PC Mag Report on Ink Economy

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Arthur Entlich

It just so happens PC Magazine is running a number of articles regarding
printers the last couple of days, so I thought I'd make the access easy
for anyone looking to read them.

This article compares a few printers and calculates the cost per page
based upon ink usage and total investment. It's not a very inclusive
report, in that it only looks at 5 printer, but what is interesting is
how the cost of ownership changes depending on the amount of use, or
type of use the printer gets. Some printers end up better value for
light duty use, and differently for heavy use, so if you are using OEM
inks, you need to consider both initial cost of acquisition plus cost
and yield of the cartridges.

The link for the article is below.

Art



The True Cost of Printer Ink

When you're buying a new printer, there are two things to
consider: the printer's price and the cost of operation. Will
you save more in the long run with a cheap printer and
expensive ink or vice versa or...? It gets quite confusing.
To help you out our printer expert, M. David Stone, has put
together a handy guide that lays out everything you need to
know about printer ink, from whose is best to how much a
particular printer will cost you per page printed. Run the
numbers here.

http://ct.enews.pcmag.com/rd/cts?d=184-4838-50-216-1332932-616185-0-0-0-1
 
Arthur Entlich said:
It just so happens PC Magazine is running a number of articles regarding
printers the last couple of days, so I thought I'd make the access easy
for anyone looking to read them.

This article compares a few printers and calculates the cost per page
based upon ink usage and total investment. It's not a very inclusive
report, in that it only looks at 5 printer, but what is interesting is how
the cost of ownership changes depending on the amount of use, or type of
use the printer gets. Some printers end up better value for light duty
use, and differently for heavy use, so if you are using OEM inks, you need
to consider both initial cost of acquisition plus cost and yield of the
cartridges.
Click to expand...

Based on the description above, I was hoping PC Magazine was going to test
for and discuss the "dirty little secret" about page yields - duty cycle
matters, enormously in some cases. The ISO standard is a continuous test,
where a printer is set to print pages continuously until the ink is
exhausted. This method takes the least amount of time to test, but ignores
the effects of servicing that happens when the printer has not been used for
some time. During the development of the ISO standard there were proposals
to include an intermittent test that would be more representative of real
life printing. This "user rate" test proposal was rejected for various
reasons, both technical and political. On the technical side, the test
could take weeks to months to run rather than a few days. From the
political side, some manufacturers use a large amount of ink in servicing
which would make their results look worse. In some cases the difference
between continuous printing and user rate printing can be 5x or more. See
the article (and chart) at
http://h10060.www1.hp.com/pageyield/articles/us/en/EfficiencyArticle.html
for some details.

Regards,
Bob Headrick, MS MVP Printing/Imaging
 
Bob said:
Based on the description above, I was hoping PC Magazine was going to
test for and discuss the "dirty little secret" about page yields - duty
cycle matters, enormously in some cases. The ISO standard is a
continuous test, where a printer is set to print pages continuously
until the ink is exhausted. This method takes the least amount of time
to test, but ignores the effects of servicing that happens when the
printer has not been used for some time. During the development of the
ISO standard there were proposals to include an intermittent test that
would be more representative of real life printing. This "user rate"
test proposal was rejected for various reasons, both technical and
political. On the technical side, the test could take weeks to months
to run rather than a few days. From the political side, some
manufacturers use a large amount of ink in servicing which would make
their results look worse. In some cases the difference between
continuous printing and user rate printing can be 5x or more. See the
article (and chart) at
http://h10060.www1.hp.com/pageyield/articles/us/en/EfficiencyArticle.html
for some details.

Regards,
Bob Headrick, MS MVP Printing/Imaging
Click to expand...

Yes, but there's a big problem agreeing which duty cycle is
appropriate.
An example would be HPs B9180 vs competitor's products in
the market.
The B9180 will clog if powered off and it is recommended
that it is left on 24/7. Even if not used, it will run a
daily cleaning cycle automatically, and additional cleaning
cycles if nozzle blockage is detected in self-monitoring.
Competitors product typically use an internal timer and
counters, and will run a cleaning cycle prior to printing,
but will not run a cleaning cycle (unless the user sends the
printer a job) if left powered on 24/7.
As it is, the B9180 is more advanced - and in "typical" use
probably wastes less ink, but a test methodology to make it
waste more ink is easily possible.

When it all boils down, if the printer makers sold ink at
reasonable prices, then nobody would care as much. Epson
for example sells identical (except for region protection
chip) ink in Japan for 50% of the price they sell it for in
Europe.
It's no secret that ink is the most profitable item in HP's
$100 billion turnover - with about $5 billion profit from
ink alone.
 
As you mentioned, the article skirted the issue on the ISo issues. I
fully agree that the differences in how the printers deal with
maintenance cycles is very important to determine real world ink use and
costs. Although there is probably no perfect system for looking at this,
some recognition would have been very helpful about the real costs, and
it is unfortunately they did not.

True comparisons might have helped to sway market loyalties enough to
cause some manufacturers to make design changes to lessen the ink waste.

The time elements involved in the testing, as it is, are onerous and
leave us at the mercy of who is willing to take it on.

I guess we are stuck with more half-way information, which is rarely
enough to make the right purchasing choice, and unfortunately, I believe
that's how the majority of inkjet printer companies like it... confused
consumers.

Art
 
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