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Looking for a printer - help!
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[QUOTE="l_d_allan, post: 203239, member: 5680"] Depends on your definition of "cheap ink" ... and very much also on your definition of "good quality photo printing". And a huge factor is print volume, especially how much photo quality printing. OEM ink works out to be $10,000 to $15,000+ per gallon. Ouch. My observation is that the trend is smaller ink cartridges that not that much less in MSRP. Refilled carts from reputable vendors like Staples, Office Max, Rapid-Refill, Cartridge-World, etc. aren't really that much less expensive ... and ink capacities may be lower. The latest / greatest printers are getting harder and harder to refill, even by the above vendors. To me, saving 20% to 30% over OEM might not be worth it, as it can be very difficult to get good quality prints, consistently. It definitely won't be OEM ink from the above vendors... those are the "Crown Jewels" of the printer companies that their business model is based on. Subsidized printers + more or less expensive paper + exorbitant ink prices. BTW ... I'd be inclined to pay less attention to the MSRP of the original printer ... entry-to-mid level printers are heavily subsidized to "set the hook" for subsequent ink sales. Also, there are often sales / rebates / good-as-new refurbs / etc. In the Canon world, there are often super deals with DSLR's + printers. But I also would shy away from no-name eBay and Amazon vendors of ink cartridges, whose prices may be a Lot Less. But it may be very much a case of "you get what you pay for" with ink. Each lot of ink may be from a different bulk ink producer, so photo print quality will be elusive unless you don't care. Green skin tones ok this time, and yellow'ish for another group of prints later? Eventually, you may get a bad batch ok ink that is prone to clogging ... then the nightmares begin (why do I know this?) IMO, about the only way you'll get inexpensive ink ... and reliable so you aren't plagued with clogged heads from no-name ink vendors whose ink changes every batch ... is refill your own ink cartridges. The learning curve can be extensive, especially if you drift into "color management' for high quality photo prints. If your photo printing volume isn't relatively high, you may be Much, Much better off getting 4x6" prints made as "loss leaders" at Sams / Costco / Walmart / Walgreens / student union / etc. If you know what you are doing, you can get excellent photo prints at a reasonable cost at Costco, using DryCreek profiles. You can get excellent German ink that works out to be about $12 per pint (16 oz ... a lot of ink ... equiv to about $100 / gallon ... about 20ยข per 13 ml CLI-8 cartridge) HTH ... [/QUOTE]
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