Earlier quoted context omitted.
How about a third model? Customer replaceable print heads with physically separate customer replaceable and optionally refillable ink tanks of various capacities. Why must such things be mutually exclusive? That said, I switched to a laser printer from Samsung for any printing that I still do. I had a HP photosmart printer for photo prints, but at the volume of a photo a year, it is cheaper to have the photo printed…
We have that in the plotter space and had it for a while in the home space as well. Not sure why we switched away from that model although I'm sure economics were involved. It also goes toward what the other commenter says - many of us would prefer a longer-life printer but the reality is that the mass-market prefers low initial prices and it's hard to put replaceable printheads with reliable plumbing into a low-end…
Isn't that exactly what HP is doing now when they sell a cheap printer with replaceable cartridges that contain ink and a print head? Are you saying the "plumbing" is the difficult part?
I suspect "economics" in this case means they weren't making huge margins on ink cartridges.