Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. put forth on 10/28/2010 11:25 AM: > In <4cc91eef.5010...@hardwarefreak.com>, Stan Hoeppner wrote: >> Camaleón put forth on 10/27/2010 1:05 PM: >>> There >>> are also "compatible" toner cartridges at lower prices, which I would >>> also avoid :-) >> >> There is no reason to avoid these Camaleón. They work just fine. The >> only difference is that ZERO of the profit goes to the printer manufacturer. >> >> One of the tenets of FOSS is a free or low cost alternative to >> commercial software. > > Free Software has *never* been about cost.
Not for the developers, but it certainly has been for many users of it. My comments related to the reasons users choose FOSS. One of them certainly is cost. My analogy was that of "Why pay Microsoft $495 for Office when Open Office is just as good for most users and is free". By that logic, why pay $75 for a Lexmark toner cartridge when you can get a "compatible" cartridge for $28 that functions identically? > I suggest against using toner or ink jet cartridges that are not certified by > the printer manufacturer since my experience has shown them to be inferior > products. Most often, they over-saturate the page leading to streak, smears, > or even splotches and lower effective DPI. Have you specifically noticed this with 3rd party toner cartridges, or are your comments aimed at ink cartridges? For a toner cartridge to cause problems the drum would have to be defective, which does happen, but rarely. Copy machines have had these drums for 40 years. The technology is very well understand and pretty hard to screw up given the simplicity of manufacturing one. The toner itself used by the 3rd party cartridge companies is identical to that used by laser printer OEMs and copy machine manufacturers, so that isn't an issue. I won't argue with anyone for one second that there are a lot of low quality 3rd party ink cartridges on the market. Manufacturing the nozzles correctly is much more difficult than toner drums. But that isn't the subject of this thread. The subject is toner refills. > Refilled / recycled cartridges are a different story. It depends on the > refill method, but they usually work just as well as new cartridges. As do 3rd party toner cartridges, which ARE new cartridges. Again, they're simply slightly different in design to avoid patent issues and to lower manufacturing costs. In over 20 years I've run into maybe 2 that didn't work correctly, both due to manufacturing defects, one in the cog drive (deformed teeth) and one with a bad drum, likely due to the photo resist layer not being deposited correctly. I've run into at least that many OEM cartridges defective for the same reasons. Everyone's mileage may obviously vary, but it seemed to me 3rd party toner cartridges were getting an unfair rap in this thread, especially given my experience with them, and knowing the technology (or lack thereof actually) that goes into them. They aren't difficult to make at all, and the QC process is rather straight forward. -- Stan -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/4cca98fa.2030...@hardwarefreak.com
