My HPC6150 (see above) got fried in an electrical storm recently, despite being plugged into a surge protector. Despite having 11 ink cartridges (6 lt. cyan, 4 lt. magenta and 1 yellow) waiting to be needed – but no black, cyan or magenta – I’ve purchased a new KODAK – 9 at a very good price and I am hoping that their promised lower ink costs will prove to be true.

Does anyone need any lt. cyan or lt. magenta ink?

Eric

If HP is monitoring this – yes, your ink marketing strategies cost you a customer who has had HP printers since day 1 with computers in the home and his business. No mas!

My HPC6150 (see above) got fried in an electrical storm recently, despite being plugged into a surge protector. Despite having 11 ink cartridges (6 lt. cyan, 4 lt. magenta and 1 yellow) waiting to be needed – but no black, cyan or magenta – I’ve purchased a new KODAK – 9 at a very good price and I am hoping that their promised lower ink costs will prove to be true.

If HP is monitoring this – yes, your ink marketing strategies cost you a customer who has had HP printers since day 1 with computers in the home and his business. No mas!

By the way, any manufacturer will tell you – the real profit margins are actually in the consumables. So, the cartridge pricing issues should really be not a surprise to any one.

The scanning and copying mechanisms are pretty slow but I am happy with the printing quality of the machine. I think the primary issue I have is ink cost and the solution I’ve found for this problem is to purchase refillable ink cartridges and bulk ink.

I will keep you posted on how well the ink works on my machine.

It annoys me that HP not only makes a huge profit margin on the price of the ink, but that they have to go out of their way to rig their machines to use the color ink that is sold with less volume–there is nothing special about the cartridges that forces them to put less ink in the dark magenta and cyan verses the light.

It’s a shame how the great American spirit has gone down through the generations. We’ve forgotten the values that have made us into the great nation we are today. It’s all about $$$ these days and I will have to admit that I myself have cut corners and try to maximize my income flow when I can but this is dishonest and flat out wrong. Shameful.

I’m so tired of HP’s tactics that I just wrote their chairman and CEO (Mark Hurd) the following email:

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I am disappointed in HP’s marketing methods for printer ink. I have a Photosmart 8250 that uses the 02 ink cartridges. They are supplied in several different forms:
1) 5 color cartridges plus 150 sheets of photo paper
2) 5 color cartridges plus 1 black cartridge
3) individual cartridges (5 colors and black)
4) XL (extra large) cartridges (5 colors in one package, 2 black cartridges in another).

As a consumer who realizes that ink supplies are the major cost of printing, I would like to do some comparative shopping (all for genuine HP cartridges). The problem is that your marketing completely obscures how much ink I am getting for the price. And it is very clear that the amount of ink in the “combo packs” is much less than the individual cartridges. And the XL size has more, but how much more? Its like buying meat that is all boxed in one size box with different prices but no indication what the weight of the meat is – just a marketing reference to ‘enough for two’ or ‘feeds whole family’. Would you want to shop for a product like that?

Today when shopping for HP ink I checked out Canon ink cartridges. They tell you how much ink is in their cartridge so that you can decide if you want the larger size for economy reasons or the smaller ones. I have decided that my next printer will be a Canon for these reasons, and that will be when the current ink runs out. If HP wants to retain my business they will have to market their supplies in a CLEARLY MARKED MANNER.