rant Inkjet printers, high running costs

[Chris Wilson]

I tried to get my old Epson C86 going again after it was laid up unused for about 8 months, but after putting in 4 new cartridges and umpteen cleaning cycles the "red" ink wouldn't flow and the (new) black ink cartridge ran out with the repeated cleaning cycles. It's now the third Epson that's given hassle and it's now in the bin. Pete on here got me a handy looking HP Photosmart B109 some time back, so i unpacked it and loaded the software. I fitted the 4 new genuine HP cartridges that came with it and was impressed by how clear scans were, and how it auto magically created pdf files if required. Fast at printing, too. I wanted to print off an oscilloscope manual, and saw it as a good trial for it, as 95% is black and white text and line drawings, with some colour screen shots. It's only 91 pages, and part from one B & W scan of a book page the cartridges were virgin. It did the 91 single sided pages of A4 but now it's saying the black ink is about to run out!!! Is that normal? I mean, 91 pages is nothing, I would have thought it'd manage 300 or so? I will have to use my B & W laser for anything other than really vital colour printing if it eats cartridges like that. It works fine and printing is very fast and clear, but I will be feeding it more than one black cartridge a week like this.

 

How successful is filling old cartridges with a syringe from a bottle of the right ink, especially black ones?

[Wez]

The cartridges included are smaller compared to what you buy as replacements, it's a con eh

[mwilkinson]

You on the pop Chris?

 

It's rant-land tonight!!