surrounds their replacement cartridge prices. Looks like, from the Forbes article that the new ones will be in the $10 price range. Curious to see how they turn this into their new cash cow. (Maybe 6 really, really low-capacity cartridges?)

    • Nah (Score:3, Insightful)

      by phorm ( 591458 )
      Normal capacity cartidges, $99.9 for a replacement print-head when the ink dries up in it...

  • Wow (Score:2, Interesting)

    by mc900ftjesus ( 671151 )
    I had an Epson in 1998 that had that. The print heads clog up when the ink dries in them. Now you have to buy a new printer instead of new cartriges, awesome.
    • I have a newer Epson that has 6 separate cartridges (one for each of 6 colors). And since 2 sets of cartridges cost as much as the printer, you might as well buy a new printer when the print head clogs up!
  • will incorporate the print head in the printer itself rather than in the ink cartridge


    This is different from what Epson has been doing in the last ten years exactly how???


    Oh, I see, HP will patent the concept...

  • Perfect... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by rm69990 ( 885744 )
    The thing I liked about HP Inkjets was that the Printheads didn't die in them, since they weren't part of the printer....so much for that :(

  • ..and Gates invented the PC. (Score:4, Informative)

    by teknickle ( 812501 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:46PM (#13045991) Homepage
    Epson has had print heads in the inkjet printers for a long time. That's why the ink cartridges are only $7 retail (I got a dozen for ~$15 on ebay).

    Canon used to have theirs seperate from the little ink wells so that you could replace the heads independent of each other.

    The 'heads' are just micro-voltage actuated valves. The ones built into cartridge heads have short lifetimes (hence why you shouldn't refill more than 3 or 4 times). The quality of heads in the Epson are much sturdier, but then you waste alot of ink trying to purge clogged valves.

    I used to work on a LARGE printer (printed directly to custom cardboard boxes). The printheads were made by Marsh printing (~400 just to have them repacked) and was bigger than my fist. (can you see me clenching).

    Anyway, not a new idea. Just a 'new specific implementation'.
    • "and Gates invented the PC"

      Co-inventor is more accurate. He did co-invent it with IBM. The Microsoft software was a crucial and integral part of the first PC. He didn't invent the microcomputer: there were plenty around before 1982. Just the PC.

  • If HP gets a patent based on this, I'm sure all the slashbots will be bursting blood vessels. Actually, they will probably starting bursting blood vessels or having seizures when the patent application is published, since they will mistake it for an actual granted patent.

    (PS to mods: I'm not trolling, this is a joke...)

  • Please stup the marketing! (Score:5, Informative)

    by imsabbel ( 611519 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:47PM (#13046008)
    Come on! "New Way to Print" my ASS.
    This is just corporate newspeak saying "we are taking over the technique our closest competitors have been using since 1995".

    Single ink tanks&co arent innovative in any way. The same with permanent printing heads. It was just HPs idea of product marketing up to now to maximize running costs by making everything disposable.

  • Ink Jet is ALWAYS a bad idea (Score:3, Insightful)

    by DogDude ( 805747 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:47PM (#13046015)
    From everything I've seen, ink jet technology is more expensive, slower, produces lower quality, and less durable printed pages. With the cost of laser/LED (Okidata uses LED instead of laser) technology so low, why would anybody, especially in a professional setting, consider ink jet?
    • But thats no surprise for slashdot.

      On professional archival quality paper, using professional quality ink, ink jet (particularly pigmented ink jet, though dyed is improving) is archival quality and will last longer than many lightjet-style prints, to say nothing of simple laserjet prints. Many museums and artists use epson 9600s and what not for their display prints. I know I do.

      As for 'lower quality', thats entirely subjective, however, modern inkjet produces smaller drops than what most lightjet print
      • On professional archival quality paper, using professional quality ink, ink jet (particularly pigmented ink jet, though dyed is improving) is archival quality and will last longer than many lightjet-style prints, to say nothing of simple laserjet prints. Many museums and artists use epson 9600s and what not for their display prints. I know I do.

        I've never seen an ink jet printer that prints out anything that 1. Doesn't get deformed from massive quantities of wet ink when printing large filled areas or 2.
        • You simply dont know anything but cheap consumer crap.

          1. Cheap crappy paper, or paper and printing profile not compatible. Most common reason: using cheap crap
          2. Cheap papter, cheap inks, bad combination (with many papers, the ink is supposed to perclorate the uppermost layer and dry beneath the surface, which seals it). There are also solutions available that seal the print after the ink has been applied.
          Again: solution for the problem: not using cheap crap.

  • Having the print head be part of the printer instead of a cartridge???

    Wow.

    Every 9 and 24 pin ribbon printer I've ever had could claim the same thing.

  • Hasn't canon been doing this for years?
  • this is a very old idea, going back to the time that manufacturers tried to conserve materials and only put as much junk into the waste stream (and expense on the backs of consumers) as was necessary to get the job done.

    Maybe it indicates that the market has spoken and where these companies were unable to knock down ink cartridge competitors with legal maneuvering, they'll now try to do it by bring the price down to the level that consumers want.

    wait wait wait.

    i am totally confused by this article.

    Canon

  • One thought..... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by AtariAmarok ( 451306 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:50PM (#13046063)
    Just one thought. It seems more odd/obtrusive to have DRM embedded in the new cartridges, which amount to something more like a mere bottle of ink instead of an entire ink delivery system like the existing cartridges are.

    This could make it easier to have alternative vendors for these new cartridges. Unless HP has some devious plan. I actually did read the FA and did not see reference to it...

  • HP said that was bad?!? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by DamienMcKenna ( 181101 ) <damienNO@SPAMmc-kenna.com> on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @02:51PM (#13046085)
    HP used to promote their printer-head-in-cartridge system for years because, honestly, it was a great idea - instead of having to repair your printer every year or two because the print head had worn out you got a "free" print head change every time you changed cartridges. I honestly thought their way of doing this was better than the rest. This turnabout is just plain dumb IMHO, it'll make cartridges cheaper but the printers themselves will be of lesser quality, meaning when they start having print head problems people will just replace the entire printer.

    Damien
    • I'll take canons method instead thanks.

      The printhead is a seperate peice, You install it when you get the printer, and you install the ink over top of it.

      My printer got clogged and I had to pull it out to clean it, but it wasn't a big deal. (actually, it was quite easy and has been fine since.).

      The average consume doesn't print enough to require a replacement head, but the ability to clean it if/when it gets clogged is good.
  • You can tell when a reciew is a review, and an advertisement is an advertisement.

    Ripped from the FA:

    "it will also breeze through black text at up to 32 pages per minute (ppm) and colour documents at remarkable speeds of up to 31 ppm."

    Now, come on. This is just getting ridiculous. There is NO WAY that this printer can print out a page every 2 seconds. I would bet money that the only way you'd get a page per minute count like this is to print a blank word document in black and white.

    And even then, I do
  • It means cheaper prints for consumers (about 24 cents per photo print)

    Because, as we all know, printer manufacturers have been selling ink for cost, rather than vastly inflated prices, for years now.

    The consumer end of the market is all about giving away the razor and charging double for the blades. Buy enough blades and they make far more than they lose from giving away the razor.

    Though this explains why it's aimed at the high end of the market where companies are generally smart enough to factor in to
  • Wow, this sounds all nifty keen, but its still using aging printer technology as the core...

    Now if you're looking for a new way to print, this guy at the office was showing me something. Its a long transparent stick, with a blue line down the center on the inside. He moved it across a flat, thin, rectangular peice of processed tree matter, and voila! Words were being printed on it! Technology amazes me sometimes...
  • 1994 called, they want their printer design back.

    I have a Canon BJC-600 that is over 11 years old, and has a seperate (replaceable) print head, and 4 individual ink cartridges.

    ELEVEN years ago Canon made this printer, yet Epson and HP love to brag about innovations such as seperate cartridges, permanent print heads, and the like. Meanwhile most HP cartridges come with the print heads clogged for you already (save you the trouble of printing anything) and Epson does you the service of gouging you on th

  • HP is finally admitting that their strategy to force customers to buy ink from HP by incorporating the patented print head in the cartridge is not working since everybody and his dog not simply refills the HP cartridges. So now they are finally willing to sell you a printer that just take cheap ink cartridges. However, the HP marketing department feels the need to spin this as some sort of "innovation" to save face, rather than admit that the "print head in cartridge" was a decision driven by HP marketing t
  • -> do not pay executives $42 million just for quitting, this should lower cost per page by at least 2 or 3 cents
    -> do not hire executives who just came from worldcom, this will easily lower cost per page 5 or 6 cents
    -> do not build DRM chips into ink cartridges, which can obviously lower the price per page by 10 cents
    -> use the money saved by lowering executive pay to hire some actual engineers, so that the company, you know, actually might build some products
  • Canon did this ages ago....

  • What's NEW is the 3,900 Nozzle Built In Head..... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Myrv ( 305480 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @03:02PM (#13046285)
    It's not the fact the print head is in the printer, it's the fact that the print head has 3,900 nozzles allowing it to print width swaths at a time.

    See Here [letsgodigital.org]
  • ...the whole printer when the head dries out, you just have to submerge the printer in rubbing alcohol and hope it doesn't catch fire when you plug it back in.
  • Puhleeze.

    Try making the fix/buy decision on an $800 Epson inkjet that's a couple of years old and needs a new head. They simplify their cartridge making too. Win-Win for HP.

    It gives one comfort in knowing a huge ruthless comptetitor like HP can shoot themselves in the foot on a regular basis. I'm glad I'm not an investor in that organization.

    HP Parody:
    Invent nothing. Reorganize everything. HP 2005 = Xerox 1999.
  • The HP Press release does a good job of explaining what's new, and why it matters.

    Forbes reads this release, and decides that the defining feature is that the printhead isn't replaceable. "Below the fold", they finally get to the point, but not before going screaming by it.

    Morons.

    Of course, this being /., nobody even RTFA's much less the source material, and is now bashing HP for claiming to have invented the wheel, when what they're actually doing is rolling out a new process for making tires.

    Morons.

  • hardly news (Score:4, Informative)

    by Atilla ( 64444 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @03:12PM (#13046468) Homepage
    so what? other manufacturers have been doing this forever.

    also, there is a much higher chance of the nozzles getting clogged on a built-in head system (people with cheap lexmarks and canons know what i'm talking about). I actually prefer having the printhead on the cartridge - you'll never have to throw the printer away if the jets have been clogged with dried ink.

    It is possible to clean them out sometimes by running some isopropyl through the heads instead of ink, but i've run in to several printers that got caked up so bad that nothing would clean them.

    I wish that the printer manufacturers would make the HEADS and the CARTRIDGES easy to replace. On most of them, you have to take the carriage assembly half way apart to get the heads to slide off.

    on a side note, I don't think that inkjet market is going to change direction any time soon - they make most of their money on cartridges. As long as you'll be able to buy a printer for $39 at wallyworld, ink will not be cheap.

  • Nothing special here... (Score:3, Informative)

    by caveat ( 26803 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @03:21PM (#13046596)
    My Canon iP6000D has the best of both worlds - separate print heads and ink tanks. Keeps the ink relatively cheap ($10-13/tank), and when the print heads wear out or clog up, they're replaceable. Shameless plug - I've used both Epson and HP printers before the Canon...I won't be swiching back.

  • This is news? (Score:3, Informative)

    by retro128 ( 318602 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @03:31PM (#13046725)
    Epson and Canon have had their heads integrated into the printers for YEARS.

    Actually, I preferred the old HP way of having the heads in the cartridge. Why? Heads get scratched. They get clogged. They wear out. Instead of buying some insanely expensive and hard-to-replace printhead, all you have to do is swap out the cartridge and you're printing like new. It's the same thing with HP's lasers...The imaging drum and the toner cartridge are in the same package. It might increase the price of the carts a little, but maintenance isn't as big of a deal. Besides if you want to max out your drum life, you can always refill the toner.

    I guess all HP's announcement means is that their inkjets will suck even more. As it is I am quite displeased with Epson and Canon products (take a guess...printhead problems), but now I guess HP can join the team. My experience with inkjets have completely driven me away form the technology. I'll gladly shell out $600+ for a laser printer that I never have to worry about over an inkjet that prints blank pages or lines if it decides to work at all. Besides a toner cart capable of printing 1000's of pages only costs, what, just double what a little inkjet cart prices out at?

    Even if you need color, the lasers have dropped through the floor. At work we just picked up an HP3550 color laser for under $1000, and that's with networking. Granted, HP really screwed the pooch and provided not an INTERNAL JetDirect like I expected, but rather included an external USB print server with no price break, but at least it prints nice.

    I thought things were supposed to get BETTER after Fiorina was ousted

  • Fed up with HP (Score:3, Interesting)

    by humankind ( 704050 ) on Tuesday July 12, 2005 @04:39PM (#13047614) Journal
    I own an HP K60 and it has performed well, until recently when the printer started refusing to print, with the message "scanner failure". Why the failure of the scanner should render the entire printer useless is one obvious design flaw, but the worst part is after doing research, it became obvious the problem was dirt on a sensor deep in the printer. Someone had posted a solution to this problem on HP's support forum and they removed it. The process simply pointed out where to unscrew a few screws and blow out an area with compressed air, but apparently HP didn't want anyone knowing the solution to the problem was that simple. That sucks, and for that reason I'm not buying any more HPs, not to mention their software is lousy. I recently replaced the K60 with a Canon MP780 and have been very pleased. Plus it has a separate, replacable print head, so I'm not sure what the big deal of this article is in the first place.

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