Inkjet Printer Cartridges (a bit OT)

[PeterMcC]

Kevin Poole wrote in

I buy cartridges from ink.co.uk - the chip issue is a bit of a pain but not sufficient to put me off. The comments below refer to the black cartridges as I use so many - I guess that they equally apply to the coloured ink cartridges but I get through so relatively few that they don't appear on the radar.

Some times - and I guess about once every 20-30 cartridges - the chip doesn't seem to transfer. It will have been the same chip moving from cartridge to cartridge without problem and then will simply refuse to work. The printer dialogue brings up a message saying that the cartridge needs to be replaced. When that happens, I buy a "real" cartridge and we're off again.

Using generic cartridges also means that you don't get the "ink running low" warnings - and sometimes the ink runs out and you get a bad print. Given that the paper tray in the printer only holds around 200 pages, the consequences of leaving an unsupervised print run that ran out of ink on the first page would be limited to a couple of pounds worth of paper. I know that would be a waste of paper but it would still be a cash saving if it happened with every cartridge. In reality, it happens rarely and only then because I've failed to take the cartridge out and check it before a lengthy run.

Different generic cartridges have different fittings to take the chips - some just have a recess (the tiniest blob of blu-tack has never let me down); some have retaining clips that always seem to work well; and some have a couple of pins, much like the original, whose heads are flattened once the chip is in place - a little like rivets - and they're good. The "Swiss-ink" offering from ink.co.uk is that type.

So, that's the chip - the other issue is the ink.

I've never had any complaints about the appearance of the print but I changed to the more expensive (1.27) inks because they dry quicker. I found that, with fairly rapid printing, the second printed sheet was being delivered into the output tray just before the ink on the previous sheet was dry. It didn't smudge the previous sheet but it collected ink on the leading edge of the second sheet. It took quite some time before I worked out why some pages - those without graphics and thus faster through the printer - were turning out with a dirty top edge. The "Swiss ink" cartridge solved that problem and, as a bonus, I found that the print looked sharper.

There are a few issues, then - and, of course, the warranty on the printer is voided - but I'd say that I save at least £500 a year using generics.

Best of luck with the ip4500 - what problem killed the ip4000?

[Kevin Poole]

Thanks for the further explanation - much appreciated. (email sent about referral id)

After around 3000 pages, almost half of which were, in effect, A4 photos, I started having problems with magenta ink either clogging or not feeding, and was spending far too long running cleaning cycles or soaking the print head. Then the cyan started playing up, and now the small cyan nozzles are hardly ever printing, and the yellow ones have stopped too. A new head would be at least £33, and while it's likely to cure the fault, there must be chance it's something in the electronics that's not telling the nozzles to squirt, or even a fault in the mechanism that's supposed to clear the nozzles. Since I've promised my mate a load of wedding car brochures before his next wedding fair, I couldn't spend any longer faffing around. Shame really - I hate throwing things away, but at £33 for a print head, and more than that for a set of genuine Canon cartridges, £61 for a new ip4500 seems reasonable, despite this wretched business of chipped cartridges. It won't see many more Canon cartridges after its first ones.

Thank heavens car makers can't tie their cars to their own brand of petrol - two of my classics, at least, would have to go.