Epson is making you throw away your ink cartridges with 20% of the ink still in them.

[voyager_663rd]

Same here. I had a MFC and was pissed that everytime one of the 4 cartridges "died" (either empty--not likely or dried up), the whole unit would not function. Got the mono laser and just finished the "starter"--which had 20% left. You want a printer, gotta play their game. Either cheap machine and expensive cartridge or expensive machine (which probably won't last more than a few years) and cheap(er) ink.

 

[Bill_Bright]

I had a MFC and was pissed that everytime one of the 4 cartridges "died" (either empty--not likely or dried up), the whole unit would not function

I'm seem to remember one of the big makers got sued, or was threatened with a suit about this (shutting down when the printer "thought" one of the ink cartridges was empty). I note my current MFC, an HP 7525 yells at me long before a cartridge is really empty, but it keeps on printing - even after one the cartridges is empty. So I know it really is empty by the printout missing colors (or black).

The irritating ones (if they still exist) are the printers that use 1 cartridge for several colors. So if you run out of cyan, for example, you have to replace all the colors even though magenta and yellow may still have lots left. Not good.

This 7525 has 5 separate cartridges for yellow, cyan, magenta, black and photo black and actually, unless I am buying other things to take me over Amazons new $50 free shipping threshold, it is actually cheaper to buy replacements directly from HP.

Hmmm, Amazon is down right now! Anyway, for my HP 564XL Black cartridges, they typically cost about $23.99 at Amazon while HP has them $25.99 with free next business day shipping. So if I need just one color, I buy from HP.

 

[newtekie1]

I think Canon was the worst when it came to ink cartridge crap. They had models at one point that would not allow you to take them out of the printer and put them back in. Once you put the cartridge in, if you remove it for any reason, then put it back in the printer would not accept it and demand a new cartridge. I supported a company that had 3 of these printers, back in the early 2000s-2005ish. If PrinterA ran out of cyan, and you took the cyan cartridge out of PrinterB, when you put it in PrinterA Printer A would reject it and say the cartridge could not be used. If you tried to put it back in PrinterB, PrinterB would reject it saying it couldn't use it. The cartridge had to be thrown out.

 

[Devon68]

. I supported a company that had 3 of these printers, back in the early 2000s-2005ish. If PrinterA ran out of cyan, and you took the cyan cartridge out of PrinterB, when you put it in PrinterA Printer A would reject it and say the cartridge could not be used. If you tried to put it back in PrinterB, PrinterB would reject it saying it couldn't use it. The cartridge had to be thrown out.

Wow that must have pissed off the company and they didn't use them since then.

 

[newtekie1]

Wow that must have pissed off the company and they didn't use them since then.

Yeah, once the first one died they replaced them all.

 

[Sasqui]

Epson's latest marking game is the "EcoTank"

Decent Epson workforce printer costs about $90
Equivalent EcoTank printer costs about $250

Depending on production, the EcoTank may make sense, otherwise you can buy several high capacity cartridges for the $160 saved!

I've got a Workforce WF-3540 and it's an awesome printer. 2 years later, I'm still on the same original color cartridges, replaced the black just a few months ago!!!