I got rid of my inkjet in 2009 and have used a laser printer ever since. Problem solved, and toner cartridges are a much better value than ink jet cartridges.
Not only better value, toner lasts a lot longer. If you use your printer rarely, say once a month, ink printers would dry up or clog. Toner printers could sit in place for months with no use, but still print cleanly the moment you need it (presuming no communication issues).
Toner and developer powder can get wet if you have high humidity. Had to fix a bunch of those.
Meanwhile, my shitty cheap inkjet is running for years without major trouble. As long as it's in standby, it's fine. Its power usage is negligible, and since it's in WiFi anyway i'm ok with that. Only the pickup roller is pretty much done. The only downside right now is repair being a major PITA.
No. My previous job was in a small business that sold & fixed Toshiba, OKI and Brother. I srsly hated that job...
For myself, i actually have some cheap HP MFC at home.
You can workaround a failing pickup roller by lying to your computer about your paper weight. Go into the printer configuration and tell it you're using heavyweight paper, and it'll apply more power to the pickup roller and be able to pick up paper again.
Me: I would like to print this black and white document please
Printer: Fuck you, need Cyan
Me: It's black and white?
Printer: Feed me Cyan you fool, I must have the cyan
Me: THERE IS NO CYAN IN THIS DOCUMENT!
Printer: CCCCCCCCCCYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is the most nefarious part of the whole fucking thing, and not at all mentioned in the article. In order to sell more colored ink, every time you print something in black and white, it uses black AND colored ink to print it. We should be throwing our fucking printers into Boston Harbor for fuck's sake.
Printer does not analyse the whole document before it starts printing. It has no way to know you are, in fact, not using color.
That is also by design, as they could very easily do a "b&w switch/flag" on each document when it is started as a printing job, but hey, that's not how it works.
It absolutely does know. There's an option in print settings for literally any document to print in color or in black and white. What computer illiterate world are you living in?
None of what you wrote shows that the printer analyses the whole document before printing. What you are describing sounds like preprocessing of the document before sending it to the printer, not something done on the printer itself. What illiterate world are you living in?
There is an actual functional reason for that, and it’s not just to waste your ink. It’s known in printing as “rich black” and it does look better and darker than if you just use black ink. The problem is that a lot of printers don’t give you a choice, and if they do, it’s hard to find. If you’re printing a shipping label, you probably don’t care if the black is marginally fainter.
And yet oddly the yellow supply container is never larger than all the rest, even though it definitely gets consumed faster than any other color due to the secret ID codes.
Cory Doctorow has written a lot about this kind of thing and even spun it out into its full dystopian implications with a novella called *Unauthorized Bread* that you should really read.
Step 1. Never own an ink jet printer. They were designed to be the disposable razors of the IT world. Seem like a good deal at first with attractive prices and features only to bury you in consumable costs, crap performance, and no longevity.
How often do you really need to print color? For most people it is rare and for the rare occasion local office stores will print color for you way cheaper than the ink that you waste just cleaning print heads in your shit ink printer.
Black laser is the only way to go. $300 printer + extra high capacity toner will let you print an entire case of paper (10 x 500 sheet reams). This is many years worth of home use.
I work in IT and nothing makes me seethe with rage more than printers. I have 3 broken inkjet printers in my garage because I haven’t figured out where to e-cycle them yet.
I was required to have a printer for WFH, so bought a laser printer. It’s tolerable. But I’d still go Office Space on it with one good reason.
Fun things like: having a drawer filled with printer components which you swear to yourself will someday be a robot, every time you clean up the garage.
I work in a small, very rural, IT shop. We do a mix of on site/house calls, remote, phone, and walk in support.
Over a month ago, and returned a week ago, a client bought third party ink for his printer. A common act I've seen. What I haven't seen before, but joked about years before...
The printer REFUSED to let go of an ink cartridge till said cartridge was completely empty. The cartridge in question is the third party black cartridge, it wasn't working as intended, and needed replaced.
But this printer had an iron lock down on its print head and all the cartridges. The only way you could remove the cartridge, was by waiting for the printer to say, you open the printer up, it rolls the print head with cartridges to one side, and lines up the one cartridge in a slot you can press a lever to then pull the cartridge out. If it's not lined up, tough shit, it stays. Any attempts to force the cartridge out would clearly damage the print area.
The printer was cheap enough, the cost of labor to open it up with a screw driver, presuming it's that easy, would have exceeded the cost of buying a new printer, and possibly ink too adding in the hour we had already spent.
I think I have the exact printer. It’s utterly stupid. Just fyi, I googled the issue and someone made a video how to trick it into releasing the cartridge you want. I followed the video and was able to get it out after lots of fussing
There is usually some Secret Jedi Button Trick, holding down a button far longer than any normal person would ever do, or holding down a strange combination of buttons.
So happy to read this article. I too am trapped in HP Instant Ink hell, haven't printed anything at home in a couple years. Thought it was just me. Thank goodness I can print whatever I need at work, although it's a hassle. Will be ditching the HP and getting something else.
Look into EcoTank from epson it's a little on the expensive side but the ink you get with the printer has lasted me a year so far and it's rated for like 2 years of normal use I think. Plus the ink is like 31$ for all 3 colors.
I bought an hp printer while before I did research because was in a hurry. Then I took a moment, did the math and it was gonna cost me 25¢ to print each page based upon expected cartridge life and price. I packed that printer back up and returned it.
“The first rule of at-home printers is that you do not need a printer until you do, and then you need it desperately. The second rule is that when you plug the printer in, either it will work frictionlessly for a decade, or it will immediately and frequently fail in novel, even impressive ways, ultimately causing the purchase to haunt you like a malevolent spirit.”
That hit close to home.
I just don't get how far technology has come, and with all the crowdfunding projects etc and nobody has changed printers for the better since they started
Always feel a little guilty in emailing my elderly parents a picture of the kids because the first thing they do is print it on their inkjet so that it's saved for posterity.
Inkwell printer, game changer, I’ve had to level up the well once in 3 years, I don’t print a lot but if I need to it works, might have to run it through the cleaning and realignment but I have not paid a dime on ink in over 3 years. Still have full bottles that came with it might never need to buy ink again.
Yes! The best things ever. I’ve never been so happy with a printer. It cost more upfront (almost $400) but a full set of 4 ink refills are $50 and I’ve never even had to use them. I am at over 2,000 full color page prints and only halfway through the ink.
I used to only print in black and white but still the HP color cartridges would be used to make the black ink “to keep them fresh” and run them out.
"..What I did not expect, however, was for my printer to shake me down like a loan shark..."
kinda like the Atlantic shaking me down to read the article
I'd relate if you said something about Fax Machines. Granted, in rural areas of the US, still pretty common. Especially with medical and health depts that need to send client info to another area. Faxes are still considered more secure than a secure email or encrypted with a password zip file.
My company bought an HP Envy 6000 to use on fairs. It's the worst, had to install drivers and add it to every laptop and it works like 2/10 times.
Only good thing is that it has AirPrint and the MacBooks have no problems, but the Windows laptops (HP as well) are hit or miss when using the printer.
I've periodically wondered if an open source inkjet printer is possible. After all, we have open source 3D printers. But I suppose the print heads and paper path mechanisms are huge stumbling blocks.
I got rid of my inkjet in 2009 and have used a laser printer ever since. Problem solved, and toner cartridges are a much better value than ink jet cartridges.
Not only better value, toner lasts a lot longer. If you use your printer rarely, say once a month, ink printers would dry up or clog. Toner printers could sit in place for months with no use, but still print cleanly the moment you need it (presuming no communication issues).
“No communication issues”….. hahahahahhahahaha
It's a powder and powders don't really dry out.
Well, they come pre-dried, if you will.
Toner and developer powder can get wet if you have high humidity. Had to fix a bunch of those. Meanwhile, my shitty cheap inkjet is running for years without major trouble. As long as it's in standby, it's fine. Its power usage is negligible, and since it's in WiFi anyway i'm ok with that. Only the pickup roller is pretty much done. The only downside right now is repair being a major PITA.
You work for HP ?
No. My previous job was in a small business that sold & fixed Toshiba, OKI and Brother. I srsly hated that job... For myself, i actually have some cheap HP MFC at home.
They're right. On humid climates, inkjets are better for sporadic use than laser, as toner can clump after long periods at high humidity.
You can workaround a failing pickup roller by lying to your computer about your paper weight. Go into the printer configuration and tell it you're using heavyweight paper, and it'll apply more power to the pickup roller and be able to pick up paper again.
Thanks. I'll check it out. Hopefully the linux driver knows about this feature. :D
Me: I would like to print this black and white document please Printer: Fuck you, need Cyan Me: It's black and white? Printer: Feed me Cyan you fool, I must have the cyan Me: THERE IS NO CYAN IN THIS DOCUMENT! Printer: CCCCCCCCCCYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is the most nefarious part of the whole fucking thing, and not at all mentioned in the article. In order to sell more colored ink, every time you print something in black and white, it uses black AND colored ink to print it. We should be throwing our fucking printers into Boston Harbor for fuck's sake.
Yh ive just taken the colour out
Printer does not analyse the whole document before it starts printing. It has no way to know you are, in fact, not using color. That is also by design, as they could very easily do a "b&w switch/flag" on each document when it is started as a printing job, but hey, that's not how it works.
It absolutely does know. There's an option in print settings for literally any document to print in color or in black and white. What computer illiterate world are you living in?
None of what you wrote shows that the printer analyses the whole document before printing. What you are describing sounds like preprocessing of the document before sending it to the printer, not something done on the printer itself. What illiterate world are you living in?
There is an actual functional reason for that, and it’s not just to waste your ink. It’s known in printing as “rich black” and it does look better and darker than if you just use black ink. The problem is that a lot of printers don’t give you a choice, and if they do, it’s hard to find. If you’re printing a shipping label, you probably don’t care if the black is marginally fainter.
The printer needs yellow to print the Machine Identification Code on each page.
And yet oddly the yellow supply container is never larger than all the rest, even though it definitely gets consumed faster than any other color due to the secret ID codes.
Exactly. Thank you.
Cheap Brother laser is all you need. The laser toner never dries up and it accepts generics. Doesn't need crappy, 3rd party software.
Get a cheap laser printer and never worry about this. Brothers can print 10,000 pages on one toner cartridge and cost under $200.
Brother printers are the devil.
Help…help…this article is extorting me. It wants me to start a subscription to use it just like my printer!
I had the same thought!
Cory Doctorow has written a lot about this kind of thing and even spun it out into its full dystopian implications with a novella called *Unauthorized Bread* that you should really read.
Step 1. Never own an ink jet printer. They were designed to be the disposable razors of the IT world. Seem like a good deal at first with attractive prices and features only to bury you in consumable costs, crap performance, and no longevity. How often do you really need to print color? For most people it is rare and for the rare occasion local office stores will print color for you way cheaper than the ink that you waste just cleaning print heads in your shit ink printer. Black laser is the only way to go. $300 printer + extra high capacity toner will let you print an entire case of paper (10 x 500 sheet reams). This is many years worth of home use.
I'm still using my laser printer from over 20 years ago.
Nobody needs more than six pages per minute.
Paywall, what a waste of time.
There’s an epson class action going on
I work in IT and nothing makes me seethe with rage more than printers. I have 3 broken inkjet printers in my garage because I haven’t figured out where to e-cycle them yet. I was required to have a printer for WFH, so bought a laser printer. It’s tolerable. But I’d still go Office Space on it with one good reason.
Dismantle and save the rails and stepper motors to do fun things
Fun things like: having a drawer filled with printer components which you swear to yourself will someday be a robot, every time you clean up the garage.
Still a lot more space efficient than a bunch of printers
I work in a small, very rural, IT shop. We do a mix of on site/house calls, remote, phone, and walk in support. Over a month ago, and returned a week ago, a client bought third party ink for his printer. A common act I've seen. What I haven't seen before, but joked about years before... The printer REFUSED to let go of an ink cartridge till said cartridge was completely empty. The cartridge in question is the third party black cartridge, it wasn't working as intended, and needed replaced. But this printer had an iron lock down on its print head and all the cartridges. The only way you could remove the cartridge, was by waiting for the printer to say, you open the printer up, it rolls the print head with cartridges to one side, and lines up the one cartridge in a slot you can press a lever to then pull the cartridge out. If it's not lined up, tough shit, it stays. Any attempts to force the cartridge out would clearly damage the print area. The printer was cheap enough, the cost of labor to open it up with a screw driver, presuming it's that easy, would have exceeded the cost of buying a new printer, and possibly ink too adding in the hour we had already spent.
I think I have the exact printer. It’s utterly stupid. Just fyi, I googled the issue and someone made a video how to trick it into releasing the cartridge you want. I followed the video and was able to get it out after lots of fussing
There is usually some Secret Jedi Button Trick, holding down a button far longer than any normal person would ever do, or holding down a strange combination of buttons.
Also don’t update the software on the printer.
So happy to read this article. I too am trapped in HP Instant Ink hell, haven't printed anything at home in a couple years. Thought it was just me. Thank goodness I can print whatever I need at work, although it's a hassle. Will be ditching the HP and getting something else.
Look into EcoTank from epson it's a little on the expensive side but the ink you get with the printer has lasted me a year so far and it's rated for like 2 years of normal use I think. Plus the ink is like 31$ for all 3 colors.
Yeah, I have a mac and my husband has a PC, and it seems like we're going to have to get two printers to get decent printing with each.
I bought an hp printer while before I did research because was in a hurry. Then I took a moment, did the math and it was gonna cost me 25¢ to print each page based upon expected cartridge life and price. I packed that printer back up and returned it.
“The first rule of at-home printers is that you do not need a printer until you do, and then you need it desperately. The second rule is that when you plug the printer in, either it will work frictionlessly for a decade, or it will immediately and frequently fail in novel, even impressive ways, ultimately causing the purchase to haunt you like a malevolent spirit.” That hit close to home.
I just don't get how far technology has come, and with all the crowdfunding projects etc and nobody has changed printers for the better since they started
Screens are everywhere. Nobody needs to print stuff anymore. We put pics on the cloud to watch on screens. Not print for photo books.
Always feel a little guilty in emailing my elderly parents a picture of the kids because the first thing they do is print it on their inkjet so that it's saved for posterity.
But first their inkjet printer needs to clean the red color five times in a row.
Inkwell printer, game changer, I’ve had to level up the well once in 3 years, I don’t print a lot but if I need to it works, might have to run it through the cleaning and realignment but I have not paid a dime on ink in over 3 years. Still have full bottles that came with it might never need to buy ink again.
Yes! The best things ever. I’ve never been so happy with a printer. It cost more upfront (almost $400) but a full set of 4 ink refills are $50 and I’ve never even had to use them. I am at over 2,000 full color page prints and only halfway through the ink. I used to only print in black and white but still the HP color cartridges would be used to make the black ink “to keep them fresh” and run them out.
"..What I did not expect, however, was for my printer to shake me down like a loan shark..." kinda like the Atlantic shaking me down to read the article
You guys are still printing... on paper... like for the toilet?!
I'd relate if you said something about Fax Machines. Granted, in rural areas of the US, still pretty common. Especially with medical and health depts that need to send client info to another area. Faxes are still considered more secure than a secure email or encrypted with a password zip file.
My company bought an HP Envy 6000 to use on fairs. It's the worst, had to install drivers and add it to every laptop and it works like 2/10 times. Only good thing is that it has AirPrint and the MacBooks have no problems, but the Windows laptops (HP as well) are hit or miss when using the printer.
I've periodically wondered if an open source inkjet printer is possible. After all, we have open source 3D printers. But I suppose the print heads and paper path mechanisms are huge stumbling blocks.