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OpenPrinter

opentools.studio

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Re: OpenPrinter

#161

Post by landgenoot »

NooneAtAll3 wrote: post #49
HelloUsername wrote: post #2

Interesting comment from last time this was posted https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48093670 Inkjet printing requires orders of magnitude more engineering expertise, materials science, industry experience and financial resources than most people imagine. That is the reason, open inkjet printers don't exist despite having been consumer products with the same drawbacks for more than forty years. That is why this is…

isn't inkjet an outdated tech by now?

Offices, maybe. Photography, not at all. Some photographers prefer inkjet over minilab.

Re: OpenPrinter

#162

Post by sschueller »

bArray wrote: post #119

> With Openprinter, you are free to choose between standard sheets or a roll of versatile paper. A few other comments have concentrated on the printer head and ink cartridge, but the roll vs sheets interests me. Manipulating sheets of paper is actually quite a difficult problem to solve - and there is only a demonstration of paper placement. Loading page after page is actually really not easy at all. There is no exam…

Pi Zero seems overkill to me for a printer.

Re: OpenPrinter

#163

Post by dotancohen »

abetusk wrote: post #157
HelloUsername wrote: post #2

Interesting comment from last time this was posted https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48093670 Inkjet printing requires orders of magnitude more engineering expertise, materials science, industry experience and financial resources than most people imagine. That is the reason, open inkjet printers don't exist despite having been consumer products with the same drawbacks for more than forty years. That is why this is…

I certainly don't have deep knowledge in this area but my understanding is that the cartridge is basically a cavity with a small hole at the bottom and a piezo electric element at the top to sputter liquid down. The tolerances are tight but considering how advanced manufacturing is, I would imagine someone competent could design and prototype it with the tools and manufacturing ecosystem that's available now. There's…

This printer uses HP 502 cartridges. Readily available, but don't expect to save on ink costs compared to a regular HP printer.

They do claim that this printer will print in black when the colour cartridge is empty, which they imply is not possible with common printers. The only time I ever encountered that I simply removed the colour cartridge and the printer was happy to print in black.

Re: OpenPrinter

#165

Post by dotancohen »

rubidium wrote: post #6
HelloUsername wrote: post #2

Interesting comment from last time this was posted https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48093670 Inkjet printing requires orders of magnitude more engineering expertise, materials science, industry experience and financial resources than most people imagine. That is the reason, open inkjet printers don't exist despite having been consumer products with the same drawbacks for more than forty years. That is why this is…

99% of this is the printhead and the ink formulation. Assuming you use generic off the shelf solutions for those two components you’re set. All the printer companies do their lock in at the firmware and software layer.

At the 2400 DPI that an HP printer can handle, the printer needs to place the head at 1/100 mm precision three times for every single dot on the page, and not smear them, despite not knowing what thickness or weight or finish the paper has. That is not trivial.

Re: OpenPrinter

#166

Post by Double_a_92 »

etdznots wrote: post #146
HelloUsername wrote: post #2

Interesting comment from last time this was posted https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48093670 Inkjet printing requires orders of magnitude more engineering expertise, materials science, industry experience and financial resources than most people imagine. That is the reason, open inkjet printers don't exist despite having been consumer products with the same drawbacks for more than forty years. That is why this is…

Lol then 3D printing must be space technology that only the most advanced materials labs in the world can achieve, yeah inkjet is not simple, but it’s also not magic,

The issue is mainly the nozzle. Ironically 3D printers are a lot easier there, since you just need to melt a thick wire, and not worry about microscopically small droplets.

Re: OpenPrinter

#167

Post by keithnz »

Alien1Being wrote: post #156

Laser printers are so much more economical. I use Brother black and white laser printer with after market toner cartridges from eBay . Print around 200 pages a day. Around 5000 pages for 37 AUD ie around 25 USD. The paper costs more per page than the toner. Just make sure you stay away from HP branded printers...

yeah, I have a cheap brother laser printer, I don't print that much, but it's been solid for several years. I did have an HP, but it was incredibly problematic, would jam rather easily. Works fine under linux as well.

Re: OpenPrinter

#168

Post by ssl-3 »

Snacklive wrote: post #73
zerobees wrote: post #69

I think the top-ranking comment about complexity is off base: they're not inventing inkjet printing from scratch. It's basically a bunch of existing modules in a new package, presumably with the promise that you will not need to buy subscriptions or DRMed ink cartridges. Is robustness and reparability a compelling pitch? If I'm counting right, I owned eight different printers in my life. Dot matrix, dye sublimation,…

Do you have any recommendations for models or what should i look out for ? My mom wanted a printer for her birthday and it's been a few months without any success when it comes to selecting the right model

If she wants to print words or shapes on paper, then a laser printer is perfect. If non-photographic color is also useful, then a color laser printer is fine. They're happy with heavy usage, and ~zero usage, and everything in between. Brother is the answer here; they tend to be low-bullshit.

If she wants to print color photographs regularly and absolutely doesn't want to wait for them, then: Some manner of inkjet. Brother inkjets take care of themselves (as long as they're powered up) with a ~daily automated song-and-dance to help avoid the head-clogging issue that many other inkjets face, but even then it's a more fickle technology than laser printing is.

It's also important to compare the price/convenience of printing photos at home to having someone else do it. Buying high-quality prints (whether from online services that deliver by mail or from the local pharmacy or big box) can be cheaper and better quality than doing it at home, and make maintaining the printing machine someone else's problem.

(edit- I unintentionally left it to implication, but: If she wants to print color photographs only once or twice per year, then... she's probably way, way better off by not doing that at home. At all.)

Re: OpenPrinter

#169

Post by Arainach »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #77
tjohns wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the technology side, I'm somewhat hopeful because it looks like they're using off-the-shelf HP ink cartridges for this. HP cartridges embed the printhead into the cartridge itself, and that printhead is arguably the most complicated part of the entire device. Outsource the printhead, and you're just designing a plotter with a PCL interface. I agree that the bigger challenge is going to be patents. It also wouldn't…

> I agree that the bigger challenge is going to be patents. Surely most/all of the patents around the actual inkjet printing function have expired though, right? I had inkjet printers in the mid 00s and if anything I feel like your average inkjet is worse these days.

In medicine, it's a regular trick to find some new patentable formulation or tweak to switch to manufacturing shortly before the original patents expire, so that you continue to have a patent-protected product.

It would not surprise me if something similar was happening here: HP's current cartridges have at least one piece that is under active patent protection and they don't manufacture any designs that have no patent protection. I don't know enough to state that's the case, but it wouldn't surprise me.

Re: OpenPrinter

#170

Post by 4gotunameagain »

bri3d wrote: post #125
tjohns wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the technology side, I'm somewhat hopeful because it looks like they're using off-the-shelf HP ink cartridges for this. HP cartridges embed the printhead into the cartridge itself, and that printhead is arguably the most complicated part of the entire device. Outsource the printhead, and you're just designing a plotter with a PCL interface. I agree that the bigger challenge is going to be patents. It also wouldn't…

Impression v. Lexmark is directly relevant to the patent situation here; in a case involving reprogrammed ink cartridges, the Supreme Court held that patent rights are exhausted by first sale doctrine; that is, if you sell me something patented, you can't sue me for patent infringement for using the thing you sold me, even if I do something later that makes you upset. It's also been widely held that ink cartridge com…

A sea of patents designed to inhibit competition & promote rent extraction, and we are running around in circles chasing our tails wondering how we can compete with China.
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