# printer cartridge refills?



## Soils4Peace (Mar 14, 2010)

Anyone with experience refilling ink cartridges? What works, what doesn't? Is it worth the trouble?


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## Berubeland (Sep 6, 2009)

I've refilled cartridges before, some places you can buy the cartridges, without bringing your old ones in. 

They are usually about 50% price of the new ones and work exactly the same


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## the-royal-mail (Dec 11, 2009)

Best solution? Get a laser. Toner lasts way longer, produces better results, and I got this samsung laser on sale 1-2 yrs ago for $90. B&W, colour too expensive. I did the whole cartridge dance for a while and got tired of constantly paying $20-30 for cartridges. I have not yet needed to swap out the toner on this thing, it does over 1000 prints IIRC.


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## Dana (Nov 17, 2009)

We always go to the local cartridge recycling place now. I take in my empty cartridge, the owner goes into the back and brings out a recycled-but-refilled-cartridge identical to mine. He keeps my empty one. I give him $10 for the full one. New toner cartridges (black toner) cost me $60 for 3 at Costco or approximately $25 each at electronic/business supply stores (Best Buy, Staples etc) so I think it is a great deal.


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## CanadianCapitalist (Mar 31, 2009)

the-royal-mail said:


> Best solution? Get a laser. Toner lasts way longer, produces better results, and I got this samsung laser on sale 1-2 yrs ago for $90. B&W, colour too expensive. I did the whole cartridge dance for a while and got tired of constantly paying $20-30 for cartridges. I have not yet needed to swap out the toner on this thing, it does over 1000 prints IIRC.


I agree. I've owned inkjets before but now I'm a fan of laser printers. Inkjets follow the sell the razor cheap and the cartridges dear model. You pay a bit more for a laser but the printing cost per page is much lower.


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## bltman (Aug 12, 2010)

+1

For black text, nothing can beat a laser printer. Only reason to have an inkjet is if you print your own photos. If you do print your own photos, depending on the the ink used to refill the cartridges, it may not be the longest lasting stuff.


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## brad (May 22, 2009)

As someone with very limited shelf space, I've been using one of those multifunction machines (copier, scanner, printer, fax) for the past few years; they're much better than they used to be. Do laser multifunction machines exist or are they only available in inkjet? I would need to print in colour as well as B&W.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

brad said:


> As someone with very limited shelf space, I've been using one of those multifunction machines (copier, scanner, printer, fax) for the past few years; they're much better than they used to be. Do laser multifunction machines exist or are they only available in inkjet? I would need to print in colour as well as B&W.


A colour laser multifunction machine would be pretty costly. Think $1k for a decent one.


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## wheel (Jun 22, 2010)

Yeah, to get all that in one package you have to go 'cheap' on everything, thus the reason most of those are inkjet machines.

If you watch the staples sales you can get laser printers dirt cheap, including colour lasers. But like inkjet's colour toners are a bit pricey. The kids have one but I encourage them to keep the colour printing to a minimum.

In terms of printing photos, really? It's probably cheaper, easier, and better quality to head into wallie world with your media chip and print them off there. Like a dime per print or something. 

Speaking of photos, am I the only one left who still hollers at their kids to stop wasting the film in the camera?


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

wheel said:


> Speaking of photos, am I the only one left who still hollers at their kids to stop wasting the film in the camera?


Yes


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## the-royal-mail (Dec 11, 2009)

Actually guys, a friend was talking to someone at the 1hr photo lab recently and was told that they are still processing quite a bit of film. Imagine that. I don't know anyone who uses film anymore. 

My suspicion is that this film is being brought in by photography students using 35mm manual SLRs. Those are still the best tool to teach someone how cameras really work.

I can't imagine who else would need/want to bother with film at this point. Digital cameras are good now.

Oh and I also agree regarding prints. I just move the images onto a USB stick and bring that to the machine and copy the images that way, a week later they call me to say the prints are in. They cost about $0.19 a piece, paper and everything. The costs of printing at home are much higher, for lesser quality. Why anyone bothers is beyond me. There's no money to be saved, and your time is lost forever as you frig around with colour printing.


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## Four Pillars (Apr 5, 2009)

My mother-in-law has a film camera. My mom just got a digital camera last year.


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

the-royal-mail said:


> Oh and I also agree regarding prints. I just move the images onto a USB stick and bring that to the machine and copy the images that way, a week later they call me to say the prints are in. They cost about $0.19 a piece, paper and everything.


A _week_?
Unless you live in some remote location on Pluto, they should be taking 1 hr. for $0.19 apiece.


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Soils4Peace said:


> Anyone with experience refilling ink cartridges? What works, what doesn't? Is it worth the trouble?


Yes, I do my own. I use bulk b&W and colour refills on my canon printer.
Ounce for ounce..printer ink is the most expensive liquid on the planet, it
seems. To replace my 5 Canon cartridges would run me over $100 + tax!
All you need to do is drill a tiny hole at the top of each ink cartridge reservoir,
and use the kit provided to fill them up. Then plug the hole with a rubber plug
provided. The inks are all basically alcohol (isopropyl/rubbing alchohol) soluble
and as long as you wear rubber surgical gloves, you shouldn't get too much
on your fingers. The kits will give you very enomical refills.
I order my refill kits from 
http://www.123inkcartridges.ca/?gclid=CIaa75SKmaUCFce7Kgodj1YJKQ
not only are the refill kits reasonable, but they offer free shipping on
orders over $49...and shipping today is expensive.

I've been using these in my canon photo printer with no problems for a
couple of years. I also have a spare print head that I have in reserve,
which I clean in alcohol, to swap with the other print head if it starts to
streak on photo printing.

There is no mystery with bulk fill ink cartridges, and once you do one,
the rest is easy.


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## kyahgirl (Jan 21, 2010)

*another printer ink suggestion*

In January I was searching forums for ideas on ink for my Epson Artisan printer. I came across something I had never heard of, a CISS-continuous ink supply system. I researched it a bit more then bought one off ebay. I paid about $60 when you include shipping. I have been really happy with it. I'd say there is enough coloured ink left to last another couple of years and the black ink will probably last another year. You can buy more ink to refill when necessary. I've saved hundreds of dollars in ink already this year.

I have elementary aged kids who always want to print reports and other things in colour. I don't want to buy a laser printer plus have a colour inkjet so this is a great solution for our family. I was paying $60-70 for a set of six ink cartridges before and they only lasted on the order of weeks, if that. 
The ink from the CISS is indistinguishable from OEM ink and prints photos as well as the original ink. 

One point to note though, you may have to make a slight modification to your printer which would negate your factory warranty so if you're not comfortable with that its not a good solution for you.


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

kyahgirl said:


> One point to note though, you may have to make a slight modification to your printer which would negate your factory warranty so if you're not comfortable with that its not a good solution for you.


Thanks for this lead...
http://www.cisinks.com/?gclid=COTew56fqqUCFUS8KgoddS0sZQ

I bought a Canon PIXMA i5200 a few years ago at Staples when they
were on sale, not realizing how expensive Canon refills were. Initially
I was able to buy aftermarket refill kits from Staples, but about a year
or so ago, they stopped carrying those and sell only Canon cartridges
which are very expensive. As mentioned , I found a much cheaper 
source of bulk ink refills (123ink) but it IS a bit messy refilling the ink
cartridges, and you have to wear plastic gloves and rinse out the syringes.

Unfortunately, I bought enough bulk ink refill kits to last me a few years
because of the special offer they had with free shipping, but I like the
CISS system, although you would have to make some mods to the
printer to rout the refill hoses and on some printers, like the Canon
I have, the clearance between the print head carriage and the plastic
front wall is very minimum. I like the idea, and even though mine
is working fine, if it ever fails and needs to be replaced, I would buy
an Epson because it can be retrofitted with a bulk ink tank.

The other thing I would mention is that the print head (very expensive)
is the area that can clog up over time and start streaking the prints.
I paid for a special print head warranty at Staples and used it about 2
years ago when the oem print head started to streak. Canon sent me
a new print head which worked for a while then started to streak as well.

I decided to DIY cleaning as the warranty had run out by then and soaked
the print heads in isopropyl alcohol over and over (pouring off any coloured
residue) until the print head was relatively clean. That solved the streaking
problem and now I have a spare print head to snap in while the other one
is being cleaned.


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## CrankIt (Dec 14, 2010)

Yeah, I'd go with a laser printer. Ink jet refills tend to be 50/50 on whether they'll work out well or not.


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## cropp (Jan 21, 2011)

I'm still in college and I haven't owned a printer for years. I go print out pages for cheap at the library or mom-and-pop stores when I need to. Seriously, owning a printer is overrated.

They are outdated so fast anyway, besides the ink cartridges, one of the biggest financial swindles in modern history lol


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## smihaila (Apr 6, 2009)

Have you heard of laser monochrome printers?
I'm not quite sure that your cost @ mom&pop stores will be lower than that.


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## the-royal-mail (Dec 11, 2009)

I have a Samsung laser printer and the red flashing light is now telling me I need a new toner cartridge. Yet I just printed a 16 page document with no problems. Strange. Anyway, I have ordered two new cartridges from ebay for about 60% less (after shipping) than the best local cost. I would prefer to reuse these cartridges but there is quite a price differential here, so I'll "donate" them in the Staples bins that accept empty toner, once this one is actually empty. Hopefully the refilled ones will work as well.


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## Financial Cents (Jul 22, 2010)

Go laser if you can, unless of course, you're printing very infrequently.


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## smihaila (Apr 6, 2009)

Amen to laser.


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## Retired Peasant (Apr 22, 2013)

Why did you resurrect a 9 year old post, just to say that?


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## smihaila (Apr 6, 2009)

Because for some reason, I've received a notification from this forum, about a new posting made this week. Maybe due to a glitch in the platform?


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## Longtimeago (Aug 8, 2018)

I'm convinced that printers have a timer function as well as a simple actually out of ink function. I don't use my printer very much at all and yet I end up with an 'out of ink' at some point in time. It's like oil changes for your car, 'every 8k km or every 4 months, whichever comes first.

I believe I don't actually run out of ink, the printer has a timer function that says, the cartridge has been in for X months, send an 'out of ink' message and stop printing until a new cartridge is put in.

Anyone else believe they do this?









How your printer tricks you into buying ink and toner when you don't need it.


I bought a cheap laser printer a couple years ago, and for a while, it worked perfectly. The printer, a Brother HL-2040, was fast, quiet, and produced...




slate.com


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## bgc_fan (Apr 5, 2009)

Longtimeago said:


> I'm convinced that printers have a timer function as well as a simple actually out of ink function. I don't use my printer very much at all and yet I end up with an 'out of ink' at some point in time. It's like oil changes for your car, 'every 8k km or every 4 months, whichever comes first.


The thing is, inkjet cartridges do dry out over time. So even if you don't use them, unless you remove and store them sealed up, they'll dry out.

Laser printers don't really suffer this problem as much. The article talks about a Brother printer where he covered the sensor to allow it to print. But in my personal experience (HP laser printers), I run the toner to the ground without issue, i.e. I never get a message about pre-mature empty toner. The printout is visibly worse when I get a warning low-toner level light. Doesn't prevent me from printing though. That said, you can take the toner cartridge out and shake it a bit to resettle some of the toner to extend a bit more printing. But eventually it'll need to be replaced.


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## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

This is true. Inkjet will dry or clog up over time, so inkjet printers have to be used regularly. You can't really store it away and not use it for a few months.

Laser printers don't have that problem. I had an old, cheap laser printer that I packed up into a box about 6 years ago and I kind of forgot about it. Recently, when moving, I unpacked the box and hooked it up... it pretty much works perfectly. The toner certainly did not degrade or dry up, even after 6 years on a shelf!


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## Spudd (Oct 11, 2011)

I have a Brother laser and it definitely uses a timer rather than some sort of ink sensor to tell you when your cartridge is empty. Luckily, by googling you can find a sequence of buttons to press that resets the timer. I am now over 6 months since my printer told me it was out of ink, and have not yet noticed a deterioration in quality. I know from last time this happened that eventually, it will start to deteriorate, and I will suffer with it until it becomes too hard to read, at which point I will actually replace the toner.


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## Bobcajun (May 15, 2018)

someone earlier said that he uses inkjet 123 for refill kit i order my laser printer cartridges from them. quite cheap. they deliver to certain subway stations here in montréal. also free shipping after 49 dollars i believe


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## MrMatt (Dec 21, 2011)

Bobcajun said:


> someone earlier said that he uses inkjet 123 for refill kit i order my laser printer cartridges from them. quite cheap. they deliver to certain subway stations here in montréal. also free shipping after 49 dollars i believe


Yeah primecables.ca is great.
But really a laser is wonderful


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## agent99 (Sep 11, 2013)

Today I bought cartridges for both our Deskjet printers. Two black and one colour for each printer. I bought these from Amazon.ca. They are Novajet brand. They also offer other brands, but we bought these in past, andthey worked well. Now on our last blacks. Total cost with free shipping for all 6 was $95. Good for a couple of years at least!

I did check 123 who I had used years ago. Pricing was in same ballpark, maybe slightly higher. Shipping would have been free (over $49 vs over $35 AMZ) but there was something odd about their cartridge numbers and size for one of the printers. So went with what we knew worked before.


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## Gator13 (Jan 5, 2020)

+1 for mono laser. I print / scan to pdf as much as possible as opposed to printing.


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## Fisherman30 (Dec 5, 2018)

I subscribe to HP instant ink. I pay about $4.50/month. There are different plans you can get, depending how much printing you do. It automatically detects when you're running low on ink, and they send you new large size ink cartridges. So far, I've found it to be cost effective.


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