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False Economy


raymac46

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My desktop system has an old HP Deskjet 5550 hooked up to it - I have it so that the grandkids can print their web based game "prizes" without blowing away all the ink in my wifi connected printer upstairs.

Recently the black #56 cartridge on the old printer ran out of ink. Since a new one costs around $40 I bought a pair of remanufactured cartridges from Amazon for $18. They tested OK but when the kids were here doing their thing this week it wasn't long before "Grandpa- the printer won't work."

I noticed that although the black cartridge still had lots of ink the printer lights kept flashing. After I took the cartridge out the printer worked with just the color cartridge - but it was slow and used a lot of color ink.

The circuitry in the refilled cartridge had failed. I dropped it in the recycle bin at Staples and got a new unused black #56 - everything returned to normal.

 

"The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price has been forgotten." - B. Franklin

Edited by raymac46
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Sometimes what could be a false economy proves to be the opposite. I have a very old Epson printer . I had to buy a flash resetter for the cartridges which was a little dear . Hence for the last ten years I have filled the original ink pots and flashed them without problems . The 4 color refill bottles cost about 5 bucks and do about 5 refills a time . This means that the quality of the paper I get is better than the economy rubbish and still saves enough for the odd bottle of chianti .

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I had good luck with aftermarket cartridges from some internet company (exact name evades me) for my Epsom the ones I bought locally never worked. :breakfast:

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I can't afford to buy cheap stuff. Everything I buy is the best I can afford at the time and I'm sure I've saved countless moolah over my lifetime.

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I own a 5550. I've never used 3rd party inks with this printer so I can't address your issue with that. The lights on mine blink but the printer still prints. I think it is trying to tell me 6 months before it happens that I should replace the carts. I wait until I can tell by the print quality that I need to replace. I ignore blinking light.

 

I have purchased 3rd party inks for an HP 722Cse. In fact, I got a black cart delivered this week. Locally at Walmart it was $50+, the only place that still carries carts for this old printer.

 

I paid a bit under $14 (shipping extra) for a remanufactured HP cart.

This is where I bought it

http://www.ldproducts.com/

 

I haven't installed it yet. I got a flashlight out and I saw that the color cart in the 722 was an LD; not 100% sure but perhaps 85% sure that the black cart is LD too.

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When the light on my 5550 started blinking the printer refused to work until I took out the offending cartridge. It worked with only one cartridge in the printer caddy - though it was slow and ate up the color ink like crazy. I have hplip-gui installed so I can see the ink levels.

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