Beware of cheap ink!

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Recently I needed ink for my computer. We seem to use a lot around here. I have a Canon BJC-2010 which has seperate cartridges for color and black. The ink is not as expensive as most brands, but when I went to buy some, I found twin packs of replacement cartridges for aa little more than 1/2 price. 2 color cartridges were about $20 and 2 black were $11. Normally the color is about $14-16 and the black is about $8-10 for 1 cartridge. So I bought them, and they are lousy. Most of the colors are off. I don't think the red is even working, the black smears very badly. It is not the printer, when I put in a name-brand cartridge, it works fine. There is a guarantee on the package, so I am going to contact them. Just thought I would let you know that if you buy these replacement cartridges, save your receipt!

-- Melissa in SE Ohio (me@home.net), March 21, 2002

Answers

You may have gotten them on sale because they were outdated. That is so disappointing.

-- Ann Markson (tngreenacres@hotmail.com), March 21, 2002.

I like the refills,, work fine,, so far,, and was ALOT cheaper than buying nre cartridges. Though,, if you go thru ALOT of them,, SAMS club carries packages of them, like 10 to a pack

-- Stan (sopal@net-pert.com), March 21, 2002.

I don't know if they are outdated, they are just an off-brand. They do have a 100% guarantee, so I am going to contact them about it. I was hoping they would work.

We use about 2 blacks and 1 color cartridge every 2 months. Sometimes a little more often if the kids are working on a big project. How long would the ink in a 10 pack be good for?

-- Melissa in SE Ohio (me@home.net), March 21, 2002.


Melissa, I'm not sure about a 10 pack - haven't seen one of those - but Phil refills our cartridges all the time. I would guess it costs about 1/4 of what it would cost to buy new cartridges! You might check into it. I'll have him email you later - I know he has some special tricks that he does to make refilling easier.

-- Cheryl in KS (cherylmccoy@rocketmail.com), March 21, 2002.

I started refilling mine after paying more for cartridges than what I could buy the printer with cartridges for. My Lexmark printer has color and black cartridges and they don't last long. Both of them together cost $65+ most places. For that price, I can buy the same exact printer with catridges. I guess they keep the profit margins low on the printer in hopes of making you a steady customer of their overpriced ink carts. It's somewhat outrageous that they charge so much for a few dollars worth of ink.

I saw Target is selling refill kits now though the price is a bit more than what you can buy online.

-- Dave (multiplierx9@hotmail.com), March 21, 2002.



Bought ink from a company we found online, comes in pint bottles, and we refill cartridges on both our Lexmark and the Xerox printers we have, works great. Initial expense was high, but this is enough ink to last us for years, probably! Jan

-- Jan in Co (Janice12@aol.com), March 21, 2002.

Do you have a link for that site, Jan?

I have a Lexmark also and the cartridges are expensive, but I've not found a suitable substitute.

Would appreciate the info. Thanks.

-- Michaela (flhomestead@hotmail.com), March 21, 2002.


I've been buying refilled cartridges for my HP Deskjet at a nice savings but I'd sure be interested in some detailed instructions, Cheryl or whoever else, on refilling them. I hate spending what I consider to be a huge amount on ink.

-- Rosalie (Dee) in IN (deatline@globalsite.net), March 21, 2002.

Hey all, I just found this forum a couple of days ago and am so enjoying reading everyone's posts. We refill our Lexmark printer cartridges also. Here's the website I use http://www.oddparts.com/

In addition to selling ink, it has great advice on how to refill cartridges. Two things I've learned the hard way. There are different qualities of ink--for our purposes, a better-quality ink worked better. And second, sponge-based cartridges are MUCH easier to refill than vacuum-based cartridges. My mom's HP printer uses vacuum-based cartridges and we've had a lot of trouble getting them refilled properly. Whereas, our little Lexmark sponge cartridge just soaks that ink right up.....well, like a sponge, lol.

-- Dee from Illinois (nospam@nospam.com), March 21, 2002.


Melissa, how long a cartridge lasts also depends upon your printer settings. In our Epson Stylus we set it to fast (least amount of ink) as the default and the quality is excellent. We almost never use high quality (although it sometimes will do so when printing something directly from the net). Hope this helps.

-- GT (nospam@nospam.com), March 21, 2002.


Yes Gt, on mine you can set "print quality" and we use medium. It looks just as good. These ink tanks are pretty small, actually the smallest ones I have seen. So I think they last pretty long for how much we use it. I use it for pre-school, the library, printing recipes and stuff from here, and one of the kids uses it almost every night. So I am happy with the amount of time it lasts, just not the qualtiy of the color with these replacement cartrdges.

-- Melissa in SE Ohio (me@home.net), March 21, 2002.

For computer ink, your MUST try this site. The ink is Perfect. I did a lot of comparing of ink before we published a 500 page book. The black is a deep rich black and the colors I use at home are very good. Cost?? $18 a Pint! That is a Lot of refills.Also they have a great kit for filling HP carts through the print head. This clears the head and eliminates drilling and pluging holes. Check it out. URL is http://global-inks.com/

-- Okie Tom (tombasin@alltel.net), March 21, 2002.

Thanks Okie Tom for the suggestion on the HP cartridges!! I'll definitely look into the kit. Nothing worse than not getting the vaccum reset and watching the ink just ooze right back out.

-- Dee from Illiniois (a_tweedledee@hotmail.com), March 22, 2002.

Global inks is where we got ours, too. An odd thing, tho. When we were at the state fair, where we got our first refill kit, we were told by the rep there that ALL printer inks were the same, that you don't need specific ink for each printer, etc. However, there are permanent and non permanent black inks. This I know because we purchased both, and the permanent ink doesn't smudge or smear when it gets wet. It certainly saves you a lot. The only thing I've learned after doing this for about three years, is not to put as much ink in as it says too! Jan

-- Jan in Co (Janiced12@aol.com), March 22, 2002.

Ooops, forgot to mention. Filling cartridge thru the print head only works for Black cartridge.Go to their home page. They have several filling aids.

-- Okie Tom (tombasin@alltel.net), March 22, 2002.


purchased a pack with black and color cartridges two new color cartridges did not work had to go to staples for one twice as much but it worked.. back to the multiple pack from sams one black did not work either i did not save reciept and the store is 35 miles away bennie in penna.

-- (bigb@bigbhive.com), August 12, 2002.

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