My answers are found below in the quote. Note that I have been sending the color data and pictures of samples/ proofs to Spyder. They have been very helpful.
I have a canon mx680. I use Costco's Kirkland paper, and Uni-kit ink. I knew my image colors were a little off. Santa bought me a spyder3 print printer profiler. Long story short. My uni-kit ink has a collapsed gamut giving me a reddish hue to my photos. The canon inks works great but...
I have been using uni-kit inks for the past year. No clogging, no perceptible fading. I thought the colors looked great until I did a print profile (spyder3 print). Took a really closer look at the colors and they are off. I am using Costco's Kirkland paper.
So if you just do every day...