Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 213 posts

Re: Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

#111

Post by causi »

ineedasername wrote: post #109

Canon & a few other major brands have consumer grade MFP that use ink tanks instead of cartridges and you avoid this kind of hassle & get a much lower price on ink refills that you just dump into the corresponding color tank on the printer. This is what I use at home, a canon G-series printer. The "down side" of this is that the printers cost a fair bit more upfront. It's also not photo-grade quality. But with decent…

There's also the fact if you don't print very often it will run through the whole tank "cleaning" and wreck itself after everything is jammed up with dried ink.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

#112

Post by virusduck »

ekianjo wrote: post #6

Laser printers are the way to go. They are typically for offices and follow a different business level: large volume printing and low-cost ink.

I've got a Laserjet from the 90's still kicking. It's wireless too with a RPi Zero W and a USBParallel cable. Generic toner cartridges are cheap and available everywhere. Only issue is that the rubber on the runners need a refresh.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

#113

Post by nkotov »

Laser is the way to go.

We have a Brother color laser (AIO) printer from 2010 at my parents house that still gets a couple pages printed every couple of months. We replaced the toners perhaps 4-5 times in it's lifetime. The thing is built like a tank and weighs like one but works well. My only issue with it is that it doesn't AirPrint.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

#114

Post by patrick451 »

CogitoCogito wrote: post #93
stuff4ben wrote: post #80

> In particular, there is some brand that was praised for consumer friendly practices here on HN that joined the dark side recently too; Brother iirc. What did Brother do to join the "dark side"? I and lots of other folks love our Brother laser printers. I haven't heard of them doing anything evil...

The brother printer (HL-L2350DW) I have auto-detects when the toner is "low" and refuses to print. It does this even though I haven't noticed any degradation in printing quality and would prefer to continue printing with the old cartridge even if it results in a worse print. I find this kind of infuriating actually. Being able to continue using a cartridge as it gets low was always one the features I loved about lase…

I've had some middling success with taking the cartridge out, shaking it back and forth, and re-inserting it. But I agree that behavior is really frustrating

Re: Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

#115

Post by nordsieck »

jmyeet wrote: post #108

Not in the industry but the problems here are quite clear: it's a combination of short-term decision making and the way consumers make decisions. Cheap printers are sold at cost or at a loss. The companies make this up on ink cartridges. Obviously this creates an opportunity for third-party cartridges so your printer gets hundreds of firmware updates to try and defeat these cartridges and protect this business model.…

> the medium drink exists solely to get you to buy the large drink

Not true any more - McDonald's change their drink pricing so that S, M, and L all cost $1.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

#116

Post by [deleted] »

ironlake wrote: post #74

My Brother black-and-white laser is about ten years old. Pretty low volume of use from me, but it's held up well and is one of the most satisfying technology purchases I've ever made. If it stopped working, I would buy a Brother printer tomorrow without even looking at other brands. The printer industry is horrible, but also HP is toxic at every level and across every product and service. Just avoid.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

#117

Post by gonzo41 »

mu_killnine wrote: post #59
acjohnson55 wrote: post #39

I used to work for Lexmark, back when they were in the inkjet business. They are perhaps most notable for starting and fueling the race to the bottom in printer price. The theory was that if you could lock the users in, the customer lifetime value would be made on selling profitably prices supplies (i.e. the ink cartridge). There were a few big problems with this: - People often could buy a new printer, with supplies…

Just an anecdote: my grandfather passed away a few years ago and he was always into new technology. After he passed when we were cleaning up his home we found no fewer than 11 inkjet printers in his basement. Every time one stopped working (probably ran out of ink, or printed poorly because of long delays between printing) he would go to Best Buy, get talked up by a salesperson about a nice new printer, and buy it. I…

And all 11 of those will still be in landfill when your childrens children are old and dying. It's a pity they didn't make them out of metals that could be easily recycled.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

#118

Post by tomcam »

mu_killnine wrote: post #76
treeman79 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He may have been smart. Cost of printer with starter ink was occasionally cheaper then just getting new ink.

Yeah, totally. He only printed things a few times a year and by then inkjets usually dry and print poorly. I don't fault him but it's interesting to these strange market forces in my life. As an aside, my grandfather was a terrific guy. He bought a Gateway 2000 PC in the 90's and spent lots of time with me getting Sim City 2000 loaded up on it. He always had some gadget to show me since he knew how much I loved techn…

Lovely story. Never knew any of my grandparents and my kids chose not to have kids, so no grandchildren to spoil.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

#119

Post by theandrewbailey »

acjohnson55 wrote: post #39

I used to work for Lexmark, back when they were in the inkjet business. They are perhaps most notable for starting and fueling the race to the bottom in printer price. The theory was that if you could lock the users in, the customer lifetime value would be made on selling profitably prices supplies (i.e. the ink cartridge). There were a few big problems with this: - People often could buy a new printer, with supplies…

My uncle bought a Lexmark inkjet for my parents about 20 years ago. If anyone wanted to print something, it was a 50% chance there would be some problem (driver issues, wouldn't turn on, ink dried out, etc), and another 50% chance that it would be recoverable and result in an acceptable printout. It was such a piece of crap that it made me avoid printers of all kinds because of the trauma. I swear that the Canon inkjet that came with the old 486 was more reliable.

I got a Canon laser printer 2 years ago. I guess I'm a boomer now.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

#120

Post by JohnFen »

Alex3917 wrote: post #14
jqpabc123 wrote: post #12

Avoid ink jet and use laser jet instead. This solved most of the frustration for me. The upfront cost is slightly higher, the print quality is slightly decreased but the long term satisfaction is greatly enhanced. Ink jet in any form is dead in my mind.

> The upfront cost is slightly higher, the print quality is slightly decreased but the long term satisfaction is greatly enhanced. OK but they still stop updating the drivers after 3 years, which is the main problem. Otherwise they would last forever.

Why do driver updates matter?
Post reply on HN