Costs of older/newer cartridges

[justing943]

Hi!

Sorry if this is an inappropriate forum for such a basic question, but I was wondering:

I know that with older ink cartridges, when colour cartridges had 3 colours in one, that black was much cheaper than colour, one reason being that colour cartridges needed to be much more intricate to properly hold 3 colours, while the black ones were a simple container that held 1 colour. I'm not sure whether the colours themselves affected the cost.

With newer cartridges, especially laser ones when each colour has its own cartridge, is black still cheaper than colour, and if anyone knows, could you go into a bit of detail about why the colours are more expensive? (involving Chemistry should be okay, my studies in Chemistry involve the chemistry of colours, haha)

Thanks in advance,
Justin

 

[ghwellsjr]

I think in addition to the points you have made that the black cartridge was also cheaper because it only had one set of nozzles and they were usually larger nozzles to accomodate the pigment black ink. The tri-color dye-ink cartridge typically had more nozzles per color and they were smaller.

But I don't think any of this applies for laser printers.

 

[justing943]

Okay cool thanks, the fact that it doesn't apply to laser printers clears up half the queries I had If anyone knows about cost of colours for later printers, the info will be greatly appreciated

 

[TheTonerGuy]

Hi justing943,

Laser cartridges are essentially built the same way regardless of color. Typically, they are also priced the same way. In many cases the price is the same regardless of color.

However, in some cases that is not true. Some manufacturers build black cartridges that have a higher capacity. Therefore, they have more toner and this usually costs more.

Another case can be made for black being used more and thus produced in larger quantities. Therefore, it should cost less.

Confused yet?

Bottom line, you cannot make a general statement that is true in all cases.

Typically you should expect color and black to be approximately the same cost within 10-15%.

TheTonerGuy

 

[justing943]

Awesome thanks! I've had many a 'discussion' with peers about ink costs, and everyone (against me) always maintained that black is heaps cheaper than colour, but I knew I'd read before that wasn't the case. It makes sense now, thanks . Unless I'm still horribly mistaken, black was only cheaper with the much older-style cartridges then :O.

 

[Tudor]

The cli-526(dye) and the pgi-525(pigment) have about the same price, but the pgi contains 2 times more ink than the cli, so the black pigmented ink is about 2 times cheaper than the colored ink.

 

[emmaachile]

but refill ink for pigment black is more expensive than dye colors. It may only apply to oem catridges.

 

[justing943]

Tudor, when you say 2 times more ink, are you referring to the quantity within a cartridge, or what the ink itself is made up of (i.e. how much pigment)?
emmaachile, yeah that's what I noticed once, so I went on thinking black was generally more expensive :O how wrong I was. :L

 

[Tudor]

cli-526 - 9 ml of ink
pgi-525 - 19 ml of ink

only the pgi is pigmented, the rest are dyes

 

[TheTonerGuy]

Hi Justing943,

When I answered your question, I was assumimg you were talking about toners for the same printer. In other words, for any given laser printer black and color are essentially the same price.

However, if you get a black ONLY printer, then the toner for that printer will be much less expensive. This is because the technology required for color lasers involves more expensive toners across the board. All colors are more expensive, including the black. Black only printers have toner formulations which are typically a lot let expensive and also tend to have cartridges with greater page yield. Thus even further reducing the cost.

Overall, use a Black ONLY laser printer whenever you do not need color. Use your color laser printer for color ONLY.

The same is not really true for inkjet.

Hope this further clarifies the situation for you.

Regards,
TheTonerGuy