The hidden costs of home printing

bbc ^ | 1 September 2009 | Zoe Kleinman and Mark Ward

[JoeProBono]

Of all the extras that can be bought to make more of a PC, the humble printer is probably the most popular.

But that humility might conceal a house guest that costs much more to run than most people realise.

While the device may be very cheap to buy initially, especially if bought at the same time as its companion PC, the running costs can, and do, mount up. Particularly if a printer is used to produce a lot of high-quality colour copies.

It is well known that printer ink costs more per millilitre than the finest champagne. And it is in the costs of the ink that manufacturers claw back what they lose every time a printer is sold.

Long-term costs

Lizzie Russell, a computer expert at consumer organisation Which? counsels people to look at a printer's long-term running costs.

With our cartridges you can get anything from 200 - 2000 pages

Martin Hurren, business development manager for HP Supplies The cheaper a printer, she warns, the sooner its cartridges were likely to need replacing and the higher the ongoing costs.....

[freedomlover]

Brother monochrome laser

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There you go. After my wife kept spending $100s on color cartridges I bought one of those and accidently “couldnt get the color printer to work” for a few weeks.

Much faster, MUCH cheaper and when do you REALLY need color?

[discostu]

I don’t need laser jet print quality. And really the price differential is still really high, I can get 6 ink jet printer for the price of the cheapest laser jet on the market, and toner cartridges for laser run the same price as the printers which makes them also 6 times as expensive as ink.

[The Great RJ]

My question is how much printing do you really need to do? Instead of printing documents I save them digitally. Far easier to share and no paper to lose track of. My printer sits largely idle.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

But I need to connect one of these to a laptop, anybody know how??

With one of these:

[antiRepublicrat]

Ahh, Heidelberger Druckmaschine. Works of art in machinery.

[Born Conservative]

EXACTLY!

[GeronL]

lol. I guess it makes pamphlets then.

[GeronL]

I think that might void the warranty on the printer.. lol

[expat_panama]

Have had some luck refilling cartridges...

We do it all the time and it's no problem.  I got neighbor kids that come over and refill on their own without even bothering me.   I'm amazed that anyone would bother with new carts when they can refill.

[Let's Roll]

Agree totally. Sure do love the prints I get from my Epson. And remember these prints are for sale or to go into art shows. They are amazing.

But costly - ink and paper both.

[dfwgator]

And it is in the costs of the ink that manufacturers claw back what they lose every time a printer is sold.

It's the old business model from the razor companies, "Give away the razor, sell the blades."

[dfwgator]

[calex59]

I know this isn’t really relevant but I never print out photos, all I need is black and white and very, very seldom use color. What I wish is that they still made dot matrix printers, those ribbons lasted forever and were cheap to buy when you did need one. There was a reason that government offices used those large dot matrix printers for so long(they still might)because they would actually print up carbons. Not only that, the sound of a dot matrix was neat:)(just kidding on the last remark).

[listenhillary]

My Brother machine, the ink costs about $2.00 a cartridge. I used to refill,but for $2 a cartridge, it’s not worth messing with now.

I check this site for the ink cartridge price before I buy a printer. http://private.abacus24-7.com/compatibility.aspx?compat=22241

Epson and Canon seem to put chips in their cartridges anymore, ruling out aftermarket inks.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

I think that might void the warranty on the printer.. lol

That must be one hell of an extended warranty.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

Awesome flick.

[mysterio]

When it's cheaper to buy a new printer than it is to replace the color and black cartridges, that's just freaking stupid.

Sounds like that market desperately needs some competition.

And what's up with like 500 kinds of ink cartridges? Really? Can we have like two or three industry standard cartridges at most?

[JoeProBono]

Nah

[GeronL]

lol. I wonder if there is a Cash for Crankers program?

[GeronL]

buy an oil well. use oil. probably cheaper.