I'm frustrated with different printers I've bought through the years. I'm talking just personal, home-use printers to print out pictures, and text files (Hence my posting in "other" and not survey or business-related). I especially am frustrated with color cartridge costs.
Does anyone recommend a moderately-priced printer that has ink cartridge replacements that don't cost an arm-and-a-leg? I understand you can also buy off-brand ink and get the equipment to inject the ink into some existing cartridges? Has anyone done that too? Are there good printers that are easy to inject generic ink if that can still produce a good document?
Thanks in advance.
I use a Brother MFC 430J that is economical on ink
Brother MFC J6510DW (recommended by fellow Beerleggers)
Ink from Super Media Store (Ink Link)
Ink was also recommended by fellow Beerleggers. I pay around $5 for a replacement cartridge. No problems yet, and I've been using both for almost 2 years.
I have a Brother MFC 420CN that I have not been able to kill off yet. I have had it eight or nine years. When it dies I will buy another Brother. I use cheap off-brand ink I buy on e-bay.
It's an excellent scanner, too.
Thanks guys. I vaguely remember talks about printers before, but I guess I figured it was probably mostly about high-grade work-printers. I should have possibly done a search. Sounds like brother might be a good thing. I like the idea of just refilling the ink, I'm glad to know that someone here does that, and that the ink cartridges aren't that expensive too.
I recently bought a Brother after comparing the cost of ink per page with a couple of other makes. It was much better than the others in that regard. I haven't had it very long but it runs well so far.
It appears there is a new standard for ink-cartridge yield. It's called ISO/IEC 24711:2007. To get a copy of the actual standard you have to buy it from ISO for 122 Swiss francs (about $134) so I didn't get one. But printer manufacturers generally refer to it.
According to what manufacturers say about it, ISO/IEC 24711 includes a set of five standard pages to be printed. They print them continuously until the ink cartridge runs out and then record the yield. Since everyone, or nearly everyone, is using the standard pages, it's now possible to make an apples-to-apples comparison of ink costs. Real-world results will vary depending on what you're printing, of course.
Information on ink-cartridge yield is often hard to find on the manufacturers' websites. Searching "page yield" sometimes works.
Hey Tom,
I can't tell you how many printers I've tossed out the front door. :pissed: (I can throw a printer almost 20')
Right now I'm using an HP Officejet 5610xi. 🙂 It works with every Mac(3) and PC(4) computer, and every operating system that I've used in the last three years and has never caused me a moment of grief. It takes two ink cartridges, which usually last 6 months to a year. I buy outdated genuine HP cartidges on eBay for chump change. They always work, even ones that are over 10 years old.
My wife uses a Canon i950 with fillable ink trays. She likes it, but I shudder when I see her filling her printer over the carpet. With the fill-'em-yourself printer, always use rubber gloves or live with stained hands. If you're not careful they're a mess.
Dave
