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Ask HN: Why is the printer industry so scammy?

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

#141

Post by js2 »

Years ago I worked for a software startup that was acquired by HP. At some point after our acquisition, we had presentations from various directors. I'll never forget the presentation from someone in the printer division. He was gloating about printer ink sales, how the printer division was a cash machine, and then he made this arm-pumping motion as he verbalized the sound effect of a cash register drawer opening: "cha-ching." It was gross. Nothing from him about technology, or the HP way, or making the best printers, or solving customer problems. Just "how can we wring more cash out of people?"

I didn't stay at HP very long. It was during the Mark Hurd era and it was a company being run by backstabbing sociopaths.

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

#142

Post by giancarlostoro »

coldpie wrote: post #54
leonidasv wrote: post #28

Toner printers are "less scammy", at least in my experience. I had a HP one and always bought the genuine cartridges. Then I saw those videos about the printing industry scams (which does happen) and tried a third party toner that costs 1/5 of the price. Guess what? After like 10 perfect printed pages, it started leaking some powder, then stopped printing random chunks of the page and turned impossible to use. I went…

I need to refill the toner in my home laser printer. I looked at some of the clone cartridges on Amazon etc and >90% of the reviews are of the form, "The cartridges arrived broken, but the seller gave me a full refund! Five stars, excellent service." Like, every single review. So either they're really shoddy and these people are extraordinarily forgiving, or they're buying reviews trying to alleviate worries from peo…

I wonder if you should be reporting those types of reviews to Amazon as misleading. They're reviewing the seller, not the product.

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

#144

Post by marpstar »

bluedino wrote: post #85
mu_killnine wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

>> he would go to Best Buy, get talked up by a salesperson about a nice new printer, and buy it. In a past life I worked at Best Buy, and the standard printer sales tactics were nuts. If a customer wanted to buy a printer, you were supposed to sell them: 2 packs of color ink (remind the customer that the included cartridges are only half-full) 2 packs of black ink 4 reams of regular paper 2 packages of photo paper GO…

Fellow former $BBY-er here... you gotta admit, the bundle pricing Best Buy ran on all of that stuff (with the purchase of a new printer, of course) made it so easy to talk them into it.

When I started I had just left commission-based sales in electronics at Sears and I was amazed at how much better Best Buy was at pushing accessories with big ticket items.

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

#145

Post by stuff4ben »

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 have a previous model DCPL2550DW and it has the low-toner warning too. Can't remember if it refused to print because I just went and bought a new toner for $45 which is cheap IMO. Anyways, I was perusing the Amazon reviews for my printer and came across this... maybe it'll help you?

Now, to override the alert Brother gives you when it THINKS you are out of ink, I have user Allegra to thank for that as follows:

"Go to the buttons and follow these instructions:

MENU > GENERAL SETTINGS

Press the down button (minus sign) until you get to REPLACE TONER

Hit OK

Please the down button (minus sign) until you see CONTINUE

Hit OK

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

#146

Post by doubled112 »

bluedino wrote: post #85
mu_killnine wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

>> he would go to Best Buy, get talked up by a salesperson about a nice new printer, and buy it. In a past life I worked at Best Buy, and the standard printer sales tactics were nuts. If a customer wanted to buy a printer, you were supposed to sell them: 2 packs of color ink (remind the customer that the included cartridges are only half-full) 2 packs of black ink 4 reams of regular paper 2 packages of photo paper GO…

The GOLD printer cable used to get me.

At Staples they also told us something about better USB cables for faster, more reliable printing.

How bad does your existing USB cable need to be before it starts to cause your printing to fail? Stop running it over with your chair.

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

#147

Post by axelthegerman »

goosedragons wrote: post #132
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.

But incredibly wasteful. For sporadic printing it really makes the most sense to go somewhere where you can print by the page like a public library, office supply store etc. I think I've spent about $2 on printing in the past 5 years. The most common electronics I see being thrown out these days is some shitty inkjet printer. Unlike a CRT or computer nobody wants them and so they sit by the side of the road for sever…

100% agreed, wish the "printing somewhere" experience was better too.

Printed at a print shop, paid 50cts for the prints and $3 to use the computer for 10min trying to print from USB drive

Printed at a library and for the printer could only pay in cash and there was a long line.

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

#148

Post by xenophonf »

goosedragons wrote: post #132
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.

But incredibly wasteful. For sporadic printing it really makes the most sense to go somewhere where you can print by the page like a public library, office supply store etc. I think I've spent about $2 on printing in the past 5 years. The most common electronics I see being thrown out these days is some shitty inkjet printer. Unlike a CRT or computer nobody wants them and so they sit by the side of the road for sever…

> The most common electronics I see being thrown out these days is some shitty inkjet printer.

I've had a broken HP inkjet on my desk for 10 years. The only reason I've hung onto it is because it makes for a very nice network-connected document scanner. I got it used from one of my spouse's parents, and I haven't ever even tried to print with it. I keep thinking about replacing it with a multifunction laser printer, but why bother? I only ever really need the scanner.

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

#149

Post by dn3500 »

Where I live in Mexico nobody owns a printer. Instead there is a print shop on almost every street corner. You walk in, print wirelessly from your phone or laptop, or hand them a USB drive, and they hand you your prints made on an expensive office printer. They also scan and copy. And it's cheap.

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

#150

Post by dark-star »

mhb wrote: post #106
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.

~20 year old HP Laserjet 1200 here.

Same. Those things were built to last (at least in the low volumes I use it for). Needs a new cartridge by now (the third I think in 20 years?) but other than that it still runs perfectly fine. And it speaks PCL5 and PS so it's compatible with everything, from the Amiga to the latest Windows 11 (and of course Linux).
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