Got a Canon Pixma MG5250 printer a few months ago. Pleased with the way it works but it is so fast….. at getting through ink. Work is picking up and I am now having to do more stuff that has to be printed. Nothing that requires a bigger spec machine but a couple of hundred a month above normal domestic use. Where do I get reliable refills or cheap cartridges. Would be happy to buy a dozen or so at a time if it would reduce costs.
I remember a thread about refills a few months ago but can’t find it.
Any suggestions please?

Print less or add the additional cost on the price charged. You aren’t a charity.

Domestic use varies…my domestic use is zero prints but my wife manages to go through cartridges monthly…

A laser should be a lot cheaper to run. Depends what you are printing.

Do you need colour?

I have a HP Laserjet that’s been going strong for years now, cheap as chips to run – bit of a big old brick mind but the newer ones are sleeker

Yes I add the cost to whatever I’m doing for work and it is only about 500 a month and probably about 250 that the Mrs does of handbags and photos etc. So mixed use and yes do need colour.

It just feels like I’m going to PC rip off all the while. Never seem to come out less than £50 lighter.

Are those Kodak printers that PC world keep advertising any good?

IIRC – £70 and then £20 for the full set of refills

We get our cartridges from http://www.cartridgepeople.com for our Canon 520. The ink quality is great, no leaking from the cartridges and they work straight off without chipping etc.

I wouldnt have thought it was the best printer for doing such high volume though…

Printers are a loss leader. Ink is where the real money is…

I bought a Dell colour laser printer for home use, plenty of life left in the toner yet given what I have printed. It has worked out loads cheaper than ink jet for us.

Thanks for the tip funky. Will give them a try as it seems alot cheaper. Not sure what high volume is and when it would become cheaper to go to a small laser. The numbers i’m talking about are absolute max.

It’s fairly easy to work out a cost per page for the printer you have vs a colour laser – you may find the cost of the laser printer, as has been said above, will be irrelevant when you look at the cost per page of the ink an ink jet uses for the same number of pages.

Will monitor the numbers from now on! Even my maths can cope with that one. Understand the machine costs are loss leaders. A higher volume b&w one to supplement present one might be the best option.

If an inkjet is really what you want, it might be more cost-effective just to write it off and buy another that’s cheaper to run and aimed at higher volume printing. “Personal” printers are just that, they expect you to be printing a couple of pages a week.

Three words:

EBAY
EBAY
EBAY

🙂

Cartridges for my Canon MP610 printer are about £55 if you buy Canon ones.

I can get a full set of 5, properly chipped up cartridges, for £7.99 delivered. And they are indistinguishable from genunine ones in use

http://stores.ebay.co.uk/THE-FOXY-INKSPOT/_i.html?_nkw=mp610&_sid=144157776

You need a CIS continous ink system –

http://www.continuous-ink-systems.co.uk/

etc.

Installed correctly they work really well.

Not sure how these guys compare for your printer, but they’re been consistently good on price for the last few HP one’s I’ve had, as I prefer original carts for printing photo’s.

Might be worth a look:
http://www.inkraider.co.uk/printer-model/canon/Canon_Pixma_MG5250.asp

What are you printing? If its photos, then you get better results at a cheaper price by using an online printer like photobox.
A cheap laser for B&W is also a good idea if you have the space.

Even the lasers are sold as loss leaders, so be careful there too.

Permier-Ink have got equivalent cartridges here:

http://www.premier-ink.co.uk/ink-cartridges/canon/pixma-mg5250/-c-62_213_771.html

that seem pretty cheap. I haven’t looked at the other links above to see if they are cheaper or not, but I have bought stuff from them before & they are pretty good.

You need a CIS continous ink system

Supposed to be very good. High setup costs, but you can divide your ink costs by ten.

Price varies – from about 15 quid on sale up to 100 quid.

they do work really well when setup right – mine was on sale for about 30 quid a few years ago, still working away now.

You need a CIS continous ink system

Supposed to be very good. High setup costs, but you can divide your ink costs by ten.

More than likely something else (print heads, paper handling) within a year or two anyway and you’ve negated any savings.

Plus one for Ebay cartridges, also set up a webpage and just give out business cards, for better for the environment.