Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for February 14, 2020

My printer acts the exact same way

You can always gift the printers sans the ink.

Someone explain this to me

It’s why some new printers now only come with starter cartridges that only print out a few pages. They want you to continue to buy the expensive cartridges.

Might it be cheaper still to simply hire a secretary who has artistic skills?

My printer cost me $50 and the ink is $46 so it’s close.

I’ve not bought new ink for MY printer in a year or so until I finally did so last month or so ago (I don’t do printing — specially color printing — that often anyway).

A $400 Epson allows you to fill with bulk ink. I’m sure the ink is “coded” to make sure you use theirs but could be the answer to over priced cartridges.

HP has ink subscriptions that are very reasonable. They are based on page count so you can always print at best quality. Best of all, when cartridges are getting low, New ink is automatically mailed.

i particularly love the ‘nozzle cleaning’ function that printer makers have added to ensure that you will run out of ink…

Often times with my old HP you could pop out the ink cartridge when it sent the empty message and just pop it back in and be good to go for a few more weeks of home usage.

While I’m prattling along here I finally bought a toner type printer on sale for home use. Wasn’t much more then the ink jets models but holy cow they last soooo much longer and replacements toner isn’t expensive at all if you DON’T buy it from the company that made the printer. I got a replacement toner for less then 20 bucks from 1ink.com (sorry for the plug just trying to be helpful/ I don’t work for them) I SMH each time I go into and office and see that they use ink jet printers.

Have all that stuff done @ the UPS or Staples stores. The extra $’s even out! Consider it!

14 Printers ! … Yard Sale on Printers at Pig’s House ! … Croc Power !

… and yet I can buy ten pens for a dollar…

One more example of why the planet is on fire.

SO TRUE STEPHAN!!!!

A wise man once said, “Buying a printer is really just buying a subscription for ink.”

Larry the Croc put it best: “Curse you, evil Huwett Pakard!”

Next thing you know, you’re going to look for printer ink gushers. Oh… wait… Rat’s already done that!

It is so rare that I need to actually print a hard copy I decided not replace the old ink-jet printer and instead now I just pop into my local library with my flash drive and pay only $0.50 a page to print. I almost never need more than a couple pages and I’m not tempted to print frivolous things I don’t need.

This may be the actual thinking of some of the folks on the 3D Printing Facebook page, judging by how many “printers” some of them have.

No it ain’t! It ain’t cheaper!

$35 for a piece of plastic filled with ink.

Meanwhile, a piece of plastic I need get my toilet to work cost $3.99. And I need my toilet more than I need my printer.

It’s because our current economic model leads to a small number of giant companies instead of many small ones.

Just looked up something from NPR. $4,731.00 per gallon.

Ditched my color inkjet and went back to a B&W laser printer around 2003. Just bought a new printer, not because the old one was out of toner, but because it didn’t have enough memory and no wifi.

I got the Epson Eco Tank which uses bottled ink. You get more ink than the small cartridges, but still expensive. I paid $100 for the printer and the ink is $51. Still cheaper to buy the ink.

If you are a diabetic, you find this to be true of blood glucose monitors. You can get one for practically nothing (often free if you find a promotion). Once the testing strips run out, you find how they make their money. And yes, I have about seven of them for the same reason.

Over about three years, I bought a succession of no-frills Samsung laser printers for either $40 or $50. At that time, they came with full toner cartridges. A replacement cartridge alone cost $60+. I think I still have those extra printers; I cannot get myself to throw away perfectly good printers.

I do that with watches. Watch: $8. New battery: $7. Huh.

I print something once a year or so. Had a letter quality matrix for many years til it broke. Then had a laser for business til it broke. Then got a new one and the next time i needed it, the jets were clogged. Got a new one, printed test pattern once a week, forgot for a while, when i needed it, the jets were clogged. I just go to Ups now. I do have 2 scanners in storage…

It’s not cheaper where I live. I just bought a new Epson printer for my wife’s home office. The printer in the States would cost around $100 ( I don’t know the cost of the replacement cartridges there but I expect they’re expensive ). The printer had I bought it in Ecuador was around $269. ( I bought it in Peru for $199 ).

What surprised me was how inexpensive the replacement laser cartridges were here and in Peru, compared to the States – about 1/3 of the price!

Go to the nearest library and use their printer. Much, much cheaper

I still miss my typewriter. (sigh)

The ink cartridges that come with new printers commonly carry only “starter amounts” of ink, far less than in a purchased cartridge. Nevertheless, there is a vast history of people just buying new printers under the assumption they’re getting a good deal… not realizing the ink will run out fairly quickly.

HP recently realized this problem and changed their entire ink strategy. They realized that 1) Ink cartridges are extremely expensive (one of the most expensive fluids on Earth at appx $9,000 per gallon) , 2) People were buying 3rd party cartridges or even new printers (at a loss to the printer company) instead of buying their cartridges, and 3) Most people at home can’t afford $70+ for a full set of ink cartridges. They balk.

So HP now has a “Smart Ink” program in which one estimates the number of pages they print a month and “subscribe” to an ink provision program. The printer keeps track of ink used and automatically re-orders ink when needed, at a relatively low subscription cost per month. If a person prints 50 pages or less per month their in price for an entire year comes to about $36. If they exceed their print amount the system charges their account a per-sheet-extra fee (which is still an expensive 10 cents per copy, but at least one knows the cost). Customers can increase, lower or cancel their subscription at any time.

I bought an HP all-in-one at a Black Friday sale this year for $30 ink included. It contains a subscription card that I can file any time. HP loses money on the printer sale, but calculates it will far more than make it up in ink subscriptions. I like the concept. I just have the printer on standby in case my color laser finally dies; at 30 bucks I couldn’t resist the deal. I think this is the first time a company has offered a realistic ink deal.

One thing I do hate about ink printers is the ink drying up if you don’t use it for a bit. You have to print a page every 3-4 days just to retain function.

I’m looking to replace my Brother phone/fax/scanner/copier/photo printer. Nobody makes that combo any more. Grrrr Once I use up the ink I have on hand, I’ll have to find something else.

Too true! It’s cheaper to buy a new kitty laser toy than replace the batteries. And yes, I have multiple printers myself…

I bought an Epson last year. Bought generic ink to replace the mini cartridges that came with it. Discovered that, notwithstanding government prohibition, they issued an update that will not recognize any but their own, expensive, cartridges. Had to go online to find out how to uninstall the update so I can use the ink cartridges I bought. Every time I use the printer, I have to cancel the auto update.

Sadly, this is SO true, especially when you select black-and-white copies and it still used up the yellow toner.

I have a quart bottle of black ink that I’ve been using to refill my cartridges for just over ten years now. I’ve saved $Hundreds$.

True dat.

The old “give them the knife and sell them the blade” scheme. Really expensive blades, that is. BTW. I have a Cannon Pixma and found after-market cartridges saving me 85% the cost of OEM. The after-markets seem to have more ink and comparable quality.

Last printer I purchased had smaller cartridges so you could replace only the cartridge you needed. I used one black and purchased the second. Once I plugged it in it wouldn’t work. I find the print head has burned out.Now I just don’t print. Been about 5 years now and not a single page printed.

Give the empty printers to Gen Z as a “Capitalists Have Won Day” present.

Save the printers so you can recreate the scene in Office Space. “Die MF, die MF, KILL!”

Generic ink can solve the problem. OEM ink is insanely expensive.

If you owned a HP printer you would understand

view Rat’s printer:

https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2115/2083998610_26cdcbc357_z.jpg?zz=1

Rat is almost right! Why is ink outrageously priced!

Rat’s right. And, surprisingly, so is Pig!

Yes! I do the same thing. Canon printers can cost less than $30, which includes ink. Two new cartridges cost about $45.

Got a Brother laser printer and a Brother color printer /scanner/fax and use generic refills for both. And that’s why I bought Brother printers… you can generally find inexpensive toner or ink.

planned obsolescence

I do this when the drum in my black and white laser printer goes. New Drum $129 new printer $89. Shows how manufacturers sell cheaper hardware to profit off future ink and drum sales.

I have 15 printers. Fight me.

It’s true.

This is actually true