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Wednesday, September 7, 2011

To Save Money on Ink Cartridges: New Laser Printer

The few weeks before transitions--end of semester, graduation, leaving on vacation--are incredibly productive. You do all the stuff you've been putting off. Frugal Son, who is leaving tomorrow for at least a year in France, has been bugging us about our printer--a cheap one that required pricy and short-lived ink cartridges. We read somewhere that printer ink is the most valuable liquid in the world. Even Hewlett-Packard, which is getting out of the computer biz, is staying in the ink cartridge biz: that's where the money is.

Here is the printer Frugal Son picked out for us. The printing costs are a fraction of our previous printer. The quality seems fine, but we're not doing anything very fancy.

The newest member of our family. No, it does not replace Frugal Son. So glad we put an end to our procrastination on this.

Have you replaced a money-sucking product recently?

11 comments:

Duchesse said...

I am tempted to joke, "Yes, our kids moved out."

But actually, it was downsizing our living space, so much less maintenance and far lower utilities bills.

Nice printer!

Frugal Scholar said...

@Duchesse--But you are still near your kids--so lucky!

Funny about Money said...

LOL! The kids moved out! Yup.

I would so much like to downsize...utilities and taxation on my home are starting to get out of hand and certainly will never go down.

Sure would love a laser printer! Have thought for quite some time it would be a good idea. However, I need a scanner, and on occasion color printing does come in handy.

Costco has the Brother HL5340 on sale for $99 if you order it online. It appears to be similar to yours; for the extra 40 bucks you get double-sided printing, which over time could save you quite a lot on paper.

Girlie said...

I've had a Brother laser printer for the last 5 years. I love it. I've only had to buy 2 toner cartridges. When the printer tells you it is out of toner and stops printing, put a label or opaque piece of tape on the clear round window that the printer looks through to check the toner level. You'll get several hundred more prints out of the toner cartridge and I haven't seen any decline in the quality.

Frugal Scholar said...

@Girlie--What a great frugal tip! Thanks so much.

Laura Winter said...

I have the same printer (or equivalent since it's 6 years old) and when I bought it it came with one toner cartridge plus a redemption for a "super size" cartridge for free. I use the printer a lot (couple hundred pages a month) and in the 6 years I've never bought a cartridge.

Taking the cartridge out and shaking it every now and then extends it's life, as dones the little trick with the paper or masking tape over the indicator winder.

Love your blog.

Laura Winter said...

ummm typos...

dones = does

winder = window

d'oh.

Frugal Scholar said...

@Laura--Thanks for the welcome info--and the compliment. And don't worry about the typos--most people read right over them (plus, I have many myself)

Toner Cartridges said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
shamraiz said...

Note too that in many (most?) real-world applications you don't "charge" a capacitor -- you just let it charge and discharge as signal is applied to it.
Plastic cards Printing

Unknown said...

The money is the main concerned where everyone wants to save it but another area is quality of the printer where one will think before to buy - Printer Ink Cartridge