New Twist to Printer Ink Refill Scam

[BrianHG]

Canon DISABLES scanner when ink runs out. Who owns this scanner

this video deserves more interest. 
when independent functional systems stop working just because one part is out of ink. so international corporations can sell more ink.
just knowing that this is happening is troubling
IMO this is a new twist printer ink refill scam.
now just imagine if your Internet of things shutdown in sympathy, for your printer? or its it their printer!
or your operating system had sympathy for the printer been out of ink, so stopped working! 
were will this type of BS end?

Yes, that is BS. I bought an HP inkjet for light home use. It actually stopped working because I refused to connect it to the internet. I returned it. I refuse to buy anything else HP (that isn't test equipment ;-P ).

Are you bloody kidding me, I wouldn't even buy any modern HP test equipment.
I would make an exception for vintage HP test equipment.  You know, the type which has no download-able firmware.

[T3sl4co1l]

Fortunately modern-HP makes no test equipment, so you're safe.  It's a shitty computer and peripherals brand.  Not in the sense of "second rate", but shitty in tactics, you know, *gestures vaguely at the thread*.

Tim

[tszaboo]

Yes, that is BS. I bought an HP inkjet for light home use. It actually stopped working because I refused to connect it to the internet. I returned it. I refuse to buy anything else HP (that isn't test equipment ;-P ).

Wow are you kidding me? So printer only works if you connect it to some webs service?
I wonder if there is a "big red button" at HP which makes your ink levels low, because some sales target weren't met.

[T3sl4co1l]

Nah, none so arbitrary.  They merely pre-underfill the cartridges for you, so you don't keep buying new printers for refills.

Tim

[cybermaus]

Nah, none so arbitrary.  They merely pre-underfill the cartridges for you, so you don't keep buying new printers for refills.

Tim

Not even needed.
Just clean your head. Watch this (I put it on the relevant starting time)
Seriously, this is shocking, even if you know all of the stuff in this thread
https://youtu.be/DkuAg46-f7c?t=58

[tooki]

Not just that. Color printers have been secretly printing yellow dots on B/W prints for some time now. Supposedly, so they can ID your printer if you send a letter with a bomb threat or something like that. So your color printer will not print B/W if your color cartridge is not there or empty.

I thought this was just laser printers? "Justified" by concerns about forged documents, money, etc.

Maybe the yellow dots is only for laser. For the inkjet, we may just lack the evidence, or widely available knowledge of it, I wouldn't be surprised there was still something printed on it.

No. In every source I’ve ever read about this, including databases of printer models and how to decode the yellow dots, it’s never shown up in an inkjet, and that’s by skilled people who were looking for them. Presumably because laser toner’s glossy appearance on matte paper is sort of essential to even a low-quality counterfeit.

Additionally, it’s easy to sneak those in on a page printer; on a moving-carriage printer, it would be very conspicuous if the printer moved the heads over blank areas of the page, too…

[Zero999]

Nah, none so arbitrary.  They merely pre-underfill the cartridges for you, so you don't keep buying new printers for refills.

Tim

Not even needed.
Just clean your head. Watch this (I put it on the relevant starting time)
Seriously, this is shocking, even if you know all of the stuff in this thread
https://youtu.be/DkuAg46-f7c?t=58

The printer is cleaning the printhead by passing a lot of ink through it. It isn't doing it just to waste ink.

[Ranayna]

Yes, that is BS. I bought an HP inkjet for light home use. It actually stopped working because I refused to connect it to the internet. I returned it. I refuse to buy anything else HP (that isn't test equipment ;-P ).

You likely ran afoul of one of their "Instant Ink" Printers. Those do require regular internet connection.
But lets be honest here. If you only print a couple of pages each month, Instant Ink can actually be a good deal. HP will automatically send you new print cartridges, as soon as the current ones are nearly empty. This includes ink used for regular cleaning cycles.
The major caveat is of course that the printer regularly needs to talk to the mothership.

[cybermaus]

The printer is cleaning the printhead by passing a lot of ink through it. It isn't doing it just to waste ink.

Absolutely, and I did not meant to imply anything else. I even prefaced with "Just clean your head"

But once you realise that any cleansing cycle is flushing what is effectively liquid gold, and flushing it at this rate, you reconsider.

This actually happened to me once: brand new ink, but clogged nozzle, so I deep cleaned it twice....next up was the almost out of ink warning.

[tooki]

And that’s why the “ink tank” inkjets (the models with built in bulk ink systems) are really the way to go for most people. The ink is dirt cheap. In return, you’re paying the true price of the printer, not the subsidized price.

[tszaboo]

Not just that. Color printers have been secretly printing yellow dots on B/W prints for some time now. Supposedly, so they can ID your printer if you send a letter with a bomb threat or something like that. So your color printer will not print B/W if your color cartridge is not there or empty.

I thought this was just laser printers? "Justified" by concerns about forged documents, money, etc.

Maybe the yellow dots is only for laser. For the inkjet, we may just lack the evidence, or widely available knowledge of it, I wouldn't be surprised there was still something printed on it.

No. In every source I’ve ever read about this, including databases of printer models and how to decode the yellow dots, it’s never shown up in an inkjet, and that’s by skilled people who were looking for them. Presumably because laser toner’s glossy appearance on matte paper is sort of essential to even a low-quality counterfeit.

Additionally, it’s easy to sneak those in on a page printer; on a moving-carriage printer, it would be very conspicuous if the printer moved the heads over blank areas of the page, too…

They could add color to black prints in tiny quantities, and form an identifier, that is only visible if you look for it. I'm not saying they do this, but there can be other methods to place an ID in a print.
This is not the elephant in the cherry tree situation. And I don't wear tinfoin hat.

[Siwastaja]

I would simply return it under warranty. Problem solved.

I think people are missing the importance of this remark.

Broken by design products are still broken. It's only more of a reason to return them under warranty. If more people, say even 5% did that, companies would immediately doing shit like this.

But people work irrationally, when they understand a company intentionally make a broken product it's kind of accepted. When a product genuinely breaks down, only then people demand for warranty repair.

I work the opposite way, if otherwise well designed and good product has some minor flaw causing it to genuinely break down, I might try to fix it on my own, but broken-by-design crap I will instantly return.