I have been monitoring this site for some time and finally have registered. This is a great informative forum with many great contributors.
But I feel somewhat left out and suspect many are in the same class as me.
that class of people being defined as...............
1. We have ink jet printers but don't print in high enough volumes where we want to learn or endure the mess of refilling our own cartridges.
2. Many of us have inkjet printers of the Epson or Canon brand. Which means the printhead is not in the cartridge. Which means non-OEM replacement ink tanks are
not only a highly competitive market but are almost dirt cheap. Futher cartridge economy not neded at those prices. ( A different experience is had with those folks with the printhead on the cartridge--after market cartridges simply don't offer the huge savings )
3. That our complaint is that not enough unbiased testing of the plethora of these non-oem brands occurs on this site. (I do note some recent work was done with bulkinkjet and wired beans cartridges but many of the posts quickly degenerated
into how refillable they were and some testers sinply drained the ink that came with
the replacement cartridge and then ran their own tests.)
4. Since there is an inate interest conflict with those that refiill and those that simply buy non-oem cartridges and use them, maybe this topic should be split into the two camps. Not that cross polination could not occur but each group could be more focused.
As for me, I recently bough a canon ip4000 and still am on the original cartridges. But will be in the market soon. I also have a lexmark printer I mainly use for an outgoing fax machine. Its simply too expensive to print with the lexmark so I share the Canon over a 2 computer lan. But really major league confused on what non-oem cartridges to buy for the Canon ip4000. .........Well lets see, there is accstation, abucus, aqx, inkgrabber, wiredbeans, and a huge variety of others.
Speaking for myself in order of priority
a. I want to know that these non-oem cartridges will be safe for my printer. What good does it do to save a few bucks and ruin a $100+ printer if the cartridge leaks into your printer big time or clogs your print head. And yes I know of the Magnusson act which gives precisely that specific out for the printer manufacturer.-----In that latter case its between you and non-oem cartridge manufacturer. But leakage happens in rare cases with OEM and non OEM cartridges. But what is the track record of the non-OEM cartridge vendor when that happens?
b. I want a contact telephone number with the vendor and knowledgable personnel.
(I do note one vendor recommended on this forum had some girl answering the telephone who denied Lexmark cartridges had sponges in them. Another vendor recommended on your site seems to have no phone number, does not answer e-mails, so X that vendor from my short list. )
c. I want to have some sort of assurance that the vendor is not perpetually changing his own suppliers. You may order once and get great results and then order at some later date and get totally different results.
d. Even though I may soon get rid of my Lexmark and replace it with a more print economical fax machine, I would prefer a vendor who deals in a wide variety of cartridges and is flexable. That to save on shipping if I also need cartridges for multiple printer brands. Also not too happy to see a fairly good deal on Canon cartridges but I have to buy some photocyan cartridges I don't need or buy a bci-6bk seperately because its not included in the package.
e. After talking about the above four items, then we can talk about how well the cartridge prints. Do users experience significant banding, does the cartridge print consistantly start to empty, what about the color match to OEM inks.
f. And yes the tester should mention how refillable the cartridge is AS AN AFTER THOUGHT.
And I can just hear some readers sayin Osage wants all this and for free........ya right and dream on. But I do note I would be willing to chip in to get some of the first class testers on this site to run some comprehensive tests along these lines. If enough people will also chip in enough cash could be raised to purchase the cartridges and also compensate the testers without hitting anyone hard. The kind of people power only the internet offers.
Just tossing this out as an idea.
But I feel somewhat left out and suspect many are in the same class as me.
that class of people being defined as...............
1. We have ink jet printers but don't print in high enough volumes where we want to learn or endure the mess of refilling our own cartridges.
2. Many of us have inkjet printers of the Epson or Canon brand. Which means the printhead is not in the cartridge. Which means non-OEM replacement ink tanks are
not only a highly competitive market but are almost dirt cheap. Futher cartridge economy not neded at those prices. ( A different experience is had with those folks with the printhead on the cartridge--after market cartridges simply don't offer the huge savings )
3. That our complaint is that not enough unbiased testing of the plethora of these non-oem brands occurs on this site. (I do note some recent work was done with bulkinkjet and wired beans cartridges but many of the posts quickly degenerated
into how refillable they were and some testers sinply drained the ink that came with
the replacement cartridge and then ran their own tests.)
4. Since there is an inate interest conflict with those that refiill and those that simply buy non-oem cartridges and use them, maybe this topic should be split into the two camps. Not that cross polination could not occur but each group could be more focused.
As for me, I recently bough a canon ip4000 and still am on the original cartridges. But will be in the market soon. I also have a lexmark printer I mainly use for an outgoing fax machine. Its simply too expensive to print with the lexmark so I share the Canon over a 2 computer lan. But really major league confused on what non-oem cartridges to buy for the Canon ip4000. .........Well lets see, there is accstation, abucus, aqx, inkgrabber, wiredbeans, and a huge variety of others.
Speaking for myself in order of priority
a. I want to know that these non-oem cartridges will be safe for my printer. What good does it do to save a few bucks and ruin a $100+ printer if the cartridge leaks into your printer big time or clogs your print head. And yes I know of the Magnusson act which gives precisely that specific out for the printer manufacturer.-----In that latter case its between you and non-oem cartridge manufacturer. But leakage happens in rare cases with OEM and non OEM cartridges. But what is the track record of the non-OEM cartridge vendor when that happens?
b. I want a contact telephone number with the vendor and knowledgable personnel.
(I do note one vendor recommended on this forum had some girl answering the telephone who denied Lexmark cartridges had sponges in them. Another vendor recommended on your site seems to have no phone number, does not answer e-mails, so X that vendor from my short list. )
c. I want to have some sort of assurance that the vendor is not perpetually changing his own suppliers. You may order once and get great results and then order at some later date and get totally different results.
d. Even though I may soon get rid of my Lexmark and replace it with a more print economical fax machine, I would prefer a vendor who deals in a wide variety of cartridges and is flexable. That to save on shipping if I also need cartridges for multiple printer brands. Also not too happy to see a fairly good deal on Canon cartridges but I have to buy some photocyan cartridges I don't need or buy a bci-6bk seperately because its not included in the package.
e. After talking about the above four items, then we can talk about how well the cartridge prints. Do users experience significant banding, does the cartridge print consistantly start to empty, what about the color match to OEM inks.
f. And yes the tester should mention how refillable the cartridge is AS AN AFTER THOUGHT.
And I can just hear some readers sayin Osage wants all this and for free........ya right and dream on. But I do note I would be willing to chip in to get some of the first class testers on this site to run some comprehensive tests along these lines. If enough people will also chip in enough cash could be raised to purchase the cartridges and also compensate the testers without hitting anyone hard. The kind of people power only the internet offers.
Just tossing this out as an idea.