Jamo

iTrader: (23)

just got round to going for some ink for the printer, went to pc world, wtf!!! how much? £34.99

I found a printer in store with ink for £25.99. granted it was a cheapy, but im sure it worked ok.....

anyway done some hunting and found this so thought I would share with you.

cost me £8 for a black and a colour, and they work brilliant, no difference at all, oh apart from cost!!

http://www.tonik.co.uk/

jamo

Apparition

Are these generic ones you are talking about ? do you use them for everyday printing or photo printing ?

Jamo

iTrader: (23)

mainly photos mate, ive just done a dvd cover and it came out spot on

so well chuffed.

Nimbus

I've bough an ink refill pack from PC World. Costs £10 and you can refill the cartrage upto 6 times. Had great results so far after refilling twice. Not tried the colour one yet but got it ready in case.

Iain Young

Be very careful using refills. The cartridges are not designed to be refilled, and the filters can easily become mucky / blocked causing clogging problems in printer jets. I've seen it happen lots of times, and personally I wouldn't touch them (not worth the risk IMO).

Luckily, the Canon printer I've got uses a different cartridge for each colour, (rather than one colour cartridge containing all the different inks), so if one colour runs out you just have to replace the single colour. Much cheaper to run and they seem to last a lot longer than other printers I've had (Epson, HP etc).

Nimbus

Iain,

Fair comment. So far we've not had any problems and it's already paid for itself twice over. If I have to bin the cartedge before I get 6 re-fills out of it I won't complain

Iain Young

Trouble is that if it blocks, you'll probably need a new print head, not just a catridge...

Nimbus

I'll take that chance

Iain Young

Like to live life on the edge eh

Nimbus

sometime life would bt too boring if you didn't take the odd risk...

_Meridian_

iTrader: (1)

There's a reason official cartridges are so expensive: it's because the printers are sold at cost to the manufacturer as competition is so stiff. The only way they can make money is to sell the cartridges at inflated prices.

We used to refill inkjet cartridges at work years ago but gave up because it was messy, and the refills lasted about 1/3 the time of a new one. Simply wasn't worth it. And commercially re-filled laserjet cartridges are even worse - one on four is faulty.


M

Goochie

OK... I actually design digital ink jet printers and have one thing to say about non-original inks - DONT DO IT!!

The ink in the original cartridges is developed for the specific print head in the machine. For example, a Canon print head operates in a totally different way to an Epson head or a Xaar print head (used in many of the leading brands). You may not see any difference in print quality initially but I am sure you will see a difference when the nozzle clogs, or when you look closely at the print interlacing. Ink manufactures and head manufacturers spend hundreds of thousands of pounds developing inks for a particular design of printer so what are the chances of PC World doing the same??

If you're after cheap originals, try eBay

Nimbus

Not many (myself included) will know about the different ink types for each printer. Like me and many others, they go to PC World, see a original black cartridge for sale at £20 and after swaring, go for the unbranded ones or the refills at half the price. False economy it may turn out to be, but the offical cartidge prices ar very expensive.