i have a kodak esp 3 printer only use it to print off car insurance stuff and holiday boarding passes and stuff,

well its 4 years old and everytime i go to use it the ink has dried out .

so i go on holiday tomorrow and you guessed it the printer dried out so after paying £20 on ink the bloody head is shagged dew to the ink drying out ,

took it up the road to local shop and he tried to clean it out but its shagged so need a printer where the ink don,t dry out every 6 mths lol

not gonna get another kodak i think there crap what do you guys use and how long does the ink last

 

Me too, a wifi one please.

 

Try and avoid fancy desktop photo printers these use pigment ink and that's the problem try and find a dye based ink printer these don't dry out as quick and can sit for months.

I run my own printing company

 

in the specs most don,t say dye ink or pigment ink ?????

 

That's the problem mate I expected that to be the case. It's normally fancy photo printers that use pigment ink and I would expect colour office printers to use dye inks these are generally cheaper ink to buy also. Obviously the printers I use are abit bigger but the inks don't change that much from your home printer to the large format inkjets I use.

HP are known to use dye inks on their cheaper range I will see what I can find.

 

The HP Deskjet 3050A is a dye ink printer tesco have it for around £36 online! Can't go wrong with that, Most hp deskjet printers from what I can see use dye based ink. If it takes HP 301 cartridges then its dye regardless of the printer model.

If you want to print photos they won't last for long unless framed they will fade but for documents and generally stuff around the home I would expect it to be fine.

Hope that helps mate.

 

Sorry to jump on thread thunder.....

But is this any good for a all in one
http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/hp-des...62065-pdt.html

 

If you don't need colour, I've used Canon b/w laser printers for the last few years and they are excellent. You just buy a new one when the cartridge runs out, but it lasts for ages.

If you want a cheap-ish version, there's this one:


And for the more expensive, this does automatic double siding (and 6400 pages from the dearer cartridge):


I paid just £87 delivered for a (brand new) LBP6650dn a few months ago and it's been brilliant.

No use if you need colour of course though.

 

Dont get an HP , i bought one for exactly the same reasons that u stated , and allough i use mine rarely , it goes through ink like its free. Next time i will buy the cheepest one i can find that comes with free ink !

 

I bought the hp deskjet 2050a from asda lastnight for £25 so if the ink is to much to replace i will just ditch the printer

 

Monopolys and mergers really need to look at this situation in general. Nowadays it is as cheap to buy a new printer of the same brand than to replace the ink with their oem replacements.

 

I can recommend this bloke!

 

Recently bought an Epson SX235W all in one. Cheap to buy, run (excellent compatible inks)and does a pretty good job of everything.

 

thanks for all your help

my bruv has a hp4500 and his ink is over 18mths old as he hardly uses it like me

i used it yesterday and he reacons it not been used for 8 mths

will look into the numbers for inks on hp

i don,t mind paying £100 as long as it lasts longer than my kodak

 

I recently bought this - http://www.argos.co.uk/m/static/Prod...s|14418969.htm
Cracking printer for the money

 

This is the plan i have (next time)

there must be something wrong with mine as i only printed 6 A4 color photos per set of ink. As it was over a period of a year it was out off warrenty and i just have to put up with it. It costs me a fortune for the amout i use it.Cheap and cheerful next time for me.

 

Get an HP Laser Jet b/w printer. Cheap as chips and cartridges last for 4000 pages and cost £29. Gave up colour a long time ago.

dl

 

I bought a Canon MX410 from Staples who were doing them for £39. The cartridges are £10 b&W and £12 colour from Amazon (original Canon ones). We dont use it all that much - did loads for our wedding and it coped well but now the odd map etc like the OP.

Has wifi, scanner, fax, photocopy, duplex printing (manual but with on screen instructions so a piece of cake).

We had a HP Laserjet before that just died and lasers are too pricey for occasional use especially when you know at some point you will need to use colour. I bought some cheapy asda photo paper and was suprised how good pics came out. The wife did all the wedding stationary with it.