I Saved More to Spend More – Clare

Let me warn you right now: if you do not own an Epson Printer, this post will bore you.

You still want to read this? OK then, carry on at your own risk. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

I bought an Epson L110 printer a couple of years ago. I can’t remember the exact price but I remember thinking that it was cheaper than my usual brand (HP) and that the sales person assured me that with their ink system I can save money on ink because their refills are cheaper and the printer does not consume that much ink for printing.

Yes, it’s true that I save money because of the cost of the printer. The ink, if I am not mistaken is in the P200+ range per bottle, which is half compared to the lowest price of an HP ink cartridge. While I need four bottles to refill while HP cartridges are two per printer, Epson’s ink does last longer. During the first year alone I only bought new ink after almost a year since I bought the printer. When we had our HP printer I remember we bought new ink more times than that.

As time wore on however, I noticed some problems with the printer: if I didn’t use it as often, there were white lines on the printed material. I had to do maintenance on the printer via the cleaning of the printer head several times before I could make it go away (which meant most of the ink went to that process). Printing photos were not so good either. The printer doesn’t seem to get the colors right compared to what I see on my laptop. Eventually, the photos also fade — something that has not happened with my previous printer.

The most interesting part that I discovered was the ink pad reset issue. The printer said that I could no longer print because of the ink pad, which needs to be replaced. I went through several forums online and discovered that in order to replace it you need to have your printer serviced, which pretty much costs as much as the printer itself. I guess now I know what makes the printer so affordable.

Fortunately I found a workaround that resets the printer ink pad count so you can use it again. Apparently the printer has an internal counter of ink used that would trigger the ink pad reset function that is supposed to make you take the printer to be serviced. Some people offer the workaround for a fee, but I found one site (which I cannot remember) that provided it for free. Once I downloaded it and used it on my printer, it worked again like nothing ever went wrong.

Suffice to say that if anything ever goes wrong with the printer again, I don’t think that I will buy the same brand. I did save, but if I wasn’t annoyingly stubborn enough to find an online solution, I would have spent more with my saved purchase.

I need to be more careful about the things I buy next time. I need to read up on things more before I buy them. Does anyone out here do that? I know I should!

Photo Source: Epson Philippines