Do you take chances in the 'Ink Lottery'

Last week I had the coincidence of two customers having difficulty with their Brother printers 'going through the motions' of printing, but the result was blank pages. Each customer had purchased 'generic' replacement print cartridges. At my first customer visit, I examined the supposedly compatible cartridge and although the 'geometry' of the cartridge was similar to the original cartridge, the physical features were noticeably different. What's interesting is that the printer acknowledged that the cartridge had been replaced but did not warn against using 3rd party ink cartridges. I advised the customer to replace each generic cartridge with original cartridges, then run the printer's cleaning utility and print head/nozzle cleaning/alignment utility.

Later that day, the customer emailed me to let me know that they replaced the cartridges and followed the instructions that I had emailed them to perform the cleaning and their printer was once again printing.

A couple of days later, I got a call from a customer wanting me to help him update a document he was having difficulty editing and to take a look at his printer. He too had purchased generic ink, but when they didn't print, he purchased original manufacturer's ink and his printer still wouldn't work. I explained that I had a similar experience just two days prior and we needed to run his printer through its cleaning utilities. It took us two nozzle cleanings to get back to quality printing.

I have had similar customer printing issues with HP printers when using generic replacement print cartridges and in each case, going back to HP original cartridges fixed the problem of blank pages being 'printed'.

The moral of the story is to always use branded replacement cartridges. If you have problems with them, you can always return them to the store where you purchased them, or directly to the manufacturer for replacement. If you do buy generic, make sure you buy from a retailer that accepts returns if the cartridges don't work in your printer. I think Office Depot still markets their own remanufactured cartridges, but I suspect they support a limited number of brands and printers.

Most importantly, every manufacturer warns that using generic or 3rd party cartridges will void any warranty. Personally, I do not take chances with the 'ink lottery' and always buy branded ink cartridges.