Raid targets Phony ink cartridges

Phony ink cartridges raid target:

"Staff Reporter 2006-05-31

THE market watchdog is investigating an underground workshop that produced counterfeit ink cartridges, labeled as famous brands, such as Ricoh and Konica.

The Shanghai General Inspection Team of Quality and Technical Supervision seized 268 ink cartridges from the workshop on Chang'an Road in Zhabei District during a raid, the team said. It acted on tips from official brand holders.

The workshop, registered as Shanghai Zhongtian Digital Office Equipment Co, hid storage and production materials in the basement of a middle school.

Copyright-infringed brands include Ricoh, Konica, Minolta and Brother. Packages were labeled Ricoh Company Ltd, Shanghai Ricoh Fax Co, Konica Minolta Office System (China) Co, and others. They appeared identical to authentic cartridges.

Investigators said company officials admitted the cartridges were purchased at a low price from illegal sources, including street vendors who collected discarded ones.

The fakes have been confiscated as evidence. Company figures on illegal profits and the number of sales were not available.

Officials with Konica Minolta Office System (China) Co said they suffer losses of 400 million yuan (US$49 million) a year because of counterfeit products using their brand."

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Avoid Hidden Costs When Purchasing a Printer

Hewlett-Packard Co. is developing the printer, dubbed the 'Printing Mailbox'.

Startup tackles challenge of sharing photos with grandma: "Sunday, May 28, 2006
By May Wong, The Associated Press

SAN JOSE, California -- Presto Services Inc., a Mountain View, California-based startup, plans to announce details Tuesday of a service that allows baby boomers and their parents to stay digitally connected without both needing a computer.

Instead, the less-tech savvy recipient would only need a special inkjet printer designed to receive and print out the sender's e-mails of text or photos -- similar to a fax machine. The printer would have to be hooked up to a phone line but would not need a special Internet connection. It only receives e-mail and cannot send anything back.

Hewlett-Packard Co. is developing the printer, dubbed the 'Printing Mailbox.'

Both the HP printer and the accompanying Presto service will be available in the fall. Presto's founder and CEO Joe Beninato would not disclose the service fees or the price of the printer."

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Stiffer competition from refillers for HP

HP sees stiffer competition from refillers - INQ7.net:
By Alexander Villafania

"SINGAPORE--IT firm Hewlett-Packard (HP) says it is expecting more competition from third-party cartridge refillers and remanufacturers in the Asia Pacific regions as more companies in this sector consolidate their operations.

Speaking to reporters during a printer supplies conference here, John Solomon, HP Asia Pacific vice president for supplies, said the third-party cartridge refillers and manufacturers are aiming at Asia's more price-conscious small-to-medium sized businesses, which comprise 70 percent of Asia's registered businesses.

Solomon said HP holds a market share of 64 percent in the cartridge supplies business in Asia Pacific while the remaining portion of the market is shared by other original ink cartridge manufacturers and the third-party refillers and remanufacturers.

Th HP executive said the company is ramping up its educational campaigns in countries where it is present, including China and India where he said there is a large market for refills and remanufactured printer cartridges."

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All-In-One, Top Inkjet Multifunction Printers: HP PSC 1610

Top Inkjet Multifunction Printers: HP PSC 1610 All-In-One --- PC World Canada:

By: Paul Jasper

"This model has a low price for high print quality overall. It's fast at printing photos, but slow at copying. PC World Canada rating: 75 Good.

Priced at just $178 the compact HP PSC 1610 All-In-One fits easily into cramped workspaces, yet still offers a number of useful features. It has the smallest footprint of the nine MFPs we tested for the June 2005 chart, measuring just 17.3 by 11.2 inches with the front paper tray closed. When flipped down, the tray can hold 100 sheets, and it does double-duty as the output tray.

Media card slots located to the left of the paper tray can read all the major formats, though uploading many images to a PC at once could be tiresome due to the slow USB 1.1 transfer speed. The monochrome backlit LCD screen displays two lines of text. To preview and print images when the PSC 1610 isn't connected to a PC, you can make an index print, mark your selections, and then scan the print. Alternatively, you can print from compatible digital cameras via the PictBridge port."

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Putting printers in perspective

Redding: Science & Technology: "Putting printers in perspective

By JAMES DERK

Aside from the computer itself, one of the most oft-used peripherals I would imagine has to be the once-lowly printer. We've come a long way since the dot-matrix days, both in terms of print quality and pricing.

I thought I had hit the big-time on my Commodore 64 when I could print out my pages of BASIC code on my $499, nine-pin dot-matrix beauty. I later upgraded to an impact printer that gave my work the appearance of being typewritten, which was really impressive for the time.

In my IBM days there was nothing finer than the workhorse HP LaserJet, which would print lovely black and white copies until the cows came home. If the print got dark you took the toner cartridge out, shook it up and put it back. That trick was good for another 500 pages every time.

My, how times have changed. Laser printers are under a hundred bucks now; inkjets seemingly come in Happy Meals. Dell usually tosses one in with every computer sold unless the moon is high. A cheap color Lexmark will run 40 bucks.

What happened, of course, was cheap offshore manufacturing and competition. The printer market is as bloody as any out there and the main game is to get the unit in the house or office. (Because that's when the fun starts.)

All of the manufacturers have patents on their ink cartridge designs so the goal is to get the printer purchased and in use. After that, it's all about the consumables. Paper is paper, of course (although they try to convince you to use a certain brand for photos.) The money is in the ink."

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LaserCycle divides to conquer

LaserCycle divides to conquer - Kansas CIty - MSNBC.com: "By Rob Roberts
Kansas City Business Journal

LaserCycle Inc., a remanufactured printer cartridge firm that's been growing faster than ink dries, has spun off a division into a separate, 500-employee corporation.

The new corporation, InkCycle Inc., has taken over remanufacturing and wholesale sales of the roughly 750,000 toner and inkjet cartridges cranked out each month at 11100 W. 82nd St. in Lenexa's Brookhollow Business Park.

LaserCycle, which retained 30 employees and direct sales of cartridges and other printer supplies and services, completed the divestiture on April 1.

'As we continued to grow,' said Brad Roderick, executive vice president of InkCycle, 'it became clear that we had two separate business models -- one that ships thousands of units and one that sells a few cartridges at a time. We needed two distinct companies so they could focus on their own sets of core competencies.'

Roderick said LaserCycle founder Rick Krska had led the corporation to double-digit growth each year since he started refilling and recycling toner cartridges in his basement in 1992."

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Printer perfect for home or small office

Low-budget answer: Printer perfect for home or small office: "Murray Hill, The Saskatoon StarPhoenix

Lexmark has come up with a terrific answer to the question of an affordable laser printer for home use. Their new E120n is perfect for home use or for a small home office.

The Lexmark E120n is a networkable, monochrome laser printer that anyone would easily be able to find room for on their desk.

Rated at 10,000 copies per month, the E120n easily fills the bill for a busy student or someone who runs a small business from home. It has all the attributes you'd hope for in a laser printer. The printer is fast -- 20 pages per minute of A4 letter-size monochrome pages at 600 x 600 dpi. Something I really liked is the first page out time. That's how long it takes the printer to spit the first copy of a document out after you hit print. The E120n is able to fire that first copy out in about eight seconds or so -- hit print, get up and go get your copy.

It works like a peach on all PCs running Windows 98 and onward, and all Macs running MacOS 9.x and on, plus drivers are available for computers running Linux. It's networkable, so everyone on your home network can have access to it, and it's perfect for printing all those school projects and papers. Why waste expensive colour inkjet cartridges when you can easily and cheaply print in monochrome?"

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PRINT-RITE Remanufactured Cartridges Come Top In Toner Quality

PRINT-RITE Remanufactured Cartridges Come Top In Toner Quali...: "PRINT-RITE Remanufactured Cartridges Come Top In Toner Quality Reports

Published 10th May 2006

PRINT-RITE PRO-ECO cost less than OEM products, print as many pages, offer equal print quality and cut 60,000 tons landfill waste a year...

While the paperless office is still more rumour than reality, independent reports in America and Hong Kong are suggesting one way for businesses to save money and the planet – at the same time – without sacrificing the quality.

According to The American Society for Testing and Material ASTM F1856 Standard Testing Results and Hong Kong Standards and Testing Centre (HKSTC), remanufactured inkjet and laser printer cartridges can perform equally well as, and cost less than, OEM products. They can also eliminate up to 60,000 tons of solid waste every year that would otherwise go to landfills.

The majority of laser and inkjet cartridges – more than 90 per cent – are dumped after one use. According to Thomas Nosker, director of Rutgers University Center for Plastics Recycling Research, 'If the plastic in these cartridges is left in a landfill, and then dug up in one thousand years, it will still be in tact. It won't change its properties over time.'

Tests by HKSTC show that PRINT-RITE PRO-ECO toner cartridges consistently deliver the same performance as OEM brands, achieving printing results that are indistinguishable from OEM products.

Print yield was a major consideration of the ASTM F1856 results, which found that PRINT-RITE PRO-ECO toner cartridges deliver significantly lower costs per page than proprietary products. (See Table1)

According to the ASTM F1856 results, a PRINT-RITE sample cartridge consistently exhibited maximum density performance throughout its service life, meaning that text and images were clear and sharp from the first to the last page. No toner leakage was detected in the cartridge packaging materials or during operation of the cartridge in the printer.

'The PRINT-RITE PRO-ECO series is compatible with a variety of laser printer makes and models. However every cartridge has one thing in common – they offer exceptional value for money. This becomes crystal clear when it comes to the planning and overall management of office consumables, increasing productivity and stretching budgets a little further,' said Nancy Ng, General Manager of A&J Technology Ltd which distributes PRINT-RITE PRO-ECO remanufactured inkjet and laser printer cartridges.

PRINT-RITE re-assembles cartridges from used OEM laser and inkjet printers, refilling them with toner and ink and replacing delicate components with completely new parts. Each step of the process is subject to inspections and the most rigorous quality controls. The result is a line of top-quality products that deliver premium performance at a lower cost than 'proprietary' brands and also help protect the environment. "

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Lexmark’s and HP’s Printer Business Model Is Increasingly Unsustainable (LXK, HPQ)

The Consumer Electronics Stock Blog � Lexmark’s and HP’s Printer Business Model Is Increasingly Unsustainable (LXK, HPQ): "William Trent (Stock Market Beat) submits: Gearlog points to the latest evidence that the business model employed by the major printer manufacturers is dead in the water. Staples’ 20th anniversary sale includes a Samsung color laser printer that can do duplex (2-sided) printing for $199 after a $50 rebate.

Manufacturers such as Lexmark (LXK) and Hewlett Packard (HPQ) have traditionally used the razor/blades approach to sales, subsidizing the initial cost of the printer and making up for it as customers buy high-margin replacement toner and ink. When the typical printer cost $700 and the replacement ink/toner was $30-$50, this strategy worked fine. Customers tended to own the machine far longer and buy multiple replacement cartridges.

As with all electronics, however, hardware prices declined rapidly. As early as 2003, one could occasionally find a basic black-and-white inkjet printer (with ink) on sale for as low a price as the replacement ink cartridge. Customers realized the printer was a better deal than the ink alone and frequently upgraded to a newer printer rather than buy replacement ink."

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Saving on printer ink

Saving on printer ink - Network World: "Saving on printer ink

By Mark Gibbs, Network World, 05/08/06
Mark Gibbs

Some time ago we needed to do some high-quality photo printing. After much research we decided on a Canon i9900 inkjet printer, which got great reviews and excellent user ratings.

When it arrived we weren't disappointed. The i9900 (priced as low as $450) produces outstanding, high-quality prints as large as 13 by 19 inches with a maximum resolution of 4,800 by 1,200 dots per inch at a very acceptable speed (about 50 seconds for a 4-by-6-inch color photo). There's only one problem: the Canon ink cartridges.

To achieve its sensational print quality, the i9900 uses eight ink cartridges - black, cyan, magenta, yellow, photo cyan, photo magenta, red and green. These cartridges hold a scant 15 milliliters (ml) of ink, which means that you run out of one or another cartridge with monotonous regularity. It's not that these are hard or time-consuming to change - it's the cost of the wretched things."

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Olivetti MY_WAY Photo Printer

By Simon Williams

Olivetti MY_WAY Photo Printer

Olivetti used to make a complete range of laser printers and was one of the first to release a consumer ink-jet printer back in the early 1980s. It's now reinvented some of its ink-jet machines and one of the most intriguing is the MY_WAY photo printer.

The company can always be relied on for a new take on design and the MY_WAY printer is unlike any other photo printer we've seen. Styled as a black rectangular block, you click down both of the side panels to reveal a slot for the paper cartridge, memory card slots and a PictBridge socket on the left side, while on the right there’s an output slot and access to the print cartridge.
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Ink refilling, recycling go together

Ink refilling, recycling go together | ajc.com: "Most cartridges have longer life than single use

By ABBY G. BRUNKS
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 05/04/06

If you grimace every time you open your wallet to pay for another ink cartridge for your printer, Rick Trenkle has an alternative.

Trenkle opened Cartridge World in Fayetteville, a franchise business that sells refilled ink jet and laser cartridges. Customers can either bring in their cartridges to be refilled or bring an empty cartridge in exchange for one that is ready to go. Customer Wentworth Maynard, who owns a medical billing company, Kan Darm Medical Solutions in Fayetteville, can attest to the savings. Maynard estimates his business receives between 200 and 500 faxes a day, which is why he goes through a lot of ink."

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Epson Hits Online Ink Cartridge Retailers

Four retailers agree to stop selling third-party ink cartridges designed for use in Epson's printers.

Martyn Williams, IDG News Service
Monday, May 01, 2006

Seiko Epson has succeeded in getting four online retailers of printer ink cartridges to stop selling a number of third-party ink cartridges designed for use in Epson printers, the Japanese company says.

The four retailers are in Germany and agreed in out of court settlements to stop selling the cartridges, which Seiko Epson asserts infringe upon its intellectual property.

The action is the latest in a string of successful attempts by the Japanese company to stamp out sales of unlicensed ink cartridges in Europe and the U.S.

Earlier this year Epson filed a complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission against 24 companies that manufacture, import, or distribute aftermarket ink cartridges for sale in the U.S. and filed a case in the English High Court against Medea International In 2005, Epson succeeded in reaching out of court settlements with companies in the U.K. and Hong Kong.

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