They are shit

Went with Epson for my recent printer as the inks are cheaper than HP but the image quality was shit on the new Epson. I could live with that but it is now telling me the ink is empty and I can’t print anything. No chance to eek out the last drops or live with a few streaks on something urgent, just forcing me to wait till I can buy some more ink.

Not a great way to treat your customers.

Do not buy one.

Is that all epson printers? I’ve used some great ones that let you shake the toner carts and refit to get the last out of them 🙂 FWIW I have owned some ship HP printers too, and cannon ones…

3/10

I’ve got an Epson wireless printer. It’s been very good.

HTH 🙂

Is that all epson printers?

All new ones. They have a chip in them to prevent you using the ink if they think you have used it enough, regardless of how much ink is actually in the cartridge. Shit printers.

Buy two next time and keep a spare .I assumed that’s what everyone did.

My HP one did that. Until it annoyed me to the point where I hit it. I no longer own or use a printer.

You can reset the chip in the cartridge easily.

Don’t know whether it is still about, but when I used to run Epson printers I used to have an Epson utility that let me reset faults and counters…
Cost most to download and got me at least three new old printers – usually with new cartridges that the exasperated prior owners had tried to repair them with!

They have a chip in them to prevent you using the ink if they think you have used it enough, regardless of how much ink is actually in the cartridge.

I had a Brother printer which did the same. I googled it and it turns out you can override it by pressing the buttons in a certain sequence. I got another couple of months worth of ink out of it.

They have a chip in them to prevent you using the ink if they think you have used it enough, regardless of how much ink is actually in the cartridge.

Same with Lexmark.

Went to Kodak a couple of years ago, don’t regret it.

Owned 3 Epsons over the years (budget ones ) and they were all unreliable. The D120 seemed to go through ink like it was going out of fashion.

Moved to a Brother printer now & couldn’t be happier. Very good ink costs.

I choice of mono laser printers are as follows:

1. Brother

2. OKi

3. Samsung

I have using my OKi B4300 for nearly 7 to 9 years now and my ex used Brother which I recommended. Both good and reliable. Ink cartridge reasonably priced compare to the likes.

Recently my OKi started wanting a new print drum (not the ink cartridge but the thing where the ink cartridge goes in) but I just ignored it and kept printing … the drum is as expensive as the printer btw.

So I will be buying a low end Brother laser printer from Maplin when my OKi dies.

Samsung looks fine but not sure how reliable it is.

🙂

I bought some cartridges from printchainstore (in China) on ebay for my epson

I assumed they’d be shit as they were really cheap but they produced decent results and didn’t set on fire, though I guess they’re assembled by orphaned kittens

Printers are just a mechanism for printer manufacturers to flog you cartridges. Think Gillette, but with more expensive consumables. My current HP business printer was exactly half the price of a full set of inks. On top of that, the print heads need replacing every couple of years. I’m just resigned to the fact it’s the least ethical part of the business I work in and wind the receipts through expenses.

I had a good Epson printer once. Lasted me years.

Buy two next time and keep a spare .I assumed that’s what everyone did.

Even if I had a spare why would I want to use it while there is still ink in the old one?

You can reset the chip in the cartridge easily.

Care to tell me how to do it for their No 18 cartridge. Google doesn’t have the answer.

IIRC it’s something about shorting two pins – I bought a little device to do it that was intended for people refilling their own and it was just a bit of plastic and metal – no batteries in it.

mine wouldn’t let me print black even though I had a full black cartridge in it on account that the Cyan one was empty! I had to buy a full set of inks to print in effing black!

jfletch – I hadnt heard about these chip resetting tools till this thread.

Intrigued I found one for my canon printer on ebay.

Have also found ones on ebay for epson.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/QE368-Ink-Level-Chip-Resetter-for-Epson-Cartridge-Refill-UK-Seller-Reset-BNIB-/111021340929?pt=UK_Computing_Ink_Refills_Kits&hash=item19d9633901

search for “[brand] chip resetter”

A chip resetting tool doesn’t help me at 10pm at night when I want to print something from my printer that had shown no signs of running out of black ink in the previous sheet printed.

So I stand by my original comment. Shit printer.

I wonder how much joy I would get trying to return it under this sales of gods act as being not fit for purpose since it can’t print despite having ink.

Until it annoyed me to the point where I hit it.

My Epson used to get regular beatings.
Now have a Canon and it’s just as bad, if not worse.
All new inks yesterday and the yellow doesn’t come out.

I *hate* consumer grade inkjets.

I acquired an Epson A3 shaped nightmare a few years ago. Last time I bought cartridges it was £80 for the pair. The nozzles dry and clog if the printer is unused for more than a few days, and the nozzle cleaning process uses bucket loads of ink every time you run it. With the last set I had I wouldn’t be surprised if less than 40% of that ink I paid £80 for ever actually got anywhere near a page I actually wanted to print.

Now the colour cartridge claims it is ’empty’, so it won’t even let me just print a page of black copy using the black cartridge which is showing half full. So the hateful, squeaky, brittle plastic pile of shit now resides in its box in the loft. I intend never to own another printer.

Never has any consumer item I’ve ever owned been more deserving of a frenzied, screaming attack with a baseball bat. Awful things.

mine wouldn’t let me print black even though I had a full black cartridge in it on account that the Cyan one was empty! I had to buy a full set of inks to print in effing black!

My HP does that; if you change the print job to monochrome instead of colour in the print dialogue then it prints fine.

Cougar, stop being all logical and helpful and let jfletch continue his nonsense ranting…

FWIW I though most people knew that new printers have minimal ink starter cartridges, so its wise to get a set of spare cartridges with the printer.
I’ve just installed a new WF3450 in the office and its fine. Dell printers however………

They’re all crap IMO

Dell printers however………

Yes?

Cougar you missed Lip gloss out of that graph. (not that I use it) Always comment to mrs b how much that must cost a ltr.

1st google give this £16.00 2.8 ml 😯

I *hate* consumer grade inkjets.

+1. They are all shit, for one reason or another.

Buy a cheap laser printer for day-to-day printing (although in the days of smartphones/tablets how much do you really need to print?)

If you want nice photo prints get them done online. If you do a lot or are a photographer or something, invest in a decent professional inkjet. The pro Epsons are really excellent and pretty cheap to run if you use a 3rd party bulk ink system.

In my experience when they have run out of ink its cheaper just to buy an entire new printer complete with ink than to replace the cartridge. That said I just use the ones at work now, saves me cluttering up space with a huge useless box.
It amazes me that technology has moved on so far, yet printers are still largely the same as they were 10 years ago.

It amazes me that technology has moved on so far, yet printers are still largely the same as they were 10 years ago.

I don’t know about that. 3D printers are getting quite good these days…

In my experience when they have run out of ink its cheaper just to buy an entire new printer complete with ink than to replace the cartridge.

Except, of course, the cartridges that come with the printer are unlikely to be “full” cartridges.

As stated above, consumer-level inkjet printers exists solely to sell ink. Anyone who buys one is effectively being mugged off!

http://www.theguardian.com/money/2013/feb/23/printer-ink-cartridges-paying-more-getting-less

I think the full Office Space scene is required. That gif ain’t enough

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsBB93IqJkE[/video]

I bought an Epson wifi printer recently, except the twatting thing wont wifi…..

1st rule of buying a printer is check how much replacement inks are!

I have an Epson SX425w and can get compatible inks on Amazon for bugger all money – have used loads of these and they’ve all worked fine – 4 sets for £10.30!…

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Multipack-Compatible-Cartridges-replace-BX525WD/dp/B005QM0NT0/ref=sr_1_14?ie=UTF8&qid=1387374055&sr=8-14&keywords=epson+sx425w

…printer only gets used for daughters schoolwork though so photo quality isn’t important.

printers are still largely the same as they were 10 years ago.

No, it’s much worse than that – from the article I was hunting for but zilog beat me to it above:

For example, the Epson T032 colour cartridge (released in 2002) is the same size as the Epson colour T089 (released in 2008). But the T032 contains 16ml of ink and the T089 contains just 3.5ml of ink. It’s a similar story with Hewlett Packard (HP) cartridges. A decade ago, the best-selling HP cartridge had 42ml of ink and sold for about £20. Today, the standard printer cartridges made by HP may contain as little as 5ml of ink but sell for about £13.

Cut open a HP inkjet cartridge and you’ll find what is going on. The size of the sponges inside, which hold the ink, have progressively reduced over the years. The rest of the cartridge is now simply empty space. In Epson cartridges, meanwhile, the ink tank has been systematically reduced in size.

I have half a memory that Kodak are about the best in terms of pages-per-pound of ink usage. I don’t know where I’ve got that ‘fact’ from though, I may have made it up. Also, I’ve never used one of their printers, so they could well be toilet.

The picture on that Guardian link is a corker.

HP300 printer ink cartridge from 2002 (left) and 2010 (right).

AFAIK Kodak are stopping selling consumer printers and concentrating on their commercial offerings. Possibly someone else will license the name for home printer use, I doubt they’ll be any good though.

Yeah, I just read that in the Guardian article too. Ho hum.

HP300 printer ink cartridge from 2002 (left) and 2010 (right).

2002 looks quite shocked at the poor quality of 2010 🙂