Canon CLI Cartridge

[fdc7446]

It sounds to me like Kamikaze is correct, Canon is anti-competitive in forcing you to buy thier carts.
It is anti American, this like having to take your car back to the dealer to get any parts or service.

 

[mikling]

Printers are a mature product now. New companies won't enter a mature market. Even Epson is departing the low end world where ONLY integrated cartridges can make enough money for the corporation. Epson's technology of an expensive piezo head has them roped in and they cannot make disposable cartridges cheap enough so they migrate to the high end and focus on where the money seems to be.

 

[Manuchau]

Mature product or not - there is always room in any market for a good product. If I had the $$$ and the knowhow, I would make and market an easily refillable printer. This lack of consumer protection by making everything proprietary is annoying to me, and possibly illegal.
I sell printers, and I know from angry consumers that many would buy a more expensive printer if it offered easy refilling, high quality prints, and even compatibles.

 

[Tin Ho]

Sorry to hijack this thread here. But I thought if the subject is about CLI-8 then this post belongs to it too. So here it goes:

I discovered something interesting about CLI-8 and PGI-5 ink cartridges. Actually I found out about it on a PGI-5 but I believe CLI-8 will be the same.

If a CLI-8 (or PGI-5) is swapped out of a printer when it is warned that its ink level is low you can refill it and use it in another printer as new and full. How do I know? I was given an empty PGI-5. I believe it was taken out when the printer warned the first time. I refilled it and put it into my ip4300. It was registered as new and full in the ink level status. It has been used for a few days and no warning so far. I got a few CLI-8 empties and I will try them soon. Will be back to post the finding.

 

[fotofreek]

Tin HO - if that really works, owners of the cli-8/pgi-5 printers need to set up some sort of buddy system to exchange emptys for refilling.

 

[headphonesman]

If a CLI-8 (or PGI-5) is swapped out of a printer when it is warned that its ink level is low you can refill it and use it in another printer as new and full. How do I know? I was given an empty PGI-5. I believe it was taken out when the printer warned the first time. I refilled it and put it into my ip4300. It was registered as new and full in the ink level status. It has been used for a few days and no warning so far. I got a few CLI-8 empties and I will try them soon. Will be back to post the finding.

Very interesting, I had an occasion where i was swopping new for old and ,for a time , carts which should have been showing as "low " started showing "good". I continued to play and confirm but then it reverted back the correct low status. I was never able to replicate the occurrence. I was not even convinced it had really happened, thinking I must have been mistaken. The main thing that will be of use is the result of use in the new machine......will it get "low" and then have to be transferred back to the "old" machine to be re-born again?... Or will it just expire in the normal way to be a "dead chipped cart".

Those of us with 2 or more chipped CL8 printers would welcome further reports on the outcome, even if negative.

 

[Grandad35]

This may or may not apply to Canon's chipped carts, but my old HP 5550 printer read some form of serial number from each cart and kept track of the ink usage by counting the "drops". One way to reset these carts is shown at (http://www.alotofthings.com/viartshop/article.php?category_id=11&article_id=84&page=). A second, easier way was to have 3 carts of each type, and to rotate them in sequence. It seems that the HP printer only remembered the fill level of the last 2 carts, and that when a 3rd cart was introduced the printer assumed that it was a new one (actually, the "cover the contacts" approach just gives 3 different serial numbers to the printer, and did the same thing). Could Canon have implemented a similar simple scheme? Keeping the drop count on the cart would require a flash or eeprom chip on each cart (like Epson), and this would cost at least a few cents more than a simple fixed serial number. Lots of talk about "encryption" would certainly throw everyone off the trial. Given that Canon's manufacturing costs are probably somewhere under $1, saving an extra 5 to 10 cents/cart would be a strong inducement to eliminate a memory chip on each cart.

Everyone has assumed that Canon's new technology was more sophisticated than Epson's - perhaps it isn't. Can someone post a macro photo of one of the new Canon chips? Perhaps someone else will see something that might indicate the technology implemented on the chip. If someone wants to mail me a chip (or an empty cart), I'll take the pictures and try to dissect the chip.

 

[mikling]

Grandad, your data refers to the older generation of HP cartridges. The newest ones are past that and can't be tricked by introducing new serial numbers so easily. Canon's system is even way past that. I have mentioned numerous times that the printer manufacturers are fighting back with a disguise of protecting the printhead and using much more sophisticated technologyies simply because it is so affordable to do so now. You won't "see" the technology through on Canon's with a photo, you'll need specialized electronic equipment to see the data transfer and even then it's scrambled/encrypted and that's why there is no resetter yet or more likely ever. Epson also has a new generation of chips to thwart refilling or more pointedly to thwart cheap compatibles. I think the days of the resetter are numbered so take care of your old printers or begin hoarding them up.

 

[Grandad35]

Mikling,

Both Tin Ho and headphonesman have now reported anomolies that can't be explained if the ink usage is recorded only on the cartridge. I don't use these carts, so I don't "have a dog in the hunt", but this is an interesting problem. Over many years of troubleshooting, I have found that you have to listen to every snippet of information and to try to fit it into the overall puzzle. I am not saying that Canon uses the same system as the old HP carts, only that it is worthwhile to consider other possibilities. It is probable that there are people on this forum who have the capability of dissecting a chip to identify the technology involved (flash, eeprom, laser cut etch, etc.).

I know that this path of investigation has a very low probability of providing a solution, but the information from Tin Ho and headphonesman can't be explained by the conventional wisdom on how the Canon chips work. There is no harm in occasionally tilting at a windmill - it's can sometimes be a very effective learning experience.

 

[headphonesman]

I reported the anomoly at the time in this forum, link provided:-

http://www.stevesforums.com/forums/view_topic.php?id=85473&forum_id=40&page=2

Please see my posts and Websnails for the 10th of June. It contains detail that I had forgotten......

I have 3 x4200`s mothballed against the day when all The big 3 follow Lexmark and forbid their printers to take anything but their own bona fide carts, I just pray that the 3rd party ink suppliers dont go out of business as well.


I quite agree with Grandad, every little helps."you have to listen to every snippet of information and to try to fit it into the overall"