[HN Gopher] Canon sued for disabling scanner when printers run o...
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Canon sued for disabling scanner when printers run out of ink
Author : LordAtlas
Score : 776 points
Date : 2021-10-16 14:46 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bleepingcomputer.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bleepingcomputer.com)
| TheDudeMan wrote:
| It's almost like the printer companies want us to stop printing
| things.
| Cyder wrote:
| We need an open source printer
| Frenchgeek wrote:
| In terms of printers simple enough to be made yourself, there"s
| always the BT100... But it was made to be cheap, not good.
| marcodiego wrote:
| Actually, they don't need to be opensource. Having free
| firmware or being a simple machine to obey is enough. There are
| good printers listed on h-node. People mock fsf ryf
| certification but I think it is very much valid.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| > Having free firmware
|
| What good is free software when manufacturers can just
| require the firmware to be signed, thereby disallowing any
| and all modifications? We'll never be truly free until we can
| manufacture this hardware at home, just like we can make our
| own software at home.
| bombcar wrote:
| Amusingly enough I believe it was esr's rant on printers that
| started CUPS.
| abecedarius wrote:
| Kragen is right that we need hackers working on building up our
| hardware capabilities in general. The free software movement
| started in an era of relatively open hardware when that seemed
| less of a priority.
|
| Admittedly I haven't done anything myself, though I admire
| those who have.
| martinhath wrote:
| See
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman#Events_leadin...
| fsckboy wrote:
| wanting access to the source code of an early Xerox laser
| printer (at MIT) is what got Richard Stallman ticked off enough
| to devote his life to free software.
|
| when I saw the headline for this article I first read it as
| "Canon sued for disabling scammer when printers run out of ink"
| :)
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| Ironically, printer software remains proprietary garbage to
| this day and it only gets worse as the years go by.
| mrtweetyhack wrote:
| opensource printer
| k8sToGo wrote:
| I bought a 99 bucks HP printer many years ago and signed up for
| HP instant ink. I have been printing for free basically since
| then since I print less than 15 pages a month. Don't even have to
| worry about the ink anymore as they send it automatically when it
| is near empty.
|
| There are a few downsides. They count per page basis. So even if
| you print only one letter, it counts against you. When you have
| to print a lot, then you have to buy in the pack of 10 pages. But
| overall still cheaper for me than to buy ink at all.
| sedatk wrote:
| Good luck until you get "print head needs replacement" error,
| and realize that for some reason it's more expensive than the
| printer itself.
| k8sToGo wrote:
| Thanks, but I have been using this combo for 4 years now and
| it's working just fine for me.
| pxx wrote:
| Didn't they try rescinding this deal?
| https://www.consumerreports.org/printers/hp-ends-free-ink-fo...
|
| Regardless, the "free subscription" is no longer a thing that
| is available for purchase. It also doesn't seem cost effective,
| given the miniscule print quota; a single laser printer toner
| cartridge yields more than a decade of prints if you were able
| to somehow always hit exactly 15 pages a month.
| k8sToGo wrote:
| I print less than 15 pages per month, and when I printed more
| it was a few bucks. So still a lot cheaper.
| marcodiego wrote:
| Hi Canon!
|
| Thanks from increasing my list of examples why people should no
| be so condescending of proprietary firmware.
| carbocation wrote:
| I don't think condescending is the right word here. Can't be
| sure without knowing your intent, but do you mean something
| like "should not be so accepting of proprietary firmware"?
| marcodiego wrote:
| Yes.
| slim wrote:
| Condescending is used when you describe someone who thinks
| he is superior to others.
| marcodiego wrote:
| TIL! False cognate. I'm not a native speaker. In
| Portuguese there is the term "condescendente" which means
| "indulgent, one who doesn't imposes discipline". What is
| the equivalent term in English?
| culi wrote:
| The actual correct translation would be "acquiescent"
| b0afc375b5 wrote:
| Greedy, perhaps?
| SAI_Peregrinus wrote:
| Considerate or Accepting both work in English.
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| I'd use accepting, though it is bland. Trusting might
| work as well.
| lokimedes wrote:
| My HP inkjet will not print any color or black if the "photo
| black" cartridge is removed. I consider this a similar "greed
| move" by HP.
| mrtweetyhack wrote:
| HP is the greediest company
| hrgiger wrote:
| If I remember right I also had to authenticate through their
| cloud service to send file to printer via direct cable
| connection from my PC.
| jerf wrote:
| Does your printer have two separate "black" and "photo black"
| cartridges?
| lokimedes wrote:
| Yep, and I am still (after 7 years) working out what the
| difference is. Photos come out just fine without any ink in
| the photo cartridge, photo paper is a must though.
| throwanem wrote:
| I'd guess "photo black" is a higher-contrast dye, and would
| wonder if BW exposures printed with and without it come out
| with the same dynamic range.
| elliekelly wrote:
| The water dispenser on my fridge stops working if it decides
| the filter needs to be replaced. I get about ten days between
| the "new filter" light and when it stops working with the
| beeping and blinking getting progressively more annoying. Oddly
| enough the ice dispenser (which also uses the filter) continues
| to function. So it's not a safety issue and someone apparently
| decided consumers would tolerate the inconvenience of no
| filtered water but not the inconvenience of no ice.
|
| It's a slight improvement over my last fridge which used DRM to
| make sure I only used their (way more expensive) branded
| filters.
| bombcar wrote:
| You can sometimes replace the filter (take the old one out
| and put it back in) and then reset the timer to get more
| water.
| voakbasda wrote:
| What brand of fridge uses DRM? Asking to avoid them entirely
| MauranKilom wrote:
| It's been a topic on HN before:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23484292
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22129801
|
| (GE in both cases)
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| Since 1990: GE outperforms all other appliance makers in
| supplying reasons to avoid their products.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| > someone apparently decided consumers would tolerate the
| inconvenience of no filtered water
|
| What kind of person makes decisions like this? When handed a
| good product, who decides to make it worse on purpose?
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > who decides to make it worse on purpose?
|
| Management beholden to shareholders above everyone else.
| hyperstar wrote:
| Any recommendations for printers or scanners without wifi that
| work on linux without unfree software?
| squarefoot wrote:
| It simply hurts me that we have Open Source 3D printers but not
| 2D ones. Unfortunately the complexity required to go from one
| object in 2 hours to say 20 pages/minute makes any FOSS hardware
| approach impossible as of today.
| pbhjpbhj wrote:
| Find a best in class printer from 20 years ago, all patents on
| it have expired: couldn't you just 'rip it off' excepting
| design elements that are non-functional?
|
| That would give a base to work from, I guess you start
| simplifying the hardware. Even if it used propriety cartridges
| at the start it would seem better than a commercial consumer-
| level printer as you could stop the 'you need all colours to
| print in plain black (K only)' and 'you can't scan without
| wasting ink getting the printer ready', etc..
|
| ??
| aboringusername wrote:
| To me it is a reminder that all cornerstones of society are
| entangled in this battle for rights and freedoms, others include
|
| Sideloading on iOS, alternative app stores etc
|
| Farmers getting access to diagnostics for their tractors
|
| Not having to buy subscription-ink (looking at HP here...)
|
| Standardized charging systems (USB-C) over proprietary cables
| like Lightning.
|
| Amazon fighting the definition of a library - they mostly stock
| books and have a weaker digital loaning system, Amazon has a
| vested interest here.
|
| I'm not sure why - as a global species - there's not more effort
| to tighten up the rules in this regard. We know business are
| user-hostile when considering greater profits and we see this
| daily, yet only _now_ does the EU consider, in another 3 years,
| that a single cable might be a good idea to reduce waste.
|
| We really need more open access to the hardware and software of
| products on the market, and certain behaviors should not just be
| illegal, but require a maximum month-long turnaround to producing
| a commit that fixes the problem or face automatic daily fines
| until it is fixed and rolled out to all customers.
|
| Seriously, I suspect this could be fixed by most people on this
| forum very quickly.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| > I'm not sure why - as a global species - there's not more
| effort to tighten up the rules in this regard.
|
| Lobbying. These industries are worth billions of dollars. They
| can afford lobbyists who will go to politicians and influence
| the law making process. They essentially buy the laws that they
| want. Copyright duration is essentially infinite now thanks to
| these guys. Also illegal to reverse engineer thanks to these
| guys.
|
| Billion dollar corporations protecting their own interests at
| the expense of the public's interests. Such a nice democracy we
| live under.
| NAG3LT wrote:
| Not just now - EU has pushed for a common phone charger
| previously and most manufacturers went with Micro-USB at the
| time, except Apple. Now, EU is just pushing that further with
| less loopholes.
|
| As for the time between adoption and enforcement - there has to
| be reasonable time given between for everybody to adjust to the
| new regulation.
| AwaAwa wrote:
| Aren't those all problems that need legal remedies first and
| foremost? I'm not sure if most people here are in the relevant
| professions.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| In general multi-function printers tend to be a bit crap even
| without these sort of shenanigans. Most people would be better
| off buying the appropriate device for each function.
| Jerry2 wrote:
| Last month, my friend's HP Laserjet Pro printer started flashing
| "SUPPLY PROBLEM" error message and wouldn't print anything.
| Apparently, all he did was update the firmware after a message
| popped up on the printer urging him to do so.
|
| Well, that firmware update included new DRM checks for non-HP
| toners. The printer would just refuse to work with 3rd party
| toner cartridges.
|
| I had to help him and had to find an old firmware and downgrade
| to an older one which didn't contain the DRM. The firmware didn't
| come from HP's website because they deleted all old versions so I
| downloaded the version off someone's Google Drive. Who knows if
| that FW contains something malicious. Also, I had to install
| Windows because old firmware update is a Windows program. You're
| SOL if you use macOS or Linux.
|
| This incident didn't make my friend go and buy $200+ worth of
| original toners like HP intended. All it did was make him anxious
| of updating anything and of using HP products and has wasted a
| lot of his and my time. He said he won't buy another HP printer
| again.
|
| If you want to learn more, search for "HP supply problem" with
| your fav search engine. Or see this link on HP support forums
| [1]. And don't update your printer's firmware if it's working
| fine... because who knows when they'll disable FW downgrade
| option and you'll be stuck with a DRMed printer.
|
| Edit: Just in case you found this comment through a search engine
| or this has affected you, I recommend downloading FW from this
| page [2]. It also has a list of affected HP Color LaserJet Pro
| printers (there's quite a few models.. the page lists 11 models).
| That blog also has a full saga of HP's shenanigans and their
| attempts to block aftermarket cartridges [3].
|
| [1] https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Printing-Errors-or-Lights-
| Stuc...
|
| [2] https://borncity.com/win/2021/02/02/firmware-downgrade-
| for-h...
|
| [3] https://borncity.com/win/2020/11/08/hp-firmware-update-
| for-i...
| pombrand wrote:
| Better yet, HP will re-enable auto firmware updates if you
| disabled them at lest with certain printers (they did for
| mine). HP never again.
| tim333 wrote:
| After my last HP printer being annoying I said never again
| and bought a Samsung laser. Of course HP then went and bought
| Samsung.
| mike-cardwell wrote:
| HP screwed me the same way a few years ago. I now have a
| Brother Lazer printer. Fuck HP. Threw that junk in the trash.
| noasaservice wrote:
| My big question here is:
|
| Why aren't companies being found criminally negligent with the
| CFAA when they force poison-pill "upgrades" that remove stated
| features from the original device?
|
| How is this functionally different than the crypt-ransomware we
| see in the news?
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| You gave authorized access in the EULA. What we need is real
| penalties for contracts of adhesion.
| ncallaway wrote:
| Do printers have an End User License Agreement?
|
| The last printer I bought, I was able to setup and print
| with, without (explicitly) agreeing to any license. Is the
| EULA part of a software install process?
| anonymousab wrote:
| There's usually a clause somewhere in small print where
| you agree to some massive EULA on some url through just
| the act of buying the product.
| noasaservice wrote:
| Prove it.
| pbhjpbhj wrote:
| So as long as I send a target an email and they don't
| respond back that they refuse then I can do anything to
| them that was in that email - same level of "authorised".
| They probably looked at an email longer if it was actually
| opened.
| oxyboy wrote:
| Honestly for me the HP instant ink plan works quite well. The
| lowest tier is 99 cents a month and gets me 15 pages which are
| sufficient. Certain months I might go over my allotment but
| that's not breaking the bank. Their cartridges run really long as
| well - haven't needed a new one in 2 years.
| jsilence wrote:
| Not to be meant snarky, but I think the office world should
| strive to print much less at all.
|
| Working at a University it is mind boggling to me how much paper
| is waster because someone internally decided they need a real
| signature. Not all my colleagues are savyy enough to paste a
| scanned signature into a pdf.
| unclefishbits wrote:
| Architects design buildings with the heaviest load being paper.
| Paper is the heaviest thing in a building.
| bootlooped wrote:
| I had a networking class in a computer lab where there was an
| unmetered printer. Almost all student accessible printers on
| campus cost money to use; I can only guess this slipped through
| the cracks somehow. Every day some idiot would be printing off
| entire power point presentations for all the lectures she was
| in and who knows what else. The printer would be running for
| the first half the class. Disgusting wastefulness.
| mhh__ wrote:
| I enjoy printing stuff out to really digest it, but I
| absolutely agree that there is a huge amount of printing
| basically being done for no reason.
|
| In a certain way I kind of enjoy printing to a printer that's
| not near me, if it can get away with it, if I have printed
| something off to read over the course of a week I feel like it
| adds some gravitas to actually go and fetch it.
| chaoskanzlerin wrote:
| There's plenty of jurisdictions where "pasting a scanned
| signature into a pdf" doesn't produce a legally valid
| signature.
|
| Germany requires some signing software for pdfs - though
| printed-signed-scanned documents are also legally valid
| signatures
| vlovich123 wrote:
| Show me someone who can tell the difference between pasting a
| signature in a pdf vs printed-signed-scanned?
|
| There was a legislature in America that tried to define pi as
| 3 so irrational laws are not surprising.
| jackson1442 wrote:
| Aside the point but I can generally tell. With PDF
| signatures they're either too smooth on the lines (that's
| what mine is) or there's some artifacting on the signature.
| Al-Khwarizmi wrote:
| If you go that route, most people can't tell the difference
| between a person's signature and a different person faking
| their signature.
|
| By the way, in Spain printed-signed-scanned wouldn't be
| legally valid either, unless a notary has seen the original
| and can certify that it coincides with their own
| handwritten signature. Otherwise it's either original
| handwritten signature, or digital signature in a digital
| PDF file, or printed digital signature with a secure
| validation code that you can verify in some URL.
| [deleted]
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > Show me someone who can tell the difference between
| pasting a signature in a pdf vs printed-signed-scanned?
|
| One challenge with potentially invalid documents - when
| agreements go south and disgruntled employees get a free
| wrench to toss into the works.
|
| Another motivator is not wanting to risk cheesing off
| judges.
|
| source: Once prepped federal cases
| garaetjjte wrote:
| >doesn't produce a legally valid signature
|
| Is there any place where it does? It seems ridiculous to me
| to treat copy-pasted bitmap same as real signature.
| system2 wrote:
| Anyone reading this, from a sysadmin: Go for brother. Ink or
| laser. No issues, never had a single problem in the last 10
| years.
|
| Lexmark was okay for a while until their imaging units started
| crapping (700 series).
| buzzwords wrote:
| I hope this article ranks high when people Google canon review.
| mensetmanusman wrote:
| For some reason I enabled the 'auto refill' on my new canon
| printer because that is what our office did (somehow).
|
| Don't do that: it kept making purchases because it didn't receive
| the ink as fast as it expected due to supply chain issues. It
| took a long time for Canon to cancel the orders that had never
| left the factory and give our hundreds of dollars back.
|
| It's a fun story at least!
| netcan wrote:
| There's an onion article in there somewhere. Honestly, giving a
| money grubbing printer a credit card and ordering powers might
| make a decent analogy to parts of the supply chain issues at
| large.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Yup. I mean, I've heard HP has some silly "ink as a service"
| program, but honestly, giving credit card details to a
| printer? That sounds extremely unwise (and the fact it's even
| possible says something about the world we live in, and not
| nice things).
| bbarnett wrote:
| It'd be like giving it to your toaster.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRq_SAuQDec
| siva7 wrote:
| I did and it's comfortable. We shouldn't dismiss innovation
| that quickly
| microtherion wrote:
| It's a precursor to the dreaded Paperclip Maximizer.
| egberts1 wrote:
| Brothers LaserJet.
|
| No malware, no adware, no funky drivers; just colored, WiFi, LP-
| protocol, multi-tray PCL and PS support.
|
| Best thing since sliced bread.
| int_19h wrote:
| I have a Brother MFC that has been working for ~10 years now.
| No problems using third party toner.
|
| One thing I did notice, though, is that it will start
| complaining and bugging you about replacing the toner before it
| actually runs out. There's a well-known way to reset that
| check, though, allowing you to print until it _actually_ runs
| out.
| perl4ever wrote:
| Is that like a Canon Xerox?
| foofoo4u wrote:
| Same here. Brother is the only printer brand I have used thus
| far that doesn't feel like its trying to scam me for my money.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Ebay: used 4 series. It'll be a heirloom.
| stephbu wrote:
| TBH this... Not one of these consumer printer businesses is
| going to survive commoditization of their now-primary source
| of consumer revenue - ink (the printer is just a loss-leading
| on-ramp to that business). These suicide-pills are the last
| gasps of a dying business model. Businesses don't tolerate
| such shenanigans, but you and I will pay the price for doing
| so.
| kqr2 wrote:
| Don't the recent Brother printers require a chip id for toner
| cartridges? I believe you can transfer the chips but it still
| seems user unfriendly.
| okl wrote:
| Not aware of that. There seems to be a very old cartridge
| model that has a chip. Do you any link/source?
| kqr2 wrote:
| For example: https://support.ldproducts.com/en_us/how-do-i-
| transfer-the-c...
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Brother sells overpriced refills but there are off brand
| replacements about half the price. They also report ink run out
| on starter cartridges when it hasn't. I think the only ethical
| printers are 3D ones.
| int_19h wrote:
| Have you tried resetting the counter? The procedure is
| different on different models, but it goes something like
| this: https://www.inkhub.com.au/ink/brother-mfc-l3750cdw-
| toner-res...
| aesh2Xa1 wrote:
| Recent firmware updates have disabled this workaround.
| Brother has joined the malfeasance club.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| I have a mechanical mod to do that ... but point still
| stands the default isn't good.
| okl wrote:
| See my tip here:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28889001
|
| Vigorously shaking the cartridge might also help sometimes.
|
| And regarding starter cartridges, you might need a reset
| gear: https://cartridgeamerica.com/ctg/brother-toner-
| chips.php
| shostack wrote:
| You know a market is bad when a company can lead the space
| simply with the platform of "we won't scam you."
| ouid wrote:
| Kinda sounds like the whole economy though.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| In some ways we bring it on ourselves by being such
| cheapskates. People post reviews in the app stores because
| they think $2 is expensive for an app then wonder why they
| end up with free software that sells their private data to
| the highest bidder.
| ouid wrote:
| It's not an "either/or" situation, apps compete on price
| and that's just not where they make their money, largely.
| tempfs wrote:
| Another vote for Brother's Laser printers. Love mine, cheap,
| reliable and works on Linux without a hitch.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| > no funky drivers
|
| Even on Linux?
| tyfon wrote:
| Can't speak for OPs printer but my brother just uses IPP and
| a PPD definition file, all supported out of the box with
| cups.
| xfalcox wrote:
| Yes and it works out if the box in any modern distro.
| pnutjam wrote:
| so, anything but redhat?
| ineedtosleep wrote:
| Brother printers, from my experience, will just work
| automatically -- depending on your distro. If you need
| drivers, they do have a Linux installer as well. I've used
| the installer before and definitely not even a fraction as
| scummy as Canon/HP driver installs.
| formerly_proven wrote:
| These understand standard PCL (and even PDF, somewhat) - you
| really only need to point CUPS at the printer's IP and tell
| it what the page size is.
| ncallaway wrote:
| My printer works on a framework laptop with Fedora 35 with
| absolutely no configuration, or any installations of any kind
| (beyond having connected to the wifi).
|
| Ironically, my windows desktop won't print to it though. It
| just reports an opaque error sending to the print queue with
| no diagnostic information. No idea if it's a windows problem
| or a printer problem, because I just use my linux laptop to
| print with no issues, so I haven't bothered to resolve the
| windows printing issues.
| heavyset_go wrote:
| Pretty much every printer released since 2010 has IPP
| Everywhere support, which allows for driverless printing on
| any platform including Linux.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| What about scanning?
| [deleted]
| gpsx wrote:
| I've had one of these forever. Great purchase. (I am sure it
| still works great but I never print anything anymore.)
| odiroot wrote:
| I am also in the Brother laser club. Don't know anyone having
| any printing problems with it. The new ones are super quiet
| too.
|
| They only tend to be a bit picky about the WiFi networks, so
| better to use with a cable.
| JFKKFJ wrote:
| I let the cartridges that come with the printer dry out and use
| them to be able to scan without having to buy ink. I have a Canon
| MG2550.
| Ansil849 wrote:
| To the engineers who design things like this: fuck you.
| flyinghamster wrote:
| So HP isn't the only one to do this, then. I had an HP all-in-one
| at work refuse to scan because it had expired the _printhead_.
| Just one more data point on "why I don't buy HP." Guess I have
| to add Canon to that list, too.
| neilv wrote:
| As many techies will probably always say anytime inkjet product
| shenanigans come up: just buy a laser printer.
|
| And I now add: and don't let it connect to the Internet, and
| don't install proprietary drivers or software for it on your
| computers.
|
| Also, remember the names of companies doing sketchy things, and
| do your part to provide negative feedback when you can, and to
| give positive feedback to better companies. (Example: I've just
| moved away from the Apple product ecosystem, because Apple did
| one too many obnoxious things, and I'll also be pointing friends
| who ask to alternative solutions.)
| centizen wrote:
| Canon was actually on my short list of printer vendors I would
| have recommended people to use. Now it's just down to Brother
| and Kyocera I guess.
| kitsunesoba wrote:
| Even Brother is dodgy, depending on the model. I have a low-
| midrange Brother B&W laser printer that worked great until
| one day it decided to stop accepting print jobs, both via
| network and USB... it just stalls at "processing" and never
| proceeds. Googling around it seems like people with various
| Brother models have seen this behavior.
| clusterfish wrote:
| Accidental failures are one thing, deliberately user
| hostile design is another.
| unstatedAnswers wrote:
| Parent is insinuating this may be deliberate sabotage on
| Brother's end, to convince users to buy a new model after
| a while
| clusterfish wrote:
| It may also be just random failure of some components
| that were simply costed to be less than bulletproof on
| their "low to midrange" model. Or a software issue as
| suggested by another poster. No evidence of any sabotage
| was presented.
| okl wrote:
| I once had a similar problem with a CUPS/gutenprint driver.
| If you are using CUPS, load the ppd from brother.
|
| It could also have to do with the detail/complexity of your
| document. Intricate PDFs or high-dpi graphics can overwhelm
| low-midrange printers. (I once had a print job that took
| the printer half an hour to process.) On some printers you
| can even install additional RAM.
| alpaca128 wrote:
| Among all the printers in our household the Canon model broke
| in the least amount of time, only fixable with a spare part
| which was "coincidentally" the same price as the whole
| printer. And the official scanning tool was just named "ij
| utility", which meant it was impossible to find with related
| search terms.
|
| It was entertaining, but not in a good way.
|
| Honestly I've never been satisfied with any printer, inkjet
| or laser. I eagerly await the day I just don't need one.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| >don't install proprietary drivers
|
| If you do need the drivers often you can unzip the installer
| and look for the .INF file. Installing from that will save you
| from the crappier parts of the software.
| busymom0 wrote:
| > I've just moved away from the Apple product ecosystem,
| because Apple did one too many obnoxious things, and I'll also
| be pointing friends who ask to alternative solutions
|
| Good to hear I have more companions on the same boat.
| blackearl wrote:
| The thing about laser is it's not a great answer for your
| typical boomer mom-level consumer. They're large and color
| laser MFPs are usually ~$500
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| The "boomer mom-level consumer" will pay more than $500 over
| year in replacing dried out ink cartridges and possibly
| printers (broken due to ink dry-out). And they're better off
| with a black&white laser printer, with the occasional color
| job done in a print shop.
| davchana wrote:
| Exactly, I (but not a boomer mom level consumer) bought a
| HP Black & White Laser on sale from Walmart with Toner for
| 1000 pages, all for $49. Whenever that toner finishes (I
| bought about in 2019), new toner is again $49. Way cheaper.
|
| Any occasional color print goes to walmart or cvs or
| staples (exactly 2 times I have done that since I bought
| this printer).
| CharlesW wrote:
| > _The thing about laser is it 's not a great answer for your
| typical boomer mom-level consumer._
|
| I'm not sure how someone's age matters, but the elderly
| appreciate "it just works" peripherals just as much as you
| little whipper-snappers. One of the best things we did for my
| mom-in-law was replace her ink-jet printer with a laser
| printer. B&W MFCs start around $200.
| rytill wrote:
| Alternative solutions like what? Your example was not very
| specific.
| kyrra wrote:
| I had a Xerox laser printer for about 12 years, and it worked
| pretty well. No special drivers needed, just uses a standard
| pcl6 or postscript. The problem with it was toner cost.
| Official toner was stupid expensive, but there was decent
| aftermarket toner on Amazon that mostly worked.
|
| I have since gone to a smarter printer with an Epson ecotank.
| Their ink is decent price and it works fairly well. Sadly The
| model I got requires custom drivers. Though they do have models
| that support PCL6/ postscript. The model I got also allows for
| larger paper sizes, but it does not handle it very well in the
| firmware.
| greggman3 wrote:
| Laser printers, at least in my experience, suck for photos. Not
| that people print photos any more but if you're using your
| printer for any kind of small framed photos or crafts than a
| laser printer really isn't a solution
| ruined wrote:
| anything you can do at home sucks for photos. drugstore
| prints too. you can't expect inkjet pigments to last very
| long.
|
| if you want a decent photo print that won't deteriorate,
| projection onto real silver or archival color process is the
| way to go.
| okl wrote:
| But honestly, even consumer inkjet printouts suck, compared
| to photos printed on a professional machine.
| jiggawatts wrote:
| I have a "consumer" Canon Pixma printer that has 12
| different ink cartridges. The quality is absurdly good, and
| commercial printing has only recently caught up.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| I send photos to Costco for printing. Cheap and easy.
| shagie wrote:
| > Laser printers, at least in my experience, suck for photos.
|
| They do... Though if your use case is _only_ photos, look at
| a completely different technology.
|
| For a number of years, for printing photos I used an Olympus
| dyesub printer - it was a P-400. It prints an 8x10 (and you
| had best use the 8x10... or make 4x 4x5s). The problem was
| that it cost about $3/page to do that print.
|
| I'm not sure about the current lineups and price points.
| Looking around, there's a Kodak one for $130 for the printer
| that appears to be at $0.50/4x6.
|
| Now days, for printing photos - for those that I want
| printed, I go to smugmug or similar.
|
| When you get down to it, I haven't been pleased by the photo
| printing quality of any of the other technologies.
| axiolite wrote:
| I bought the cheapest (Samsung) personal color laser printer
| I could find, and I would have to say it is, at worst,
| mediocre for photos. They come out a bit darker than one
| would like, and some of the colors can sometimes be shifted
| to a slightly different tint. Very bright/vivid photos
| generally come out looking great on plain paper... better
| than inkjet as they don't saturate the paper.
|
| You should look around for current reviews on the quality of
| photo printing on color lasers, as I'm sure you'll find
| reasonably priced models which do a very good job.
| zeusk wrote:
| What Apple alternatives have you been using?
| tannhaeuser wrote:
| Seconding that. If you mean Apple's scanning of photos for CP
| when they're not required to by law, that _is_ absurdly anti-
| customer for sure. But using any Google /Android device other
| than Lineage, eSolutions, etc is way, _way_ worse. Just so we
| 're on the same page, on Monday or so we were discussing
| Samsung's keyboard app selling your keyboard presses to third
| parties, and Samsung is even considered premium.
| reayn wrote:
| Would help if you could be more specific here but aside from
| hardware (macbook/iPhone) there's alternatives (not just
| competitive but also plain better ones) to just about every
| service Apple provides.
| sangnoir wrote:
| > As many techies will probably always say anytime inkjet
| product shenanigans come up: just buy a laser printer
|
| It's Canon/HP/$MANUFATURER shenanigans - nothing inherent to
| inkjets. I think the better solution is to buy from more
| ethical printer companies, like Brother.
| acjohnson55 wrote:
| The inherent problem with inkjets is the ink drying out over
| time, requiring replacement even if you only use it
| occasionally.
| rdtwo wrote:
| This or the printer constantly dumps ink to prevent this
| problem. Both are not ideal
| mianos wrote:
| Like Epsom printers that come with just enough ink to
| prime the print head, dump the rest and print two colour
| pages. It is a terrible purchasing experience.
| dspillett wrote:
| _> requiring replacement even if you only use it
| occasionally_
|
| I'd say especially if you only use occasionally, given how
| many times I sometimes had to run the head-clean on the
| last inkjet I used, every time it was left alone for a
| couple of weeks.
|
| At the time I ran a B&W laser for bulk (and letters & other
| documents that needed to be crisp) and the inkjet for
| occasional photos and other colour work. I now just have a
| colour laser and on the rare occasion I need better photo
| quality I get a print done commercially.
|
| Be careful on your selection of laser printer though, some
| are far more expensive than others wrt consumables, and/or
| far less reliable, especially as the not-silly-expensive-
| for-home-use end of the market.
| derfj wrote:
| Personal story about a sister-in-law that worked for Brother
| for 5+ years, all her stories made it seem like a employee
| focused and ethical company.
|
| She got really sick really fast, Brother fired her as
| suddenly the "position no longe existed", cancelled her
| health insurance, and - speaking with their lawyers - they
| knew that she might very well not live to see the end of a
| civil case trying to reinstate her position/insurance. She
| did not get to see a day in court, had to fight to get subpar
| health care for the short duration of the rest of her life.
|
| Just one story, and I'm sure there are many cases where they
| treated their sick employees better, and there are always two
| sides of every story, "would have increased the total cost of
| everyone's insurance" etc... that said no Brother product
| will enter my abode again.
|
| I almost never comment on anything, but seeing ethical and
| Brother in the same sentence just got me. Apparently that
| story is still raw after 4 years.
| sangnoir wrote:
| I'm sorry your sister went through this, and that I
| unintentionally picked at your emotional scab. My PoV is
| that of a customer, and Brother is relatively less
| customer-hostile.
| _Understated_ wrote:
| I've always bought HP business laser printers.
|
| They've always worked for me.
|
| I also don't let it connect to the internet as it has a fixed
| IP and no gateway.
|
| Also none of this cartridge subscription business and I've
| always been able to buy the cheap unbranded cartridges on
| Amazon or Ebay for a fraction of the HP ones that must be made
| from solid Platinum or something...
| sildur wrote:
| Don't forget that almost all printers region-lock their
| cartridges/toners:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regional_lockout#Printers
| dn3500 wrote:
| Re: Printer drivers, you mostly don't need them any more,
| because almost all printers will now ingest pdf directly. You
| can bypass cups and your driver and talk directly to the
| printer using nc:
|
| cat myfile.pdf |nc printername 9100
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| Most of the budget printers won't support that, they don't
| have enough processing power to render PDF directly. Even
| with the typical enterprise printer it's not as reliable as
| you might expect.
| axiolite wrote:
| I previously explained why this is a terrible idea:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28058184
| amelius wrote:
| I'm looking for a cheap consumer printer with built-in
| bookbinding function. Does anyone have any good experiences to
| share?
| jonnycomputer wrote:
| I'm increasingly getting irritated by the feeling that I don't
| actually own or control the hardware I purchase.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| It's not just a feeling. You really don't own or control the
| hardware. It's controlled by the proprietary firmware running
| in the computer embedded in it. This firmware controlled by the
| corporation. It will prevent you from doing anything that harms
| their business interests.
| jacquesm wrote:
| You're late to that particular party. This has been a trend
| that started somewhere in the mid-90's and it's getting worse
| every day.
|
| Every manufacturer the world over is right now wondering how
| they can turn their one-time sales into a recurring revenue
| stream.
|
| Case in point: the Bosch e-bikes now offer a 'Bosch account' to
| supposedly access premium features on the bikes which in a sane
| world would be included in the purchase price and which really
| do not require an online account or service to begin with.
| JustAnonymous wrote:
| This is actually about software more than hardware. Richard
| Stallman's spark for founding the free software movement was
| being unable to modify his lab printer's source code to do what
| he wanted it to do.
|
| A lot of us have been conditioned to think you "just can't"
| modify things like firmware, or OSes, (or increasingly in
| phones/tablets, user-space). But for Stallman's generation,
| hardware devices were 100% owned, repairable and hackable by
| their owners. Only software and the abuse of it could so
| comprehensively change a hardware device from something you
| obviously own, to something which in a real sense you don't
| control or even realistically own anymore. Apple is leading the
| charge in this as other companies itch to pile in.
| amelius wrote:
| That's why I buy hardware that starts with "i" in its name.
| That way, I know that "I" am the owner and "I" am in complete
| control.
| sahkopoyta wrote:
| have you tried fixing your i-devices? I would not call it
| complete control if seemingly unrelated parts stop working
| after replacing some part yourself
| jonnycomputer wrote:
| So this morning I noticed that the LEDs were on on the
| computer I built even after I shut it down. That's how it
| works by default, but I didn't like it, so changed the
| setting in the BIOS. I have to think that something reset
| back to the defaults, and I'm guessing Windows 10? I built it
| so I know it, but I guess I still don't own it. And don't get
| me started on how Windows 10 never goes to sleep like it
| should.
|
| Maybe I'm curmudgeonly, but I'm tired of things I choose
| being changed on me, things I own be used to profit on me,
| things I use to spy on me. And its not just software and
| hardware. For example, I bank at X, but they've merged with
| another bank and are becoming Y. So now different website,
| different checks, different name, etc. and for what? for a
| line on some CEOs resume. Similar when I make a loan and the
| loan is sold to someone else, and my payment processing
| routine has to change to accommodate someone else's profit-
| making deal.
| sdflhasjd wrote:
| I don't think I've seen Windows touch any BIOS settings
| with the exception of the boot order (which it only does
| during install).
|
| It's more likely the CMOS battery is duff or some other
| issue
| JasonFruit wrote:
| Well, if you built it, it was _you_ who put Windows 10 on
| it. I 'm not convinced this is an example of you not owning
| the hardware so much as not realizing that the software was
| going to turn on you.
| rado wrote:
| Hello Epson
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| Do Canon printers in the EU have this problem? I would think
| customers would be able to return them as defective.
| laurent92 wrote:
| At one point, Canon was the good pupil of printers-scanners,
| worked for 12 years, cheap at purchase, ink expensive like
| everywhere else, driver for CUPS (Linux) and not much call-home
| in Mac drivers.
|
| I'm sad if Canon reverted its game for anti-buyer shenanigans.
| gigatexal wrote:
| Can't think of a more anti-customer move on Canon's part.
| netcan wrote:
| Something very dystopian about these kinds of stories. Wringing
| the market like a wet mop. A limping business model for a piece
| of home equipment built on low quality, adware and gimmicky
| nonsense. .. winning the race to the bottom.
|
| Ultimately, there's always a market for value but there's also
| always a market for the cheapest possible thing.
|
| Is it possible to have a company today premised on the idea of
| making a decent, cheap printer?
| shoulderfake wrote:
| Printers are a terrible business period. But this kind of
| underhanded scumbaggery needs to be punished
| alerighi wrote:
| I stopped buying inkjet printers. They are a scam, the ink costs
| a fortune and they are built as cheap as they can, meaning that
| they will break and you have to throw them away because they are
| impossible to repair, they are slow and when you need them they
| don't work because they were not used for too much time.
|
| After having 5 broken printers in the garage I said enough, that
| is a useless waste, and invested some money in a mid range laser
| printer (only b/w, but I don't need to print in color anyway)
| that doesn't give me any problem, and with a toner that costs 10$
| on Amazon (not original, but who cares?) I print 2000 pages. That
| means that in 5 years that I own it I only changed it 2 times.
|
| I really don't see a reason for inkjet printers to exist, I hope
| they will disappear from the market.
| dghughes wrote:
| And even inkjet vs laser doesn't matter since many companies
| may do like HP and require you sign into an HP account just to
| print.
| bluGill wrote:
| Return it then. Notice that every other thread is saying just
| buy a brother?
| mleo wrote:
| I have been fairly lucky, I guess, with Canon printers.
|
| I purchased a large format printer in 2007 to print tabloid
| size photos. And then I purchased another in 2015 with a
| scanner. I believe the large format one still worked, but it
| was large (obviously) and I had less need for it or space for
| it with kids around.
|
| The current one is almost 7 years old. I keep looking at laser
| printers, but until this one actually dies, there is no point
| to replace it and I would lose the option to print photos.
| Natsu wrote:
| The last time I bought one, a new printer _and ink_ cost less
| than just refilling ink. That was a very long time ago.
|
| I print infrequently, but need to have color prints available
| at any time for family, so I got a color laser printer
| something like 15 years ago. It has wireless so it's on our
| wifi and I've never had any issues with it, nor have I even run
| out of the original toner.
|
| It was definitely worth it, I never want an inkjet again.
| orev wrote:
| At the low number of pages printed at home, I don't mind buying
| the actual name-brand toner. If you're only changing it every 2
| years, the cost doesn't matter much, and at least the company
| (i.e. Brother) gets some profit from being a good citizen.
| Going with non-OEM toner in that situation just drives the
| company into needing to find more revenue streams, such as
| locking down the cartridges, which undermines you. At some
| point people need to be willing to pay a little more to a
| company that treats them with respect.
| discreditable wrote:
| I switched to OEM toner after using up some generic stuff I'd
| been working on for two years. It's barely more expensive and
| it was nice they included a prepaid shipping label for me to
| return the used cartridge to them.
| tsimionescu wrote:
| How about they make their money by selling a good printer? I
| don't have to buy has from my car company if I want a good
| car.
| sagarm wrote:
| I'm using a 10 year old Brother with the starter toner.
| Still going strong, but I haven't given Brother a cent
| since I bought it for $100. Can they survive off that?
| Hopefully.
| noasaservice wrote:
| One purchase does not give a company the rights for all
| future purchases. If their business model assumes that,
| their business model is faulty.
| vlovich123 wrote:
| Would you rate the typical car buying experience as one
| that's fair where the customer generally isn't taken
| advantage of?
| throwaway09223 wrote:
| In terms of vendor lock-in on the fuel supply? Yes
| absolutely.
| kube-system wrote:
| It's has historically proven difficult to sustain that
| model because the consumer printer market for the past 20
| years has been race to the bottom. It's hard to compete
| when competitors are selling their printers at or below
| cost.
|
| Consumers mostly tend to make their purchase decisions on
| the margin, and so the razors-and-blades model works well.
|
| I guess there may be a few recent exceptions to this like
| the Epson Ecotank, although I don't know how profitable
| that has been for them.
| kaladin-jasnah wrote:
| Well, the EcoTanks are pretty expensive to begin with.
| They also have some colour quality issues that requires
| you to waste ink to like... recalibrate every so often,
| or something thing like that?
|
| But most of the time, it's fine, and the ink is cheap.
| kube-system wrote:
| All of the inkjets on the shelf would have similar prices
| to the EcoTanks if they weren't sold at or below cost and
| subsidized by their cartridges.
|
| It costs HP/Canon _at least_ (if not more than) $49 to
| build a $49 inkjet all-in-one.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Brother has been selling solid printers and software for
| as long as I have used them, which is 15+ years.
| kube-system wrote:
| I agree, and I have a couple of them myself.
|
| But they're not the ones cranking out the $20-$50 inkjets
| that litter the shelves at Walmart/Best Buy
| ikerdanzel wrote:
| Rare companies doing that these days. At least Brother and
| Epson seems to be decent. Canon and HP really need to
| reconsider their tactics otherwise it will damage their
| brands for decades to come like that famous computer brand
| that outsource support to India which affected the sales and
| then pull out from public listing to private.
| maxerickson wrote:
| I put a piece of black tape over the window on my Brother
| starter toner like 4 years ago. Print quality is still good
| enough for anything I print at home (which is obviously very
| little).
| spicybright wrote:
| What does this do?
| maxerickson wrote:
| There's a sensor that checks the toner level. The tape
| tricks it into thinking the level passes instead of not
| passing.
|
| I don't remember if it just stops the printer from
| complaining about the level, or if it refuses to print
| with a low level.
| zdragnar wrote:
| Hides the fill level from the optical sensor. They can be
| rather pessimistic about the quality of print that you'll
| get at lower levels.
| rdiddly wrote:
| Yeah I badly want revenge on the whole industry, or at least a
| way of banishing them from my life forever, but the local
| maximum I've attained thus far is to buy bottles of ink, drill
| small holes in the top of the cartridges, inject ink and cover
| the holes. The printer still complains of low ink (i.e. it's
| lying and probably always was), but you can suppress the
| warning. So it costs me one sheet of paper to find out the
| truth about my ink levels, and I haven't bought a cartridge in
| years. I have two color & two black, so I can swap a full one
| in and refill the empty one at my convenience.
| js2 wrote:
| I had a contrary experience and I stopped buying laser
| printers. I had to toss two Brother lasers in the trash because
| Brother's customer service on warranty repairs required more
| hoops than I was willing to deal with.
|
| Meanwhile, I ended up with an HP OfficeJet Pro 8620 that was
| recommended years ago by The Wirecutter and I use HP's ink
| subscription service. It's never failed on me. It never jams.
| No fuser or toner to worry about. Ink just magically shows up
| at my house when I need it. The old cartridges go back to HP
| for recycling. It is the most reliable printer I have ever
| owned, and I've owned dozens of printers since the early 1980s
| of almost every technology. I love it. It is one of the few
| devices in my home that I can say it Just Works. I will be sad
| if it ever dies and I can't fix it.
|
| Edit: I purchased the HP for $150 in May 2016 on closeout from
| Office Depot. I've been on the $5/mo or $10/mo plan since then
| depending upon family needs, so let's say I've spent another
| $500 since then on ink costs, so I'm at ~ $650 since May 2016.
| I've printed 16,083 pages, so my lifetime per-page cost is ~
| $0.04.
|
| Maybe my mistake was going with a cheap color laser. But I've
| been thrilled with this particular HP and the convenience of
| their ink subscription program. Meanwhile, Brother's customer
| service on the laser printers which failed under warranty was
| terrible. It was the Brother HL-3170CDW. This isn't my review,
| but it matched my experience, except I mistakenly bought a
| second printer so I could re-use supplies I already had for the
| model:
|
| https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R32TEW142QU2G6/re...
|
| Edit: reworded for tone. Thank you for the feedback below.
| vlovich123 wrote:
| You probably print a lot if an ink cartridge service is cost
| effective for you.
|
| I've had 2 b&w laser printers my entire life, both Brother
| (after getting annoyed with Epson inkjet printers that were
| "affordable" in high school). The first got me through
| engineering school printing maybe 300+ pages a year, so like
| 2000 pages. Did not replace the toner once and don't recall
| any meaningful problems. That printer stayed with my mom and
| works to this day for her odds and ends (maybe has had one
| toner replacement). The second is a printer I bought after I
| moved to California when I ended up needing a printer (went
| without for a while). It has also lasted a very long time
| without issues although maybe the toner hasn't lasted quite
| as long (but I've done things like print out game manuals).
| It sucks that Google cloud print went away but that's not
| Brother's fault. The wifi connectivity is serviceable
| although a PITA to set up after a move. Other than that,
| works flawlessly. No drivers, no maintenance, nothing. Just
| print, wait ~10s and the printer starts printing at a quick
| pace.
|
| My point is we all have our stories about the printers that
| work or don't for us. Objectively though laser printers have
| lower maintenance on all fronts and used to have a higher
| upfront cost (although these days, they seem competitive).
| I'm not sure why you got a couple of lemons. I don't claim
| the entire Brother product line is gems either. But I do my
| research and look for a no-frills standalone H&M's laser
| printer that seems particularly beloved by the community.
| Some times you might need to look for it second hand if it's
| not being sold right now or look for it's spiritual
| successor. Hasn't failed me yet but I also don't buy and use
| enough printers at volume to have a complete comparative
| picture.
| throwanem wrote:
| > You probably print a lot if an ink cartridge service is
| cost effective for you.
|
| HP's service bills by page count, not by ink usage. So as
| you increase print volume, the unit economics get _worse_.
| I use it for photo print applications that don 't require
| high quality or a print size greater than US letter. For
| that, which maximizes the ink-to-paper ratio, it works out
| splendidly.
|
| (I suspect it works out as well for HP as for me, because
| the program also requires spent cartridges be returned in
| prepaid packaging. This allows them, and their expensively
| precision-manufactured print heads, to be refilled and
| reused.)
| megous wrote:
| What I noticed when you buy the printer is that for cheap
| laser printers, included tonner sometimes has just 1000
| pages rating or so, and replacement tonners are rated for
| 2000 or more. Manufacturer is probably hoping people will
| not notice.
| js2 wrote:
| > You probably print a lot if an ink cartridge service is
| cost effective for you.
|
| I did the math and showed my work. $0.04/page over the last
| 5 years.
| goboronshka wrote:
| No it's just downvotes because you were mocking someone
| alerighi wrote:
| For the amount I print, I will never have to replace the
| fuser in a lifetime probably. The toner I can get it cheap
| enough on Amazon, and I don't care if isn't original because
| it works just fine. I chose on purpose a printer that allows
| you to install third party toner without complaining.
|
| I 5 years that I want to a laser printer I spent 100$ for the
| printer itself, and 20$ for 2 toner from Amazon, and I'm on
| the second one and it's still half full.
| stickfigure wrote:
| It's your tone.
| js2 wrote:
| Apparently not.
| [deleted]
| vlovich123 wrote:
| Since you've updated your comment, I think the key difference
| is that most people try to stick to B&W laser printers as
| those seem to be rock solid. Rather than going for new
| printers or printers that have an insane sale like a $450 for
| $150, look for reviews from forums for people who have been
| using the printer model for years (or join and ask on such
| forums if you can't find anything). It sounds like the
| printer you happened to pick had a known design/manufacturing
| flaw and whose service life wasn't up to snuff, which
| probably explains the huge discount. Remember. Laser printers
| make money on the printer, not the toner so much. That means
| if a printer is getting a huge discount, it probably has some
| kind of problem.
| int_19h wrote:
| Color laser printers are also pretty solid these days
| without paying through the roof. It sounds more like OP
| just got unlucky with two lemons in a row.
| dreamcompiler wrote:
| Inkjet printers can do a fantastic job of printing photos and
| color documents, and maybe four times a year I would really
| like to do that at home. Unfortunately nobody seems to have
| built an inkjet printer with nozzles that don't gunk up, and
| cleaning the nozzles doesn't work very well and uses more ink
| and time than the document you wanted to print in the first
| place.
|
| It's probably possible to design an inkjet printer that
| actually works as well in the real world as a laser printer,
| but it would threaten the business model of all the printer
| manufacturers so I'm not holding my breath.
| FireBeyond wrote:
| Canon's imagePrograf series don't gunk up, but they will use
| a lot of ink cleaning. It's also their most expensive model
| of inkjet (my Pro 1000 will print 17" wide, but is $1,300).
| dylan604 wrote:
| If your only color print needs are for photos, look into dye
| sub printers. You can go years in between printing, and use
| the same roll with no issues. These are pretty much what you
| get when you order from any brick&mortar store printing from
| digital files or any modern photobooth kiosk
| dreamcompiler wrote:
| Yes dye subs do a great job and they don't gunk up. But
| unfortunately as you said they are _only_ for photos, they
| require special paper, and they only print in smaller sizes
| (i.e. you cannot use one to print a color page of a
| business report). Their supply costs are high too but that
| 's not a big deal if you use them rarely.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Why did you feel the need to explain this when as you've
| said I've already stated for photos? Nobody made a reco
| to use for doing a report.
|
| Not sure if you are aware, but you can get 8x10 prints
| from a dye sub. For the dye sub market, their prices have
| definitely gotten much cheaper relative to themselves.
| They are more expensive that shitting $99 ink jet, but
| that's the point of this thread.
| toast0 wrote:
| Inkjets work ok and get a lot less gunky if you use them
| frequently. The problem that I have (and I assume you do
| too), is if I'm printing a couple of times a year, it's hard
| to spend two or three times the amount on a laser printer
| than a cheak inkjet. Even though the laser printer is the
| right answer. I did end up getting a laser printer last year
| when my child was printing a lot from chromebooks and Chrome
| OS stopped supporting cloud print, but also didn't support my
| inkjet (via network or usb). Shopping at CDW Outlet helped a
| bunch with pricing, but you have to be in the shopping phase
| when the right inventory is there.
| skjoldr wrote:
| It is rather easy to keep an inkjet printer from gunking up
| if you buy a set of refillable cartridges, fill them with a
| 50/50 mix of demineralized water and inkjet cleaning fluid,
| install them and run a cleaning cycle after you finished a
| printing session. No ink in the nozzle means no gunk. This
| trick also works well for cleaning nozzles, since the
| cleaning fluid is a surfactant and it breaks up clumps of
| dried pigment better than just a stream of ink.
| andrew_ wrote:
| I've got a 20 year old Xerox Laser that's rock solid. Picked it
| up second hand. I print so little that I'm still on the first
| toner cartridge I bought. The scanner works well and gets lots
| of use (only downside is that it doesn't work over the network
| on Mac, which I can live with)
| bigboy12 wrote:
| 100%. I've had 4 Epson printers. All junk.
| officehero wrote:
| > and with a toner that costs 10$ on Amazon
|
| If you haven't tried replacing toner without replacing
| cartridge (the only way to achieve this level of cost
| efficiency), there may be some intermediate steps that are good
| to know about:
|
| https://youtu.be/HaGQlP23Fqc
| cletus wrote:
| Since I've seen this many times before, I would be willing to
| pet you were buying "cheap" inkjet printers. By "cheap" I mean
| they take ink cartridges.
|
| Never ever ever buy a cartridge inkjet printer.
|
| instead buy a tank printer (eg Epson Eco-Tank). They are more
| expensive. You fill up the ink from a bottle.
|
| Cartridge printers are sold at a loss and designed to make a
| profit from the cartridges. This is why printer manufacturers
| are constantly fighting third-party cartridges with unnecessary
| firmware "upgrades". Additionally, the printer will use some of
| that ink to clean the printer heads so the printer will run out
| of ink even if you don't print anything.
|
| Also, retail printers are typically sold with less-than-full
| ink cartridges.
|
| It's a good example of how consumers buy based on price rather
| than value. But don't confuse cartridge vs tank inkjet
| printers. They're completely different beasts.
| colanderman wrote:
| Careful with off-brand toner. The toner particles are often
| jagged rather than smooth, which can damage the fuser roller,
| requiring replacement. This happened to me after a few years of
| using off-brand toner. I was able to perform the repair myself,
| and granted the cost wasn't as much as buying on-brand toner,
| but it was challenging (lots of delicate parts) and I don't
| wish to repeat the experience.
| EvanAnderson wrote:
| The bigger problem I've seen w/ off-brand toner are refilled
| cartridges that are poorly plugged and end up leaking toner
| all over the inside of the printer. Toner is a nightmare to
| clean up, and once you get toner deep into the nooks and
| crannies of a printer you'll never get clean paper output
| again.
| helij wrote:
| I disagree. A few years ago I bought Epson XP-6000 after a few
| years of laser printers. It's the best printer I ever had. Ink
| is ok in price but I don't use the printer much. It works
| whenever I need it though. On top of it, it's also a great
| photo printer. Printed tens of photos to date and all come out
| ok - comparable to consumer shop photo printers (the ones you
| can use in big shops).
| skjoldr wrote:
| I've got two A3 inkjets, an older Epson Stylus Photo 1410 with
| 3rd party ink tanks installed and externalized waste ink
| container mod, and a newer Epson L1800 with built-in ink tanks,
| at my workplace. Both are 6 color photo printers. I've kept
| them running for years with few problems. Long-term maintenance
| consists in keeping the nozzle clear of dried pigment,
| chaniging the rubber paper feed roller every couple of years,
| and keeping an eye on the ink levels in the tanks and the waste
| ink container. The 1410 had printed over 110,000 pages by now
| and is stil going strong. Printing with 3rd party inks is
| incredibly cheap, I use Korean Ink-mate ink with these two and
| it costs a fraction of a cent per page.
|
| Now, it is true that inkjets are fussy and you need to keep
| printing with them to keep them operational, but I managed to
| clean out a very dry nozzle twice with nothing more than a pack
| of lint-free paper, some specialized cleaning fluids, a pack of
| syringes, and a thin rubber tube, simply using guides found on
| the Internet. And I haven't had any mechanical failures yet
| that weren't caused by the paper feed roller being worn out
| (which is expected) despite both printers being used daily for
| years.
|
| Maybe I'm just lucky, or maybe Epson did really good with these
| two models in particular, I don't know.
| jSherz wrote:
| Any tips on choosing an ink supplier? It seems to be a bit of
| a crap shoot.
| skjoldr wrote:
| I was recommended this ink by local printer servicemen. It
| turns out they really don't like working on broken inkjets
| (it's really messy and it's not guaranteed that a dirty
| nozzle will work even after ultrasonic cleaning), so they
| tend to give sound advice on how best to keep them running,
| including ink choice. It really depends on the printer
| manufacturer and model so YMMV.
| quijoteuniv wrote:
| Exact same situation. Avoid inkjet. Laser b/w if you need photo
| quality send to print
| jonplackett wrote:
| The simple reply is 'I need colour and I don't have space for a
| gigantic colour laser jet printer in my room'
|
| I'd love a master jet but it's just not in any way affordable /
| practical.
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| I think that not buying printers is the correct answer,
| difficult to get everyone to do it, but it is the metric most
| likely to change behavior.
|
| Inkjet technology is fine, it was the exploitation of it by HP
| which lead to copy cats that really made it ridiculous.
|
| I've got an HP inkjet wide format plotter (36" wide) that was
| built both before HP was all in on ink as a profit center and
| built by a different division (plotter division). It has been a
| reliable workhorse for over 20 years now and while I don't use
| HP ink any more (they don't sell it) third party ink works
| fine.
|
| I replaced my desktop printer with an Epson Eco-tank printer.
| They claim it comes with 2 years of ink (at my rate that is
| probably 4 years :-) and they the ink is not expensive. So
| there are people trying this model of "let's not bother
| screwing people on ink" and I'm trying to reward them by buying
| their printer.
| quercusa wrote:
| I don't think I've ever seen an inkjet plotter in action.
| Does the paper go through a single pass? I was always
| fascinated by pen plotters, especially when drawing diagonal
| lines or changing pens.
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| Yes it is single pass, this particular model is an HP750C+.
| I had a wide format pen plotter before it and it would send
| the paper back and forth which was pretty mesmerizing but
| it required a lot of maintenance on the paper handling
| system so that the paper wouldn't slip.
|
| The HP inkjet "plotter" works by rasterizing the plot in
| the host computer's memory and then sending strips of
| raster to the plotter. The dot resolution of the print head
| (replaceable, but not part of the ink system) matches the
| 0.7mm resolution of the pen plotters it replaced.
| bondarchuk wrote:
| It's called a plotter but it's really just a large inkjet
| printer these days.
| dvdkhlng wrote:
| Can second the praise for the Epson Eco-Tank printers. Ink is
| cheap and lasts extremely long. Also I never had any problem
| with clogged nozzles etc which I used to face frequently on
| the cheaper printers. (though my Eco-Tank printer is black-
| and-white only which maybe alleviates many of those
| problems).
|
| Also the integrated scanner worked out-of-the box for me
| under Debian, after I compiled and installed utsushi [1] from
| sources (edit: I'm only scanning from the utsushi command-
| line, no experience WRT integration with sane etc.).
|
| [1] https://gitlab.com/utsushi/utsushi
| jolmg wrote:
| > I really don't see a reason for inkjet printers to exist, I
| hope they will disappear from the market.
|
| They're still useful for cheap printed confections. You can use
| them with edible ink and paper. It's quite nice to print photos
| on cakes and stuff.
| okl wrote:
| On some toner cartridges you can even tape a piece of paper
| over the sensor window on the side, that is used to determine
| fill state with an optical sensor, to get another ~500 pages.
|
| Example pictures: https://geekanddad.wordpress.com/2014/03/02/
| saidajigumi wrote:
| Inkjet printers are fine, so long as you don't need or buy the
| terrible low-end consumer offerings. As an occasional-use
| around the house printer, I agree they're absolutely terrible,
| even without the scammy behavior of virtually every
| manufacturer. Just inkjet head clogging alone is enough to put
| anyone off. Inexpensive laser printers have been cheaper, more
| reliable, and much faster for a decade or more. Pay a bit more
| these days and you get a nice color laser printer with duplex
| printing. It's worth noting that even low-end lasers aren't
| immune to scammy behavior. Manufacturers have pulled sleazy
| tricks like hard page counts for the toner cartridges, so that
| even if the cart is still good it won't print. At least in the
| past, there are often embarrassingly easy workarounds (e.g. a
| minute to Google, then another minute with a sharpie).
|
| That said, once you get up into the (semi-)pro photo/art
| printers, they're fantastic _for that application_. i.e. very
| much not an office printer. The ink per ml in the bigger cart
| sizes is often _one or more orders of magnitude_ cheaper. You
| still need to run them enough to keep the heads nice and clean,
| but they also usually have decent auto-cleaning support built
| in to help maintain the print head so long as it 's getting
| used periodically.
| sxt wrote:
| My friend, if you have the time, learn to refill your
| cartridges on your own. I own one of them cheap HP 25XX for
| home use, I simply refuse to buy new cartridges and give in, I
| instead got a refill kit with 100ml bottles of all colours for
| ~9$, and now all I need is 15 min of time for refill and the
| slight risk of creating a mess during the process.
|
| The HP cartridge holds an approx 9ml, so that gives an idea of
| how long those bottles should last(Also colour is 9/3 ml
| colours). Once these are done, I can just go ahead and get just
| a few more bottles which drives the price down further.
|
| I've had no issues in printing apart from the first time I had
| done it. I obviously would recommend getting one of those
| brother Ink tank ones, but there's no need to trash an HP if
| you can figure to do this and keep a backup cheap maintenance
| printer.
|
| Btw, I still use the stock cartridges that came with the
| printer, saving on a ton of cash and pain of hunting for
| cartridges.
|
| P.S: I've tried this on 2 other models too with no issues
| koheripbal wrote:
| 15mins here and there, isn't much, but I still paying
| slightly more for a laser printer and changing the toner
| cartridge once per year. It takes one minute, and I really
| dont mind being limited to black/white.
|
| My brother MFC has lasted over 10 years now - no repairs
| needed. It's so old it only allows WEP wifi connection and my
| kid loves the beeping noises the fax button makes.
| moonchrome wrote:
| Laser scanner combos are huge compared to an inkjet.
| JustAnonymous wrote:
| > I really don't see a reason for inkjet printers to exist, I
| hope they will disappear from the market.
|
| What's preventing the exact same thing happening to laser
| printers? You have to buy toner as well.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| Let's not throw the baby with the bathwater. Injket printers
| have advantages and can be cheap if we dismantle the highway
| robbery of inks. Just because inks are expensive does not mean
| that we should get rid of inkjet technology.
|
| > I really don't see a reason for inkjet printers to exist, I
| hope they will disappear from the market.
|
| Perhaps you should investigate why they exist. Seems too naive
| to wish for their disappearance due to lack of knowledge.
|
| https://www.precisioncolors.com/
|
| I've been using these for years for Photo printing. Can vouch
| for excellent quality and affordable price. You need a color
| calibrator to calibrate these inks + paper.
| thekid314 wrote:
| I'll have to look into them. I've been using
| https://www.octoink.co.uk for my photo printing and they have
| been great.
|
| The sad thing is that there aren't any good review sites.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| I've been using PrecisionInks for 10+ years. It is an old
| school family business and never once disappointed me.
|
| I use this spectrophotometer for calibration: https://www.b
| hphotovideo.com/c/product/1369004-REG/x_rite_eo...
| captn3m0 wrote:
| The highway robbery is what keeps them cheap?
|
| Honest Question: Would inkjets remain cheap if they all
| accepted $STANDARD bottles available everywhere and
| compatible with all printers.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| We solved the similar problem for exchangeable storage
| media in the form of SD-Cards. Before SD Cards, the whole
| thing was fragmented like the printer industry. CF cards,
| minidisks, and proprietary memory sticks. It can be done.
| klodolph wrote:
| The exception is if you print photos. There's not really a good
| alternative to inkjet, except RA-4, which is out of reach for
| consumers.
| orev wrote:
| There really is no reason to be printing photos on your own
| printer (for consumers, though I suspect it's similar for
| pros). Every corner drug store (in the US) can print them
| with better quality and at a lower cost. Maybe it's a slight
| hassle, but how many people are printing a significant
| quantity of photos anymore?
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Don't they keep copies of your photos and/or metadata?
| Can't trust anyone any longer.
| rdtwo wrote:
| It's kind of a pain to go to the drug store at 9pm to Print
| your kids solar system project. Just saying
| spywaregorilla wrote:
| Kid can deal with regular paper
| throwaway09223 wrote:
| Wow, I just use regular paper for school projects lol.
|
| I think the disconnect here may be that most people
| rarely print glossy, so stopping by a store isn't a big
| deal for the vast majority.
|
| If you're really printing glossy on short order demand
| then of course owning the machine might make sense.
| lazide wrote:
| Sounds like something that would be pretty trivial to
| solve by a ever so slight application of advance
| planning?
| factotvm wrote:
| Did you miss the part about kids?
| lazide wrote:
| Have two of them, youngest under 3, and a full time
| single parent. If you don't plan ahead and direct them
| usefully, they'll roll you hard (not out of malice, but
| because they're kids) and everyone has a much tougher
| time.
| mlyle wrote:
| My middle schooler often doesn't have more than a couple
| days between when he has everything necessary to complete
| an assignment, and when it is due. He has other workload,
| too, so there's no guarantee he's working on it that
| night. Getting to the one drugstore with a remaining
| photocenter near me in the evening is a pain. Even with
| notice, it's a pain.
|
| People have legitimate reasons to want their own high
| quality color printers, even if that is its own pain,
| too.
| true_religion wrote:
| Like the advanced planning of buying your own printer so
| you don't have to drive 20 minutes into town to print?
| jeromegv wrote:
| American society in a nutshell. Need to drive 20 min to
| reach civilization so instead you end up buying inkjet
| printers that are likely end up in the trash every year
| due to their low quality production and because the
| corporation is scamming you with overpriced cartridges.
| lazide wrote:
| Yup. Socio-economic and geographic forces are powerful,
| and there is a reason why many things are different in
| the US from denser locales with historically stable and
| established urban centers like Europe or Asia.
|
| Give us another couple thousand years or so.
| kjs3 wrote:
| Sounds like condescension from someone who doesn't have
| kids.
| tshaddox wrote:
| Also true of black and white printing, but of course the
| whole point is that people like the convenience of being
| able to do their printing at home.
| kjs3 wrote:
| "I don't do a thing, therefore no one does or should do
| that thing".
|
| I print photos all the time. My mom doesn't want to look at
| a computer just to see a photo. I don't want to give my
| photos to a third party.
| [deleted]
| sonofhans wrote:
| What you say is not true for professional photographers or
| designers. For one thing, pro-level printers are in fact
| better than what the drug store has, which are optimized
| for speed, economy, and vibrancy -- none of which are major
| concerns for professionals. They want accuracy and quality
| above all else.
|
| For another thing, being able to print proofs in your own
| office is important. Having to run to the drug store to
| check color output is an awful pain.
|
| Lastly, professional photo printers are often larger than
| what a drug store has, or at least higher quality at that
| large size.
| MPSimmons wrote:
| The kind of crap that HP is pulling here is not a concern
| for pro-level printers.
| lazide wrote:
| Pretty clearly the poster was referring to the consumer
| grade ones which 99% of folks are going to buy no?
| amelius wrote:
| The problem is printing photos that you want to keep
| private.
| lazide wrote:
| If you print many of those, there are pro grade inkjets
| that are dramatically less scammy, or color laser
| printers that aren't bad either.
| klodolph wrote:
| Color laser printers don't have acceptable quality for
| photos, IMO. I used to work as a tech in a lab with tons
| of these printers and, unless laser printing technology
| has changed a lot, it just doesn't cut it for photos.
|
| I mean, you can see the photos, and they're clear enough,
| it's just nowhere near the quality that you can get for
| the same price.
| klodolph wrote:
| This is completely untrue.
|
| I've done extensive price comparisons based the cost of
| paper and ink. For different brands and models of printer,
| I've done comparisons of the number of pictures you have to
| print to break even, compared to the cost of taking it to a
| shop and having them print it for you. I included discount
| online printers as well.
|
| These comparisons include the cost of paying for all
| consumables--usually ink, but some printer models have
| additional consumables which you have to include. These
| comparisons also factor in the difference between the
| included inks and the ink refills (some printers ship with
| ink cartridges that are less full than the refills).
|
| It is not hard to come out ahead, doing your own prints.
| When I was doing this comparison, it was only economical to
| go to the store if you were sporadically printing the
| smallest picture sizes. For a medium picture size like
| 8"x10", you could be using high-quality paper and inks at
| home and still spend less money than bargain online print
| services.
|
| As a rough estimate, printing yourself with high-quality
| inks and papers can come out to around $0.02 per square
| inch, or $1.60 for an 8"x10" photo. Right now, an 8x10 is
| $3.56 on Shutterfly, or $2.99 on Snapfish. That's a pretty
| stark difference.
|
| So you save about $1.40 per photo, and you can use this to
| calculate how long it takes to amortize the cost of the
| printer hardware. For a $250 printer, like a reasonable
| low-end Epson or Canon photo printer, that's just 180
| prints.
|
| YMMV. I expect most people don't print photos at all these
| days, and only put photos on their phone. I personally
| don't see the point in printing out 3.5"x5" photos if I own
| a tablet or phone with a screen that large. So, my
| expectation is that people who print photos are making
| albums of family photos, or perhaps they're amateur
| photographers or digital artists. Someone with a passing
| interest in photography or making photo albums, who prints,
| can easily blow through 180 prints to break even on a
| printer purchase. If you just have a few picture frames
| around the house you want to fill, obviously just go to a
| shop.
|
| When I purchased my printer, I was comparing against more
| expensive local photo labs, rather than the cheapest online
| services. I was also comparing 11"x14" prints, which
| typically cost around $10 each, versus $3 at home. The
| purchase of a $700 printer is amortized after only 100 such
| prints, in this scenario.
| coldtea wrote:
| If you print photos, go to a print service.
|
| How often do you print photos that you can't?
| bombcar wrote:
| Every Walmart can print photos in a hour for cheap, and if
| that's not an option Shutterfly and friends are always doing
| sales (or free with shipping prints).
| klodolph wrote:
| If you're doing more printing, you'll come out ahead buying
| inkjets + ink + paper (factoring cost of all the
| consumables, here). Except for the smallest sizes (like
| 3.5"x5") which can be churned out by Noritsu machines at
| high speed--it's hard to beat the price of 3.5"x5" lab
| prints.
| EvanAnderson wrote:
| There some thermal dye sublimation printers targeted at the
| home market for making 4x6" prints. The cost-per-print is
| pretty hideous compared to a local store's photo dept. or
| online photo printing services, but the quality is pretty
| good and the units seem to get good reviews. I've seen them
| used for print-on-demand at events (think "photo booths",
| etc).
| tdeck wrote:
| How about dye sublimation?
| klodolph wrote:
| Dye sub at home is more expensive, per photo, than going to
| the lab.
|
| You might get refill for 100 photos for like $40, maybe a
| bit less. Then you pay for the paper. Limited size options.
| Looks great, though. Drugstore prices are around $0.25 and
| local labs are around $0.40, which are more economical
| options.
|
| I've only ever used dye sub for photos that needed
| immediate turnaround.
| alerighi wrote:
| If you need to print photos is cheaper to get them printed by
| a photograph shop or if you need a lot of them even order
| from a service that prints them and sends it to you. Not only
| it's cheaper, but it's a far better quality than the shitty
| quality of consumer inkjet printers.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Also an exception: printing transparencies for screen-
| printing masks. Laser-toner does not get the opaque blacks
| you get with ink.
| evgen wrote:
| If you print photos yourself then you are doing it wrong.
| Send them to a service that actually has a photo printer that
| is not a piece of shit and you will find your prints actually
| lasting longer than the ink cartridge you used to print them
| with.
| jader201 wrote:
| I got my first printer in high school, around 90-91. It was an
| HP laserjet printer, when they were first going mainstream. I
| loved it, it always printed well, and the toner seemed to last
| forever. Of course, it was B/W, but that was all I needed.
|
| Fast forward to today, I have never owned an inkjet printer.
| Over the past 30 years I've owned a total of 3 laser printers.
| The second was in 2005, because I wanted a scanner. The third
| in 2014, because I wanted network. So each one has lasted
| around 10 years each, and not because they broke, but because I
| wanted new features.
|
| I have forever told anyone asking my advice on printers to
| avoid inkjets. When they do, they have problems with the ink,
| either drying out or having to replace them all the time.
|
| I agree, inkjets should've died a long time ago. The only
| reason to buy one in the past was if you were on a tight budget
| and _had_ to have color. But nowadays, color lasers are
| dropping, or it's super easy to send something off to X to
| print it for you.
| EvanAnderson wrote:
| Fed a diet of the necessary consumables-- toners/drums,
| fusers, rollers, separation pads, etc-- a 1990s LaserJet will
| outlive us all. For me, "peak LaserJet" was probably the
| LaserJet 4 w/ an integral JetDirect. The 4000 that followed
| was pretty solid and faster but more plastic-ey than the 4.
| willis936 wrote:
| A fun thought, but my HP LaserJet 4050N from ~1998 crapped
| out after ~16 years.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Ah, just out of warranty... too bad, really! But do not
| despair, you could probably fix it if you set your mind
| to it, or make one working one out of two broken ones,
| assuming you can find another broken one.
| willis936 wrote:
| This was years ago. I went without for a while but
| recently decided my demand for color printing and
| scanning in my home exceeded my supply of cash needed to
| get a crappy injket. Even used color laserjets are hard
| to come by for mortal prices.
| hedora wrote:
| How cheap are you insisting on? Single function networked
| color laser printers are in the mid $200's, new.
|
| If you add a page fed scanner, you're looking at
| $400-500.
|
| Surely, you'll waste $100's on dried out inkjet ink and
| buying a new inkjet printer / scanner combo every 2-5
| years.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| Cheap laser printers, like cheap inkjets, use the cheap
| razor/expensive blades model, too (and leverage the
| popular understanding of the semi-knowledgeable that that
| is an inkjet but not laser issue to get away with it.)
| pnutjam wrote:
| watch craigslist and such. I got a brother 4040C N for
| $20 with full toner.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Keep an eye on bankruptcy auctions, those tend to have
| lots of good hardware which gets sold at very low prices.
| The more obscure the auction house the bigger the chance
| that you will score cheaply.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Agreed on the 4, those things were indestructible. I had
| two in the office in IJmuiden, ended up donating one when
| our main HQ moved to Canada. Both the donated one and the
| one that I still have are still running today. Toner
| cartridges are still available, both the originals (a bit
| pricey) and lots of aftermarket options for about half the
| price of the branded one.
|
| I fully expect the one I have to outlast me, the other is
| in a more hostile environment and might not, but it too
| seems to be doing just fine, print quality is still
| excellent.
| shawn-butler wrote:
| I have a 4L but the paper feed has weird jam issues over
| time.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Check the alignment of the paper feed sprockets, likely
| there is some remnant of an old sheet of paper in there
| or a bunch of lint. You _do_ need to maintain such a
| device over the longer period, it 's not exactly magic!
| madengr wrote:
| Yep. HP, Agilent, then Keysight, which is the only good
| part left of the original HP.
| sireat wrote:
| I own a HP 4050N that I paid 5 euros at a bank bankrupcy in
| 2008.
|
| Still have not changed the cartridge (apparently it is good
| for 10k pages).
|
| I am starting to worry that all cartridge refill businesses
| will close before I need a refill..
| ghaff wrote:
| I think it was a 4 that I had for ages. This was even in
| the days when taking something like this in to be repaired
| was still a thing.
|
| Had a Samsung laser printer that didn't last long and have
| had a Brother for years.
| RichardCA wrote:
| The 5mp was a straightforward parallel printer that fully
| supported both PCL5 and Postscript and was affordable. I
| think that was the peak.
|
| Nowadays I get by with a P2015dn because you have to have
| Ethernet, and it suffers from the wake-on-lan issue but
| it's tolerable. I'm afraid to try anything more recent.
|
| But the thing I miss most is that it used to be cool to be
| a fan of HP. Now that's just nostalgia.
| codazoda wrote:
| I have a 15 year old Wi-Fi Brother Laser that is still
| going strong. I've replaced toners a few times and the drum
| once. I'm sure it will last another 10 years. They still
| sell a brand new model that is almost identical.
| wantoncl wrote:
| Would you have the model numbers for yours and the newer
| model? Thanks in advance.
| rolleiflex wrote:
| I can perhaps give the model number of mine -- it's a
| Brother HL-2270DW laser I purchased in 2014, has wired
| ethernet in, wifi connection, and has been in use ever
| since. Most of the time it was on wifi and I can confirm
| wifi also works without any glitches or problems.
| hyperbovine wrote:
| Not surprising at all--HP in the early 1990s was still very
| much an engineering-focused company (both H and P were on
| the board until `93) that made high-quality, durable
| products. This was right before it got gobbled up by MBAs
| and celebrity CEOs, who spun it off into a hundred subunits
| hawking flimsy plastic trinkets and "business consulting".
| jasonwatkinspdx wrote:
| What happened to HP is so sad. They made fantastic
| products, especially their high precision stuff. Those
| oscilloscopes still fetch a decent price on ebay because
| they're so dang good.
|
| Up where I live there were a lot of HP employees in the
| LAN party scene pre broadband. Anyone would be frustrated
| and angry over layoffs, but what happened locally was a
| different level of disillusion and disappointment. It was
| brutal to just watch as someone adjacent, not going
| through it.
|
| Fiorina got a lot of sexist nonsense thrown her
| direction, but at the end of the day, was still a
| terrible CEO. HP's capitalization grew by 3 billion
| dollars in a single day when it was announced she was on
| the way out. Markets certainly aren't oracles, but that's
| one hell of a shift.
| hodgesrm wrote:
| I got an HP Laserjet in the late 80s for a computer
| center I ran at the University of Washington in Seattle.
| It was the best piece of hardware I've ever purchased.
| The clincher was the care with which they packed it and
| the simple instructions to take it out of the box and get
| it running.
|
| I knew it was going to be great before even powering up
| for the first time.
| cabalamat wrote:
| Agreed. I used to have a DeskJet 500 which I sadly got
| rid of years ago. It had much better build quality than
| modern inkjet printers.
|
| > This was right before it got gobbled up by MBAs and
| celebrity CEOs, who spun it off into a hundred subunits
| hawking flimsy plastic trinkets and "business
| consulting".
|
| Indeed. Very sad.
| birdyrooster wrote:
| HP LaserJet print quality these days is worse than their
| laser printers back in the early 2000s. It's quite sad. The
| products are flimsy and under engineered. The prints aren't
| as sharp and the inks are as expensive (sometimes even more
| than) as before. They rev versions of printers and make them
| incompatible with previous cartridges that technically fit,
| but are no longer in the supported model list. Scammy as
| hell.
| nowherebeen wrote:
| Funny enough, I never owned an inkjet. My parents bought a HP
| LaserJet 5 when I was 13. That thing was a tank. It lasted a
| good 15 years before it finally broke. I think in that time,
| we only changed the cartridge less than 10 times.
| TedShiller wrote:
| 10? I changed it 2 times in 16 years.
| MrFoof wrote:
| This. Bought an HP LaserJet in 1998. Only just replaced it
| this year with a newer one for more features and higher res.
|
| Thought admittedly if I replaced or repaired the power
| module, it probably would've went another 20 years at least.
| hungryforcodes wrote:
| Funny enough I had bought my fair share of inkjets and had
| been disappointed for the obvious reasons stated here.
| However one day somewhere around 2005 I found an HP LaserJet
| III on garbage day near my house and took it home. To my
| surprise it worked fine and even had toner. I was STILL using
| it without a toner change 10 years later when I moved cities,
| and gave it to someone. I could leave it off for a year and
| print 50 pages. Never a problem. Pretty good for free.
| limeblack wrote:
| > I agree, inkjets should've died a long time ago.
|
| Aren't inkjets better for photos?
|
| www.ldproducts.com/blog/pros-cons-of-inkjet-and-laser-
| printers/amp/
| jader201 wrote:
| Sure, but as I said above, unless you're printing a lot of
| photos, you're better of sticking to photo printer services
| (online or in-store) for printing photos.
|
| Most people don't print enough photos to justify the pain
| of owning an inkjet printer.
| NegativeLatency wrote:
| Still on my first b/w laser printer from 15 years ago. Got it
| setup with CUPS to enable air print hosted from my Linux home
| server
| throwaway2016a wrote:
| I bought an HP color LaserJet in college because my inkjet
| printers needed constant head cleaning and took forever.
|
| 18 years later, still works great and I've only changed the
| black toner once and never changed the color.
|
| Of course the printer itself costs the same as 5 inkjets and
| when the toner does need replacing... ouch.
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| Isn't one of the big issues with old laser printers that
| they consume obscene amounts of electricity (>100W) when in
| stand-by?
| throwaway2016a wrote:
| I've never measured but probably. I think that is more a
| problem for businesses though. For home use though, I
| just shut it off when not using it.
|
| If you really want I suppose you could put it on a ZWave
| or Wifi switch so you could turn it on remotely.
| mrexroad wrote:
| That's exactly what we've done. Threw a HomeKit
| controlled plug behind it, added automations for it to be
| on when high probability of being used and off otherwise.
| Beyond that, it's only a, "Hey Siri, turn on the printer"
| to start printing.
| chefandy wrote:
| I constantly print with heavy color usage as a Junior in a
| graphic design/interaction design BFA program. After
| painstaking research, I bought a Canon and some refillable ink
| cartridges. I pay more for paper than ink, which I get for
| about $15/liter! The print drivers don't accept CMYK-- they
| only accept RGB and do their own internal conversion-- so exact
| color correction is a challenge. Even still, it's passable for
| proofing/critique prints without fussing or even decent prints
| of photographs. It would absolutely meet the needs of a casual
| user.
|
| The thing is pretty cheaply built so it's janky as all get-out,
| but ink included, I haven't touched the expense of the cheapest
| laser printers-- maybe half. I'll upgrade when its limitations
| outweigh the benefits.
|
| _(watch out-- it won 't work on every model. It looks like
| some cartridge companies sell refillables for models they know
| won't work without official cartridges, so do some reading!)_
| TedShiller wrote:
| I bought an HP LaserJet in 2003. It still works perfectly and
| prints like a charm every day. I've only changed cartridges
| twice.
| greggman3 wrote:
| I felt lucky in Japan in that you can print at every
| convenience store so I'd just walk 1-2 mins to the local store
| when I needed to print. 10 cents for B/W, 50 for color.
|
| In SF you can print at the library which I've done once.
| ksec wrote:
| I still dont understand why printing as a services has not
| caught on anywhere else.
| klodolph wrote:
| Has it not caught on in the US? You can print as a service
| nearly everywhere in the country, at places like Fedex
| Office, Staples, Office Depot, etc. Photo prints can be
| done at drug stores like CVS and Wallgreen's (not all
| locations, though).
| dv_dt wrote:
| After similar shenanigans from HP, I went to Brother laser
| printers and haven't looked back since.
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| I went with a Brother Laserjet after reading a recommendation
| comment here. Amazon has cheap cartridges for it, too. The
| only issue I've had is wifi network connectivity. When it was
| plugged in worked flawlessly. This is a buy it for life
| product.
| 14 wrote:
| Me too but almost makes me want to buy a second one and just
| put it in storage in case the day comes when Brother too
| succumbs to corporate pressure to "improve products".
| sillyquiet wrote:
| Yep. Have had a Brother HL-2270 (b&w laser printing) for
| years, and couldn't be happier with it, especially coupled
| with a PI-based CUPS server for AirPrint capability and the
| like.
|
| The only thing I miss about not having an inkjet is color
| printing and at-home photo printing, but there are so many
| on-demand online print shops nowadays, I can't say it's a big
| deal.
| ghaff wrote:
| It was going to cost me $100+ to refill the inks on my
| large format HP inkjet photo printer. I took it up to the
| attic a few months back from whence it will likely go in
| the trash in a few years. I have the same Brother printer
| and it just works for occasional B&W printing. The rare
| color photo prints I want are easily handled (better)
| online and, while I'd like to print a color map or
| something now and then, it's not worth having an inkjet
| printer that will be used so seldom the ink will dry out.
| BeFlatXIII wrote:
| Occasionally needing to print musical scores on large-
| format papers is what keeps me chained to inkjets. The
| price bump from inkjet to laser is significantly steeper
| for wide-format printers compared with letter/a4
| printers. IIRC, instead of $90 vs $150, it's up to $200
| vs $700.
| KingMachiavelli wrote:
| For that purpose a color laser jet works just fine
| although are are much more expensive.
| ghaff wrote:
| If I were in need of a new laser printer I'd probably
| consider color at this point, but it's not worth
| replacing my existing B&W printer for a once in a blue
| moon color print.
| dylan604 wrote:
| why waste the effort of taking it to the attic to just
| add to the clutter? Reminds me of the users that put
| things in the trash can/recylce bin but don't empty it
| "just in case".
| mlyle wrote:
| If you need a large format color print in the next year
| or two before it rots, you can change your mind and buy
| the ink and avoid buying another $700+ large format
| printer. Option value.
| ghaff wrote:
| Because I have the space, it takes a minute, and maybe
| (though probably not) my needs will change some day. I'm
| not going to argue it's completely rational but I do
| occasionally dust things off that I have put into
| storage.
|
| I do go through the attic every now and then and toss
| stuff that hasn't been used for ages.
| willswire wrote:
| Pi-based CUPS is the way to go. I developed an image for
| balenaOS to manage a fleet at the previous enterprise IT
| company I was with.
|
| https://github.com/willswire/balenaPrint
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I do not understand how the other printer brands are even in
| business when Brother is an option. I feel like their
| reputation for being the best in the consumer space would
| have spread far and wide by now.
|
| I have been able to scan all of my documents with their MFC
| line directly to my Dropbox (or box or drive or onedrive)
| account for over 6 years now, AND Brother Web Connect
| automatically OCR's them.
| somehnguy wrote:
| FWIW I was totally set on picking up a Brother B&W Laser a
| few months ago to replace my crappy inkjet because I've had
| great experiences with them in the past.
|
| I wanted it _now_ though, and locally could only really
| find a good deal on a Canon. I 'm extremely happy with it,
| prints great, fast enough for me, can get knockoff toner
| for cheap on Amazon that hasn't given me any issues, and
| the wifi networking is rock solid. Duplex printing, flatbed
| scanner, the works etc for $100.
|
| It also has a pretty thorough administration panel built
| in, though as a home user I only clicked around it for fun.
|
| So now both Canon & Brother are on my recommendations list
| when anyone asks me what printer to buy.
| Lio wrote:
| The wonderful thing about a Brother laser printer is that
| you don't need to be need to install drivers; CUPS will
| cover you.
|
| I'm used mine with macOS, iOS, Linux and Windows.
|
| So no multi-gigabyte downloads, no proprietary cloud
| photo storage and no telemetry.
|
| I've had that in the past with both Epson and Canon
| inkjets.
|
| Is the Canon laser any better?
|
| I'm so sold on Brother now I don't think I'd trust Canon
| again.
| somehnguy wrote:
| I haven't installed drivers or software for any printer
| (inkjet or laser) I've used in the past like 10-12 years.
| They just work across all my devices automatically
| (windows, Mac, Linux, iOS, android). So no idea how
| Canon's software is.
|
| The days of needing drivers & manufacturer specific
| software are long gone at this point unless you have a
| very weird or specific setup. Heck, I can even scan
| without any special software. They all still prompt you
| to install their junk in the manuals, but you don't need
| to.
| greentissue wrote:
| Brother makes good hardware but bad software. They
| recently gave up support on newer versions MacOS. They
| have an android printing driving with 100+ reviews @ 1.X
| out of 5 stars. It not longer works on newer android
| phones. I've tried for years to get my networked brother
| multifunction laster printer working with my chromebook
| to no avail. If it somewhat works its printing things
| slightly incorrectly, running out of memory, etc...
| lallysingh wrote:
| I just got my 3rd Brother Laser (color with scanner).
| Everything (iPad, Mac, iPhone, Linux, android) prints
| perfectly with it.
| dghughes wrote:
| Isn't Brother agressive in it's constant unclearable
| warnings about using generic toner?
| discreditable wrote:
| Not on my MFC-L2740DW at least. I've used generic toner
| from Monoprice just fine.
| rhino369 wrote:
| It's probably model by model. My brother inkjet was just
| as bad as a hp. Wouldnt print black if color was low,
| error codes from generic ink.
|
| I got a brother laser that doesn't complain about generic
| toner.
| hdjjhhvvhga wrote:
| Maybe, but I own Brother printers for >10 years and I
| haven't seen such a warning yet.
| localhost wrote:
| No. I have two Brother laser printers here (HL-L8360CDW
| and HL-5470DW) and have been using generic toners since
| the OEM toner cartridges ran out. I have never seen any
| warnings.
| 13415 wrote:
| They can be surprisingly hard to get in some areas of the
| world. For example, I live in Portugal and larger shops
| like Worten, Fnac, El Corte Ingles have anything but
| Brother printers. Even IT providers for business and PC
| shops rarely have them in stock. You can mail-order them
| _from_ Brother Portugal but not many people know that and
| will do that.
|
| It's quite mysterious and I'd like to know the reasons.
| madengr wrote:
| Brother also makes machine tools and high-end sewing
| machines, so some of that quality mindset must flow into
| their consumer products.
| jack_pp wrote:
| Because most non-tech people don't know, they really have
| no way of knowing until they get burnt or someone tells
| them and at the end of the day a cheap inkjet is 60-80$.
| lazide wrote:
| There are a lot of people out there that haven't figured
| out the scam yet, and new ones minted every day. And those
| brands will sell 5 of these rip-off inkjets to someone at
| high margin before they figure it out and buy a brother
| once - for 1/5 of the total profit to brother.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| But between Consumer Reports, Wirecutter, the 18 million
| review websites, Costco, I feel like such an obviously
| superior brand and product should have had its reputation
| widely known by now, like Toyota/Honda.
| kube-system wrote:
| I think you highly overestimate the amount of research
| the average person does on a printer purchase. Yes,
| _some_ people will buy a CR magazine or ask their friends
| /relatives opinion for a $30k car, but will they do that
| before buying a $60 printer?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| True, but I would have figured that by now, so many
| people would have had bad experiences with inkjet
| printers from HP/epson/canon that they would have sought
| out that information. Or maybe even retailers would
| promote it so people are more satisfied with their
| purchases.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| Here is the average printer purchaser:
|
| "Hello Best Buy / Staples / Office Depot salesperson, I
| need a printer."
|
| "Well, I'd recommend (insert whichever manufacturer
| currently cutting retail most margin)."
|
| "No, a friend had a bad experience with them."
|
| "Oh, then (insert second highest margin)."
|
| (Repeat)
| kube-system wrote:
| Meanwhile the most economical printers aren't even on the
| shelf because their high purchase price causes them to
| have low sales volumes.
| lazide wrote:
| Yup, though those tend to be purchased by large corps in
| bulk via industrial channels, so the companies still make
| good money.
|
| Most large corps have done the math and know their TCO
| all in is much lower (since they have the scale that they
| need to hire staff and explicitly account for dealing
| with issues like printer problems).
|
| The printer companies have also done their market
| research and math, and know how much they can squeeze out
| of these corps while still having the math clearly make
| sense for them.
|
| Can you imagine the logistical and end user support
| nightmare if they gave everyone their own cheap inkjets?
| Lolz.
|
| It's bad enough as it is, and per-page the problems are
| way less frequent.
| [deleted]
| jerkstate wrote:
| My Consumer Reports (online) subscription is probably the
| best $10 per year I spend
| ecpottinger wrote:
| You are right. I remember in particular when the company
| I was with sold the Panasonic home printer. For a student
| is was great, but _ALL_ the parts were made of the type
| of plastic that could not take heat in the long run.
|
| The user manual clearly said no more than 100 pages at a
| time and less than a 1000 a day, no problem for a
| student.
|
| Yet time after time someone would come in and want one
| for office work. We would point them to the better
| printers that have hard metal parts in all the key areas
| and would print all day nonstop if needed. Yet time after
| time they insisted on the cheap home Panasonic printer.
|
| Then a few months later they would show up screaming and
| yelling that we sold them a piece of junk. Shame that the
| printer kept track of how many pages it printed. And the
| manual clearly stated the limits. We never saw the court
| cases they threaten us with. :)
| kube-system wrote:
| Yep. Duty cycle, as an engineering concept, is
| notoriously misunderstood by the general public.
|
| It seems every day that there's some sort of outrage in a
| blog or article: "Did you know that [large organization]
| spends $[x] for their [equipment]? Wow, you can buy
| [consumer version] at Walmart for 1/100th of that price!"
|
| No, outraged taxpayer, your school district isn't wasting
| money by purchasing a $10,000 copier. Your HP all-in-one
| can't replace their use-case, despite how you imagine it
| could.
| RealityVoid wrote:
| I am still skeptic, honestly, are some metal gears worth
| the 20x-10x cost increase? Yes, you can make it more
| suited for long term use for _some_ cost, but that much?
| At what point is is actually fleecing customers? Some
| products surely are just fleecing, but how can you tell?
| Usually, you can't.
| kube-system wrote:
| The difference between this:
|
| https://www.hp.com/us-en/shop/pdp/hp-deskjet-2755e-all-
| in-on...
|
| ... this:
|
| https://www.hp.com/us-en/shop/pdp/hp-laserjet-enterprise-
| mfp...
|
| ... and this:
|
| https://www.office.xerox.com/en-us/multifunction-
| printers/al...
|
| ... is not some metal gears.
|
| All three of those are machines with fundamentally
| different functions and capabilities.
|
| I have (long ago) supported consumer grade printers in an
| enterprise environment. They're so bad as to be unusable.
| You spend way more than the $10,000 on the nice copier in
| lost productivity due to poor reliability and additional
| IT labor required to fix a fleet of inkjets.
|
| With a $10,000 copier, you push out an group policy to
| install it on everyone's PC and it runs pretty smoothly
| and can take the load. If you put $100 inkjets on 80
| different desks, you end up having to hire another FTE
| just to manage the cartridge replacements, driver
| installations, head cleanings, paper jams, etc. And the
| experience is worse for the end users too. If they need
| 250 handouts printed in the next 10 minutes, they simply
| can't do it.
| RealityVoid wrote:
| There is obviously a difference between the three, but is
| it that much? And how much is it really because of
| underlying technology and how much is it because of
| artificial market segmenting?
|
| I also take offense with he fact that the 3rd example
| does not even have a listed price - that is a BIG red
| flag for the habit of making the customer pay as much as
| possible.
|
| And the HW cost is justified, the SW cost is NOT, the
| interface should be simple and clean. Why is it not? No,
| here vendors are to blame.
| kube-system wrote:
| Yes, the functional difference between those items is
| staggering.
|
| The difference in _capacity alone_ between the HP all-in-
| one and the Xerox copier is literally the same in
| magnitude (60-80x) as the difference in capacity between
| a semi truck and a passenger vehicle.
|
| These are different tools that literally do different
| things. You can't print 250 handouts with that HP all-in-
| one, and you can't transport 25,000 lbs of freight in a
| Camry.
|
| A routine use-case for one of those large copiers is
| something like a person needing to give a 25 page
| document to 10 people on short notice. Not only is it not
| practical, it's not even _possible_ with a consumer
| inkjet. A high end workgroup copier will spit them out in
| a short moment, already stapled (or bound!) and ready to
| go. Do you realize how silly it would be to make 10
| people with 6-figure salaries stand around waiting for a
| consumer inkjet, even just one time? You 'd be wasting
| thousands of dollars to save pennies.... and that's
| assuming you don't consequentially impact your ability to
| generate revenue. I certainly wouldn't want to be
| responsible for a b2b sales team relying on a consumer
| inkjet to submit proposals on time.
|
| > And the HW cost is justified, the SW cost is NOT
|
| These aren't separate itemized costs when you buy a
| printer. You either get the Xerox printer with the Xerox
| software, or you get the HP Deskjet with the Deskjet
| software. You don't get to choose to use the DeskJet
| Printer with the Kerberos integration from the Xerox
| software. The teenager working at Best Buy is not going
| to be able to help you find a copier with software that
| is HIPAA compliant.
|
| > I also take offense with he fact that the 3rd example
| does not even have a listed price - that is a BIG red
| flag for the habit of making the customer pay as much as
| possible.
|
| It's an example of a ~$10000 copier. The price isn't
| listed because customers don't buy this type of machine
| directly through Xerox anyway. These types of purchases
| are done through formal proposals through Xerox vendors.
|
| Large businesses don't buy things the way you do. They
| submit RFP/RFQs to vendors.
| lazide wrote:
| It isn't that the metal gears alone are worth 10-20x. It
| is that if you do the math over a long period of time,
| use it somewhat often, and include things like your time
| (at any reasonable labor rate) fixing issues, tracking
| down replacements, etc. it almost always makes sense to
| have something that will have fewer issues, last longer,
| and is designed to be more durable even at greater
| expense. In things with moving parts, that may mean metal
| gears and reinforcement in wear areas, but not always.
|
| This of course depends on how frequently you are going to
| use it, how hard, for what, and how severe or expensive
| the consequences of it breaking on you unexpectedly are.
|
| 'Commercial' or 'pro grade' is usually more durable and
| expensive because the market demands it - employees are
| often harder on equipment than someone who bought it
| directly, it gets used at a much higher duty cycle,
| maintenance is often neglected at least as much as a
| residential user, etc. and the market is willing to pay
| more because it breaking stops them from making money, or
| requires them to spend more money on labor getting it
| fixed.
|
| They also tend to have horrible UX or require specific
| steps to work, since they know it is being bought for
| it's utility not because it is pretty (most of the time),
| and someone will have to figure out how to use it or get
| figured after the company is already paid.
|
| They still do get scammed sometimes of course.
|
| The printer equivalent of harbor freight tools has a
| place if you're going to toss it in a year anyway due to
| a move, or need it for a single job and then never again,
| as long as it isn't a safety/critical path item anyway.
| coffeecat wrote:
| Reviews and anecdotes can be misleading in some cases. I
| bought a cheap secondhand Xerox Phaser printer, which has
| some horrible reviews online, and its previous owner was
| getting rid of it because of network connection issues.
| The network connectivity issue was fixed with a firmware
| update, and I've found it to be an excellent printer -
| useful documentation, supports every printing protocol
| under the sun, and the cost of aftermarket drum/toner
| replacements work out to less than half a cent per page.
| kube-system wrote:
| If the average consumer can't be bothered to read a
| review before making a purchase, they're certainly not
| reading about firmware updates, or buying a secondhand
| Phaser.
|
| Regular people go to a big box store, look at the items
| on the shelf, read the marketing material on the box, and
| fork out $79.99.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Someone needs to make a QAnon post about the scam, then
| it'd be over for ink jets /s
| kube-system wrote:
| Meh. Knowing about "the scam" is not enough to avoid it.
| People already know ink cartridges are expensive.
|
| To get a good deal you have to calculate TCO which
| requires understanding consumable prices, yields, and
| print volumes, and doing the math to figure out all of
| your options.
|
| Being mad is easy. Being analytical requires work.
| hdjjhhvvhga wrote:
| I don't think it's that complicated in that case as you
| just need to know how many pages you are going to print.
| If the amount is greater than the one provided for in
| your inkjet starter pack, go buy Brother. Any other
| option will make you suffer as these cheap laser printers
| are disposable pieces of junk designed only to sell ink.
| kube-system wrote:
| > need to know how many pages you are going to print. If
| the amount is greater than the one provided for in your
| inkjet starter pack
|
| aka print volumes and cartridge yields, as I said.
|
| In any case, if you're not calculating TCO, then you're
| not calculating TCO. Brand loyalty is just brand loyalty,
| even when tech savvy people do it. There are economical
| and uneconomical printers from nearly any brand depending
| on use-case.
| hdjjhhvvhga wrote:
| It's not a bad idea. Prepare a few memes about this and
| post it to anti-vaxx and conspiracy groups - they will
| take care of the rest. And they will do it well - making
| sure the message gets right through to your parents and
| grandparents.
| lazide wrote:
| Plenty of folks still buying GM, Ford, and a hundred
| other brands based on the market data though right?
|
| If it takes a decade for someone to figure this out, and
| most people are buying things like this in the late teens
| to early thirties, then no matter what you're going to
| have ~2/3 of the market who hasn't figured it out.
|
| Also, a lot of folks get drawn like a magnet to new and
| shiny, or whatever the latest marketing spiel is and
| don't even think of the long term impact. Like the vast
| majority.
| SomeCallMeTim wrote:
| I have a Brother inkjet all-in-one, and it works great,
| BUT...
|
| Problem is that it needs to "clean" the print heads
| frequently. It uses up ink every time it cleans. So if
| you're not printing frequently, 95% of your ink will be
| used up by letting the printer do its thing.
|
| I tried just leaving it unplugged for a long time once, and
| sure enough the print head clogged. It took a lot of
| printing and cleaning (and wasted ink) before it became 99%
| usable again.
|
| But the Brother B&W laser we got? It Just Works.
| drdec wrote:
| All inkjets perform poorly in the infrequently used use-
| case.
| dreamcompiler wrote:
| Same here. The other problem I found with HP was software:
| Their drivers were ridiculous multi-gigabyte downloads and
| they would often be buggy and either bring my Mac to a crawl
| or just outright crash. This was several years ago; it might
| be better now, but I swore off HP because of it.
| yarcob wrote:
| HP accidentally revoked a code signing certificate
| recently. Since certificates are regularly checked for
| revocation by macOS, suddenly all HP printers stopped
| working on macOS.
|
| It took a few weeks until everything was fixed again for
| me, I had to reinstall drivers from Apple and HP multiple
| times. But my mom still hasn't gotten her HP inkjet to work
| since then.
|
| Add to that the fact that they sent firmware updates that
| caused printers to stop working with 3rd party ink -- I'm
| never buying anything from HP again.
| dv_dt wrote:
| Hp has had bad printer driver software for decades
| GordonS wrote:
| I did the same thing.
|
| I battled with colour HP, Canon and Epson inkjets for so many
| years, then eventually snapped 2 years ago and bought a mono
| Brother laser MFD for a ridiculously cheap PS150 - wow, no
| more buying ink every month, no more "head cleaning" or "head
| alignment" every.single.time I want to print something, no
| paper jams, no _stress_ when you just want to print one
| damned page!
|
| Just... a perfectly working device! And the ink lasts ages
| too - the smaller cartridge that came with it lasted a year,
| then I bought a standard sized one that's still going strong.
| I really can't rate Brother highly enough - _zero_ issues,
| everything works perfectly.
|
| My only mistake was not switching to a mono laser printer
| sooner!
| dsego wrote:
| Are the new ones with refill bottles instead of ink cartridges
| any better?
| Bluestein wrote:
| Own one, Epson. Ink clogs in piping out of reservoirs ... ...
| but no big deal.-
| juniperplant wrote:
| I own an Epson EcoTank ET-2650.
|
| Despite costing more than traditional inkjet printers, I find
| that build quality is not that great (cheap creaking plastic,
| scanner bed occasionally detatching from its hinge).
|
| Another issue I have with it is that ink level reporting is
| inaccurate; indeed, the manual itself recommends to visually
| inspect the tanks, which are semi-transparent and can be
| observed without opening the printer. However, I found that
| it's impossible to do that because dried ink covering the
| inner surface of the tank makes it impossible to distinguish
| the actual ink level line. Because of that, I have to
| remember to look inside the tanks to check if a refill is
| needed from time to time.
|
| That said, ink lasts ages and refilling is cheap compared to
| cartridges, so overall I'm happier with it than with any
| other traditional inkjet printer.
|
| If you don't need color printing, laser is the way.
| megous wrote:
| Dunno, I have the same cheap HP DeskJet 6940 for 14 years, just
| buy non-brand b/w ink[head] every 2 years or so and it works
| fine for occasional home use.
|
| I had a laser printer before at home before, and it's slow to
| warm up, tonner is 10x as expensive as refilled ink head and I
| kinda fear the tonner particles getting into the air and I
| breathing them. Page output is similar for much higher price.
|
| Quality is better, but for home use I'd only consider laser
| printer if I was still making PCBs at home.
| PeterStuer wrote:
| Xerox does the same. I have a Workcenter 6605 that would still be
| a perfect greyscale multifunctional but can do nothing as the
| Yellow toner check can not be passed and a repair costs more than
| a new printer.
| MPSimmons wrote:
| If the point of a class action lawsuit is to change behavior, $5m
| is not enough to bring it to the attention of the people who need
| to see it, in that organization.
| syntheticnature wrote:
| I ran into this when going to scan paperwork for my taxes a few
| years back.
|
| Then, a year later, the printer developed some sort of error on
| initialization of the print head... and it would refuse to scan
| on that basis, even though the scanner mechanism was completely
| separate and scanning UI still came up. It turned out there
| already was a class-action for this second issue, except my Canon
| hadn't manifested the issue earlier and so no settlement for me.
|
| Got a B&W Brother Laser with a simple flatbed scanner built-in.
| Not perfect, but covers the occasional need to print something
| out short-notice, and scans well enough for the main needs I have
| there. Some folks say just use services for printing, and there
| is some validity to that, but it's nice to be able to quickly
| print up a reference sheet or label without planning ahead.
| bad_username wrote:
| If you don't need frequent scanning of multi-page documents,
| scanner apps for smartphones do stunningly good job of creating
| PDF document scans using the camera.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > Got a B&W Brother Laser with a simple flatbed scanner built-
| in.
|
| Since early 2000s: It's been mostly Brother lasers for my small
| biz clients. Brother was terrible before 2000, became
| cheap/reliable and stayed that way.
|
| I placed a few this year.
| [deleted]
| aqibgatoo wrote:
| I am happy that finally somebody is suing a printer manufacturer.
| kazinator wrote:
| Article:
|
| > _the printer ran out of ink_
|
| Quite wrong! Should say: "a count-down chip in just one half-full
| cartridge started sending an empty indication signal to the
| printer".
| osrec wrote:
| Damn the need for recurring revenue. It makes us make bad things
| that eat away at our own resources.
|
| I wished there was an alternative payment model, where everything
| is perhaps paid off over time. If the product fails during the
| specified time period, the payments stop. It would hopefully give
| the companies some sort of recurring revenue, while incentivising
| them to build something that lasts and not play dirty tricks on
| the consumer.
| matheusmoreira wrote:
| > Damn the need for recurring revenue.
|
| They'd still be thriving under an honest business model. There
| is no need for any of this. There is only greed.
| progbits wrote:
| The problem is nobody cares about long term sustainable
| growth.
|
| Execs come and go and want a nice fat bonus now. Shareholders
| will jump ship to a different company that does this and
| manages to go more up-and-to-the-right. This bubbles down the
| whole chain - it is the PMs and teams who push for change,
| redesign etc who get promoted, not the ones who just continue
| making a good product that will last.
|
| You don't have anyone who sticks around for many years and is
| passionate about the problem and doing the right thing. And
| even if you do, in a public company they get pushed out by
| CEO who promises more immediate growth.
| spideymans wrote:
| Crazy idea, but Amazon Prime Printing.
|
| It would be a great free Amazon Prime perk for the home market,
| where people print only a few times a year, and don't
| necessarily mind waiting 24 to 48 hour for a printed document
| to come in the mail. I'd imagine revenue could come in from
| higher-quality printing options (photos, books, etc...)
|
| Living in a small apartment, I don't have the space to keep a
| printer that would only be used a few times a year, so I'd love
| this kind of service.
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| We have a "copy cat" and mailbox place around the corner.
| Check your favorite mapping site.
| MichaelZuo wrote:
| Mandatory service contracts are common for commercial
| equipment.
|
| It guarantees recurring revenue and guarantees the customer
| will have support the next day (or same day sometimes) if
| anything happens.
|
| Retail customers simply pick the cheapest thing though that
| satisfies their needs, most of the time. It's been the same
| story since the first retail shop I imagine.
| pid-1 wrote:
| I guess they could rent printers.
| londons_explore wrote:
| I'd be interested to know if this was intentional.
|
| I can very much see that the all-in-one device has some
| "initializeHardware()" function that tests and sets up all the
| internal components, which probably requires ink to run (firing
| an ink jet as part of the initialization with no ink present
| usually burns some ink and it'll permanently clog with carbon
| deposits).
|
| Likewise, I suspect if the light bulb in the scanner was faulty,
| it wouldn't print. Or if the chip controlling the fax functions
| was unresponsive, it may not scan, copy or print.
|
| Designing a device which can self test every component, and then
| have a matrix of exactly which components must be present and
| working to do each function is very possible... but it's extra
| engineering effort, extra testing, and an extra source of bugs.
|
| For example, if an ink cartridge is missing, the weight of the
| carriage will be different, which will need different motor
| control parameters to ensure the movement speed is suitable
| (they're DC motors, so require quite complex control algorithms
| to move at a close-to-constant rate across the page).
|
| Overall, it might not be Canon management requiring this
| behaviour, but rather the engineering teams deciding that all
| these corner cases are not worth the effort of supporting.
| wly_cdgr wrote:
| The reasons don't matter as it's absolutely unacceptable user
| experience that breaks a major implicit product promise. I get
| that engineers may be too people-stupid to understand that it's
| a non-negotiable blocker, but that's why you employ UX
| designers
| mthoms wrote:
| Printer companies have long lost their right to getting the
| benefit of the doubt.
|
| At any rate, if your theory is correct then they are knowingly
| selling a defective product. Using the scanner is not a "corner
| case", it's one of the devices' primary functions.
| LordAtlas wrote:
| From the article: "Since at least 2016, other customers have
| contacted Canon about this exact problem [1, 2] and were told
| by support agents that ink cartridges must be installed and
| contain ink to use the printer's features, as shown by the
| agent's response below."
|
| I'm inclined towards malice and not incompetence.
| misnome wrote:
| Yes, clearly this is just a bug that will be fixed as soon as
| they are made aware of it in 2016
| gerbilly wrote:
| I was fortunate enough to buy a 1990s laser printer.
|
| Back then companies were still short sighted enough1 to build
| them to last.
|
| It's an Apple Laserwiter 12/640PS.
|
| It's still chugging along today, with 64Mb of memory no less!
|
| [1]: Recurring revenue wise that is.
| kitsunesoba wrote:
| I'm tempted to track down an old LaserWriter myself, those
| things don't quit. Are you able to find toner for yours
| reliably?
| gerbilly wrote:
| So far so good on the Toner. I _think_ I heard that the guts
| were the same as an IBM printer, but I might be wrong on
| that.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| I think it used a Canon print engine.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| They're the same guts as HP printers and it'd be easier to
| interface to one of those with a Jetdirect Ethernet card.
| Anything built before Fiorina tanked the company will be
| reliable. The later models will also have faster warm up
| times for the fuser.
| wly_cdgr wrote:
| Imagine willingly working for a company that does this. Every
| employee of Canon should be ashamed of themselves
| MathMonkeyMan wrote:
| If you have the luxury of protesting with your job selection
| (as many do), then this is fine. Isn't it a slippery slope,
| though? I'd venture to guess almost any largish company has
| done something inexcusable by someone's reasonable standard.
| Should be all be ashamed for being members of the worker
| society?
| wly_cdgr wrote:
| If you work for a company that does things that you yourself
| believe to be wrong then yes, you should be ashamed. And
| everyone should believe that what Canon is doing is wrong
| k8sToGo wrote:
| Ah yes. The lady at the front office surley has had any say in
| this.
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