The brother printer my spouse has had for ages is finally running out of ink and a quick chedk shows that they don’t make cartridges for it anymore, you cant reset them, and you can only buy dubious 3rd party options on amazon for $150 each. For that kind of money id rathet find a printer that let’s me put of the scam, but im not finding a lot of options there. Does anyone have advice?
like suggested already: go for laser B&W. I am on the Brother team: they’re much cheaper and very reliable (I replaced mine ~2 years ago after 15+ years using the previous Brother). And it this new one can still work with third party toners.
When I need to print in colors, which is rare to be honest, I just go make those prints to a copy shop. It’s much cheaper than having to purchase a printer and overpriced ink. And I don’t have to worry about cleaning it either.
As a general tip: Unless you absolutely need color printing, always, always buy laser printers. Toner is much cheaper than ink, lasts longer, doesn’t dry out, quality and print speed is much higher and the printers generally last much longer. Brother is a solid choice, and I’d stick with them unless you have specific reasons to choose something else. Maybe the MFC-L2820DW if money is not an object or you need the features, or HL-L2460DW if you’re looking for a solid budget option and don’t need anything fancy.
Does anyone have advice?
Get an older Brother laser printer.
There might be an echo in here, but Brother laser printer is the way to go. I’ve had mine for at least 15 years and the only complaint is deep sleep mode caused wireless printing issues until I figured out how to turn it off.
EcoTank printers. I bought one (an Epson) 7 years ago (maybe 8), and filled it up with liquid ink. I’ve refilled it once since, and that refill cost me under $50 total. It has some quirks, but it just keeps printing. Don’t know if the tech has changed, but I don’t see how you can DRM liquid.
I looked at these when replacing my HP, but they’re still inkjets, right? We don’t print often enough to keep inkjets operational–the ink dries and permanently clogs the head. I tried manually clearing that on my last one and was completely unsuccessful. It’s been lasers ever since then.
This one seems to work even with weeks of no printing.
Laser printers are far better all around, if you can stomach the up front cost.
If not Brother, I like my Epson ET-38XX. The 28XX series are also nice. Tanks and refillable. Super efficient on ink and good output. No weird shit. Just works.
Epson will say it’s out of ink when it’s not just so you have to buy more. It’s enshittified too. Also, I bout a nice one and it was broken within a week. That was about 10 years ago though.
okay. that sucks for you.
I’ve been using mine for years. no issues.
