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HP Ink Costs More Than Human Blood
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Negative Decibel
2[H]4U
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the whole comparing the cost of ink to blood is really stupid to me. Of course it is; I donate blood all of the time. If people sold blood instead of giving it away, than I am sure things could be a little more even. Really it's all about the laws of supply and demand. Economics 101, people!
You donate blood for free or maybe even for a cookie and a small juice. But the people taking your blood sells it to someone who needs it, thus it cost someone money for blood.
Negative Decibel
2[H]4U
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i agree with your statement, however blood replenishes it's self; practically an infinite supply, and is given away voluntary.
ink is manufactured, and people are payed to make it.
Parmenides
Supreme [H]ardness
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- Apr 25, 2006
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I wouldn't be surprised if taking your printing to walgreens or Sams ends up cheaper.
ProfessorKaos64
[H]ard|Gawd
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Agree 100 percent. Get yourself a SOHO laser printer and while the toner for the laser is a little more but man do you get your money's worth.
silentbrain
Weaksauce
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- Jul 7, 2005
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Yeah, but blood needs to be maintained and stored properly, not to mention tested for diseases. Then there's the cost of running the facilities and paying the staff, that is if they get paid at all. It's not an assembly line, like it is with ink. I figure it takes a lot longer to draw an amount of blood than it does to produce the equivalent amount of ink carts.
Replenishing blood means paying for more food, also.
Blood is constantly going bad, to boot.
Enduring_Warrior
[H]ard|Gawd
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Penn and Teller have a few good episode when they talk about some ridiculous things that only the dumbest persons would believe. I know. You'd be surprised.
Most of what they do is go Michael Moore style take part of the truth and then use it as their own excuse to make comedy in their show. At least that's better than what Moore does.
defuseme2k
[H]ard|Gawd
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- Oct 7, 2004
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- 1,074
It amazes me how much people do not know about the economics of printing in general. Working for an office store for 5+ years (staples -- no longer.. was a few years ago) I saw just about everything under the sun as far as printers go. You also learn how things are hawked at customers and their ignorance is played against them, just like extended warranties and buying any product where its end result is getting you into a subscription plan on the consumables. Its just rape. You will get no argument from me on laser printers, but that just plays into a larger point. I'm going to completely ignore refilling cartridges as well, because this assumes you do not care about longetivity of photo printing or benefits to OEM ink -- so there is no point in even addressing it. Printing is all about upfront investment, which is why lasers are the cheapest in the long run with the most upfront investment, but cheap 50$ printers will eat you alive in ink if you're dumb enough to buy one when you print every day.
Cheap inkjets are stupid to buy if you actually want to print often. If you print very irregularly, you can get away with a cheap printer, assuming you do print at least often enough to keep the ink jet heads from drying or clogging. Just like buying a cheap cellular plan or a pay as you go, it costs more in the long haul, but only if you use it in the wrong case. Doing a pay as you go plan and using a thousand minutes a month is just fucking stupid. The point of the printer costing less than the cartridge is rather ignorant as well, I won't swear its always the case, but 99% of the time when you buy a cheap printer that appears to cost less than its cartridge isn't magic. It's because the cartridge you get has very little ink in it compared with the one you buy off the shelf to replace it. This allows them to give you a cartridge to make sure the printer works and print a few things, and for store demos without costing them very much, so throwing the printer away and replacing compared to replacing the cartridge is actually even more expensive.
If you're not a complete cheap-o and you actually pay for the printer you need, especially if you need color, then buying a higher end inkjet is actually worthwhile. It isn't only print speed and print quality, but ink cost also comes into play. Certainly, in most cases for home users who print a photo every few weeks -- they do not need laser printers, although if you can find a good deal it might be worth the extra money. Just don't get the sticker shock when you've printed for 2 years and then need to buy a 100$ toner cartridge. Multiple toners for color laser, and then the drum might have to be replaced after a few years depending on your use. The ink cartridge replacements for higher end inkjet printers are just as expensive as the cartridges for the cheaper models, but the cartridges contain more ink and sometimes technologies that increase page count. I suggest when shopping you check the replacement cartridges cost and page counts. Just like EPA ratings on milage, take it with a grain of salt-- but you can certainly use it to compare printer brands. Its also worth making sure you check to see if the print head is permanent, replaced on every cartridge, or has to be replaced every so often. HP's method of replacing it on every cartridge purchase -- I agree it can be the wrong way to go, but sometimes it is worth it since the cartridges that are just ink tanks can evaporate more quickly. If you actually divide out page counts it can be even more economical than the other methods, as long as you factor in the fact the printer head might die which means a new printer (like some Epson models), or the cost of it after you've printed enough. You certainly can't compare an HP cartridge directly to a printer cartridge where the printer head is replaced every so often, its just not an apples to apples comparison. I'm not pro HP, but there are other pros and cons aside from cost. For instance, especially the higher end HP printers are far more reliable than other brands from my experience.
Cheap inkjets are stupid to buy if you actually want to print often. If you print very irregularly, you can get away with a cheap printer, assuming you do print at least often enough to keep the ink jet heads from drying or clogging. Just like buying a cheap cellular plan or a pay as you go, it costs more in the long haul, but only if you use it in the wrong case. Doing a pay as you go plan and using a thousand minutes a month is just fucking stupid. The point of the printer costing less than the cartridge is rather ignorant as well, I won't swear its always the case, but 99% of the time when you buy a cheap printer that appears to cost less than its cartridge isn't magic. It's because the cartridge you get has very little ink in it compared with the one you buy off the shelf to replace it. This allows them to give you a cartridge to make sure the printer works and print a few things, and for store demos without costing them very much, so throwing the printer away and replacing compared to replacing the cartridge is actually even more expensive.
If you're not a complete cheap-o and you actually pay for the printer you need, especially if you need color, then buying a higher end inkjet is actually worthwhile. It isn't only print speed and print quality, but ink cost also comes into play. Certainly, in most cases for home users who print a photo every few weeks -- they do not need laser printers, although if you can find a good deal it might be worth the extra money. Just don't get the sticker shock when you've printed for 2 years and then need to buy a 100$ toner cartridge. Multiple toners for color laser, and then the drum might have to be replaced after a few years depending on your use. The ink cartridge replacements for higher end inkjet printers are just as expensive as the cartridges for the cheaper models, but the cartridges contain more ink and sometimes technologies that increase page count. I suggest when shopping you check the replacement cartridges cost and page counts. Just like EPA ratings on milage, take it with a grain of salt-- but you can certainly use it to compare printer brands. Its also worth making sure you check to see if the print head is permanent, replaced on every cartridge, or has to be replaced every so often. HP's method of replacing it on every cartridge purchase -- I agree it can be the wrong way to go, but sometimes it is worth it since the cartridges that are just ink tanks can evaporate more quickly. If you actually divide out page counts it can be even more economical than the other methods, as long as you factor in the fact the printer head might die which means a new printer (like some Epson models), or the cost of it after you've printed enough. You certainly can't compare an HP cartridge directly to a printer cartridge where the printer head is replaced every so often, its just not an apples to apples comparison. I'm not pro HP, but there are other pros and cons aside from cost. For instance, especially the higher end HP printers are far more reliable than other brands from my experience.
3rd party is your friend, if you can wait for the cartridges to be shipped.
Carrot Ink
LaserMonks
I've used both of these companies for 3rd party cartridges for my Epson and Canon printers and they're both pretty good.
However, with my Canon iP6600 (which, with some tweaks, also prints on CDs/DVDs directly) that I've had for the past couple of years, I've gotten into refilling the cartridges and resetting the chips. It cost me about 30 bucks altogether for one black (three 30ml bottle of black ink) and one color (one 30ml bottle each of cyan, magenta, and yellow) ink refill kit (both came with the necessary accessories to refill) and another 30 bucks for a Canon CLI-8 chip resetter, but I figure I've already saved at least twice that already (and have plenty of ink in the refill kits left). The only downside is that I still have to purchase the Canon OEM "photo" cyan and "photo" magenta cartridges, since I still can't find 3rd party equivalents, but I don't have to change them very often (1-2 times a year, at most).
That's just f**king wasteful...spend a little time and effort and get a solid printer that you can get good deals on 3rd party ink or are able to refill the cartridges.
Good Lord...
Recycling has less to do with profitability or cost effectiveness and more to do with responsible consumerism. Remember that what you're too trifling and lazy to recycle is what your kids will inherit.
What will really blow you mind is what some people actually toss into a landfill dumpster. Want to see ignorant people in action? Visit a landfill.
AaronP
[H]F Junkie
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- Jan 13, 2005
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- 11,527
Yeah for my printer, even on those sites I still saved $10 buying a new printer.
My next printer will definitely be a black laser though, I don't print very often but my Dad knows people who can refill a toner cartridge for cheap.temujin987
[H]ard|Gawd
- Joined
- Jun 24, 2008
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- 1,351
that's why i switched to a laser printer. i only print black/white and not that often. if i print maybe one or two pages per week (since i hate the waste of resources by printing. i do as much as possible with digital documents) that canon printer would just clean the printing heads and waste loads of ink. and the printouts had white lines across the page every other centimeter. could have been a crappy printer, but then i switched to a cheap laser printer for 80 bucks 5 years ago. awesome. i'm still using the toner cartridge that came with it, that's how little i print.
if people i got at work are about an average, then i'd say people need to get a clue and learn how to put two files next to each other on screen or use excel in a better way to compare data instead of printing loads of pages and manually go through it. what absolutely makes me sick are people who make some really low sophisticated spreadsheet, print it (without setting the margins properly so you get 4 pages instead of just one), take a look at it for five secons, then throw the pages away.
if people i got at work are about an average, then i'd say people need to get a clue and learn how to put two files next to each other on screen or use excel in a better way to compare data instead of printing loads of pages and manually go through it. what absolutely makes me sick are people who make some really low sophisticated spreadsheet, print it (without setting the margins properly so you get 4 pages instead of just one), take a look at it for five secons, then throw the pages away.