HP Must Defend Half-Empty "Economy" Ink Cartridges

An Anonymous Coward excerpts this short Detroit News story, which begins "PALO ALTO, Calif. -- Hewlett-Packard Co. must defend the sale of half-full ink cartridges with its printers after a Minnesota appellate court reinstated a lawsuit against the world's largest maker of printers. Three Minnesota women claim that the company doesn't reveal that the 'economy cartridges' installed on new printers are only half full of ink." The cost of refills is why I've given up on inkjet printers entirely (for now) -- guess which division of HP made more money than the other four combined?

Nothing new

[delphin42]

I've been buying half empty bags of chips for years. All they need is a label stating that the cartridges are packaged by weight, not volume!

Price comparison

[kpansky]

Cost of new black ink cartridge for my printer: $40

Cost of laser printer with toner on eBay: $50

Maybe they should just sell disposable printers instead.

Made more money?

[SpamJunkie]

guess which division of HP made more money than the other four combined?

Compaq?

Pessimists

[finny]

See, some people only see the negative. I see the ink cartritge as half full.

Re:Price comparison

[fo0bar]

Shipping cost of laser printer with toner on eBay: $75

Re:Why do people bother with inkjets?

[Anonymous Coward]

50rry, l4z0r is teh suxest!

Economical on Slashdot too

[Skevin]

HP Must Defend Half-Empty "Economy" Ink Cartidges

Apparently. These "cartidges" also seem to have half as many R's.

Re:It is explained in the small print.

[tomhudson]

Come on, be fair. Deceptive packaging is just that - packaging designed to give a false impression. People who bought based on this false impression have been defrauded. The cartridges are not "economy", as they are falsely represented.

Companies have been doing this with laser printers too - the first toner cartridge is less than half full, always.

Mind you, this reminds me of the ongoing fight I'm having with a coffee maker who sold me 2 12-cup coffee makers that make only 6 8-ounce cups. Nothing in the fine print, nothing in the packaging, nothing in the manual.

We'll see who blinks first - or whether I'm going to have to take them to small claims court.

Re:Price comparison

[Merry_B.Buck]

Maybe they should just sell disposable printers instead.
No, I think the next step will be free printers and ink cartridges, but a large Doubleclick ad is printed in the middle of each document.

Re:Why do people bother with inkjets?

[bravehamster]

Actually, about 60% of the stuff I print is in color, i.e. my digital photos. Altered, of course, to show my fabulous vacation with Heidi Klum. You can see my need for full vibrant colors.

I will wager...

[Anonymous Coward]

There's no law that says "HP will include cartridges with each and every new inkjet printer they sell". I see no rip off here other than the three women and their lawyers.

I will wager a large sum that these broads also think their husband's paychecks belong to them for life, married or not.

I will wager the same sum that their lawyers will agree with them on that point too.

Re:Marketing Innovation... Wow..

[huckda]

The last 3 cars I've bought were all filled with gas when I bought them...

You must have haggled quite a bit to piss them off so much that they wouldn't even fill your gas tank :0

Re:Pessimists

[Dr Caleb]

Others, pragmatists such as myself, would say the cartridge is too big.

Re:Made more money?

[jubes]

No.... It is definately DEC.

Re:HP has always made the money on the refill

[jkr0605]

This study [cockeyed.com] is a pretty amusing look into exactly how much each page of inkjet-ed printing costs you.

Is everyone forgetting

[^chuck^]

The joys and savings of cost of a dot-matrix. Not to mention the fact that there are pages out there designed specifically to create music while you print (for the speakerless/soundcardless of us out there).

Re:Price comparison

[ivan256]

I have one of those printers. Bought it because it was cheaper then an ink cartridge for my lexmark, and cheaper then having kinko's print addresses on 100 envelopes. Used it 'till it was out of ink, and now it sits in a box. Some day I'll throw it out. Oh well.

(It was $29 right before christmas, cable included)

Re:Why do people bother with inkjets?

[Anonymous Coward]

Get a laser printer and a black and white cat. Of course, you may end up with Pepe LePew trying to romance it, but think of the money you'll save on ink refills.

Re:Why do people bother with inkjets?

[Anonymous Coward]

Pictures of your cats?! Freak.

the dog factor

[spoot]

I had just stocked up on about 30 carts for my epson 740 that I bought from a friend (along with a revision a imac) for a hundred bucks. The day the package arrived from "ink cars are us", I had taken the printer down from the shelf and while answering the phone in the next room, my dog pissed on the printer. I took it as a sign from God. I threw out the printer, Gave the carts to the x wife (let her have the karma) and bought an Ethernet laser the next day.

Re:Why do people bother with inkjets?

[eyeball]

oops, i meant pictures of my pussy.

Dot Matrix Forever!!!!

[SHEENmaster]

My panasonic dot matrix has never quit.

I just shove in a $2 cartride, and type:

cat /dev/hda >> /dev/lp0

It is as simple as that.

Re:more expensive than gold

[spektr]

Remove the cheap solvent, and, by weight, inkjet ink is more expensive than gold.

Yeah. Even if you printed counterfeit money with an inkjet, you *still* couldn't afford its cartridges!