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Printing high-quality color deskjet/inkjet label and such can burn through a lot of expensive ink.
For those who have tried cartridge refiller kits, you know what a pain the butt those are, especially if you've ever tried to refill HP cartridges. That's why you can buy printers on the cheap but pay through the nose for the cartridges which are designed to wear out or self-destruct. Professional refiller places have learned to refill these sensitive cartridges with finesse, but the cartridges will still wear out.
Manufacturers use several techniques to ensure their cartridges won't last long. Sensitive electronics, tiny capaciters which wear out, balloon ink-pockets, etc. Epson requires a special chip-resetter tool before it will show the cartridge as being useable. And there are more caveats, not to mention that each manufacturer uses a different ink 'recipe' which has its own unique shading and viscosity so you can't use ink from another manufacturer. In short, refilling is a pain in the ass.
Now for some makes of printers, there are third-party ink tank kits which allow you to hook up 1-quart or more tanks of each color ink which flow down flexible tubing attached to a device which fits onto your printers print head. If you ever see those t-shirt printing places at the mall, you'll see those devices. But they can be expensive and a pain.
I contacted a local refiller place and told him that I wanted to buy a new printer but one that I could refill inexpensively since I was going to do a lot of color photo printing. He recommended Canon printers, specifically the i560, i960 or other printers in that line. It seems that Canon ink tanks for these models have no electronics. And the cartridges are clear so you know exactly how much ink you have. Just drill a small hole in the top, and put more ink with a syringe. Awesome!
But I went one step further. As it turns out, you can buy third-party ink cartridges for Canon printers on eBay for next to nothing...or very close to it.
The Canon i960 takes 6 cartridges. Black, Cyan, Magenta and Yellow, and a Photo Cyan and Photo Magenta. I was able to find exact boxed, shrinkwrapped duplicate cartridges for those which work exactly like the originals.
The best part? I got two of each of the 6 cartridges, (12 total) and shipping for only $27. The eBay reseller I got them from was called Abacus27-7 and they had a feedback rating of over 15,000.
So if you have tons of color printing to do and are printing draft quality to save ink, try an inexpensive Canon printer for under $100 (i560) and load up with ink for just a little more.
Hope that helps!
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