Anyway as I said, I just put this down to a gremlin in our network so we began supplying these printers to our clients because they just ticked all the boxes and there was nothing to compare to them on the market at the time.

That is when the problems began.  Not all of the 8500A’s we supplied failed but more than half did exactly the same thing as our one.

HP customer support has, in their defense been pretty good over the years so I began calling them on behalf of our clients about this issue.  To date over a year later there has been no resoulution to this problem and I must have made well over 100 calls to HP.  Invariably, after a very long drawn out session of diagnostic testing on the phone involving entering secret menus not in the product manual and resetting all sorts of things, the problem still remained and HP to their credit, eventually replaced the faulty unit.

It does not end there though.  They refuse to admit that there is an issue with this product even though I have found a large number of other disgruntled consumers registering their disgust electronically, even on HP’s own forum.

The real killer though is that on a number of occasions the replacement machine also failed in exactly the same way and the whole process had to be repeated in order to acquire my client a third machine.  So far all the three’s are working normally, on the same networks, with the same software.  Hmmmmmm?

The only logical assumption I can make, given that I cannot find any common factor in all these cases such as the same router or OS version etc. is that there must be sub-standard components in these machines that are failing and HP is quietly replacing the ones from those who shout loudest with fully tested machines.

I have found that in some cases, opening the cartridge door and closing it again will release the current print job only, but the problem still persists with subsequent jobs, so you have to open the door for every document.

I phoned them with the serial numbers of 10 machines they had replaced and asked to speak with their complaints department.  The refused to connect me.  I wonder why?

Anyway, my advice is to avoid this product and go with the Epson Workforce Pro, a whole other league above this poor offering from HP.

According to a number of industry bloggers, Lexmark is under investigation by both the British Office of Fair Trading and the Trading Standards Institute after a firmware update was released that prevents third party and refilled inkjet cartridges from being used in Lexmark printers.

A number of consumers have reportedly complained to the two advisory bodies after noticing that the latest firmware update for their inkjet printers prevented them from using cartridges that were not Lexmark originals.

However Trading Standards told The Recycler: “we don’t deal with investigations into businesses”, and that it may be the case that a local authority is separately dealing with the complaints against Lexmark.

When contacted, the Office of Fair Trading stated that it does not give out any information about ongoing complaints against companies and Lexmark declined to comment.

This issue has serious implications for the aftermarket – the OEM seems to have made a move towards shutting its printers and cartridges off from remanufactured and refilled cartridges. However, taking this step may also land Lexmark in serious trouble with the British authorities for cutting off its aftermarket competition.

The OEM has been involved in a series of moves that may suggest it is trying to shut out the aftermarket, including patenting an anti-remanufacturing device, and contesting a longlegal trial with Static Control over the past few years.

Samsung has alsobeen criticised for updating its chip technologies in an alleged attempt to block the use of remanufactured cartridges in its printers.

Have you experienced this issue first-hand? If so, please comment.

Our recommendation is that you take this seriously and avoid buying one of these products for the time being.  We have long suspected that this practice has been going on.  It is the only logical way to explain the behaviour of a number of printers rejecting 3rd party cartridges  brought to our attention by customers.

Check out my post of July last year, “Cartridge Alert for Epson Printers“

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The thing that really annoys me is that I am unable to return the favor and respond with hundreds of rubbish emails because they all bounce back.  I may even start a new topic called the top 10 most ridiculous comments.  I’d bet that I get comments on this post that claim how wonderful the content is.  If I do I’ll name and shame the pertpetrators.

Most of our Epson customers use them.  Cartridges of this type are able to contain a little under 20ml of ink.  A year ago we noticed that they only contained 14ml and recently only 7.4ml in the black and 5.5 in the colour.

This means that Epson has been stealthily increasing the price of these cartridges without you noticing by reducing the amount of ink.  Typically they cost around £12 each.  Compare this to ours containing 19ml at £5 and you can see just how much you are being ripped off.