I don’t care how “open source” the printer claims to be. Both hardware and software belong to Belzebub. Such was the dark pact printer makers signed in blood decades ago, and all land shall obey by those words. We shall hit the print button and wallow in torment forever.
Would be nice, if it was USB by default and Ethernet/Wifi just a module you attach. For most private users, the IoT part of printers is actually a security hazard. Especially for such a portable device.
Edit: private users
i can’t remember the last job i had with non networked printers. that would only work with very small offices.
Ethernet by default with an optional WiFi module would be ideal.
On the one hand, I’m really excited about this because the printer industry is literally the worst. On the other hand, I haven’t printed anything for years, I probably won’t use it much/ever.
I print things still pretty consistently. Random forms that need hard copies to have a wet signature, activity sheets for the kids to color, templates for drilling holes in walls, etc. Make the business a lot less toxic and I think you’ll start seeing printers in more homes again.
Say it with me pow-der based to-ners.
Its probably just much cheaper and easier, unless you absolutely have to have color, to go to good will and get a brother laser printer for like 10 bucks.
I got one years ago and its still on the original toner cart it came with, and I print decently often.
I tried that once with a Dell LaserJet. Managing printer drivers was a nightmare, and every time I plugged it in, the lights flickered. Eventually I got rid of it because the hassle wasn’t worth the effort.
Hopefully this means no hidden yellow tracking dots.
Those are only on colour laser printers.
It is not open source with that license.
PittyPity.(CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0, the non–open-source part here being NC)
As an ESL, I had to look up pitty thinking it has to do with pits
Pity and Shame typically go hand an hand, you’ll hear people say “That’s a shame” but you can replace shame with pity “That’s a pity” and achieve the same result.
However when addressing another person, you won’t hear people say “I shame you” instead you’ll hear “I pity you” to show displeasure or anger to another person.
Hope this helps!
I think it’s mostly because above spelled it wrong and it made it just different enough that we thought it was a new word.
I can’t wait for the laser ink variant!
Ah, you have one of those electric diesel cars I’ve been hearing about
I don’t know of any diesel electric cars, but most diesel locomotives use their diesel engines to generate electricity to run the drivetrain.
Same with ships.
Edison Motors!
Or natural gas being called a “green fuel” by German politicians.
I bet they have liquid ice, too.
Laser ink as in gray/brown-scale that chars the paper no ink needed!
That’s direct thermal, not laser. Problem is direct thermal prints don’t last very long and the paper is expensive. Thermal transfer uses expensive ribbons, and laser is super complex.
I hope someone finds a way of making laser charring/printing less complex.
Aaand its dependent on HP print cartridges. This is a hard problem but the dependence on HP will probably backfire
But you can just refill those yourself. The biggest problem with HP printers is that it times out cartridges, even if there’s ink left.
From what I can tell the print head is built into the cartridge and that’s the hard part for printer technology.
But I think you might be right depending only on the hp cartridge will open them up to cease and desist. If they make it also use a cannon cartridge that also has a print head then I think they might be ok
I think the fact that it’s hardware will prevent any cease and desist (or rather the legal teeth behind them). It’s not licensed IP but a physical product.
Like I think of it more like 3rd party car parts. Depending on the part, they often need to target specific makes, models, and even years of cars. It’s why so many parts have had encrypted handshakes with the main computer (John Deere is famous for this but I understand some cars are doing it for some parts these days, too) because they couldn’t just stop them in the courts.
I’m not sure that this is how it will work but hopefully. Also selling ink cartridges is how HP makes its money and it uses some of that money to subsidize the printers themselves, so they might like that this printer sells more of those rather than moving entirely away from their ecosystem.
Yeah, ultimately it probably does end up selling more cartridges over time. Like even with the refillable ones you still gotta replace them eventually because of the print heads. Honestly, the more I think about it I think I’m just gonna continue to not print things out at my house and just use the Kinko’s when I need to for a dime a page. I mean how much do I actually print out anyway. This is the same math I did when decided not to buy another ink cartridge last time my printer stopped working
I’ll stick with my 15 year old brother laser that’s still works just fine.
Don’t bother my Brother, brother from another mother! We’re Brother brothers!
Semantic satiation is kicking in…
Which one? I find the print quality from Brother to be below HP, I think because Brother uses LED and not laser.
inkjet
Virtually useless unless it supports non consumer ink cartridges or you buy chinese drop in knockoffs.
And even then only if you need to print graphics/images in high quality.
All hail laser.
hooray my fuser has jammed, my transfer belt has stretched, toner is smeared everywhere, my printer weighs a ton.
How often are you moving your printer that the weight is a concern?
I have wiped a toner cartridge with a paper towel and chucked thst sucker back into a ye olde HP from 20 years ago with a broken guider clip and it still prints perfectly fine.
I wiped it because it was leaving a smudge at the edge of the paper after never cleaning the rollers for aforementioned 20 years.
I guess I can add briefcase printer for mission impossible as a use case for inkjet lol
HP Laserjet 4000 here. I love it. I could use it to kill a skunk and then put it back on the desk and print a novel for $0.25
It looks really neat! Depending on the price, I might get one :)
Expect this to be priced like a laser printer. Most inkjet printers are subsidized by cartridge lock in and ink priced higher than platinum by ounce.
Honestly, I don’t mind inkjet as a technology, the quality is plenty good and I don’t give a crap about speed. And as you can see from this design they’re a whole lot more compact. The whole reason I don’t use them is the predatory ink pricing, which this product in theory solves!
For now, you can get inkjet printers that use liquid ink. Ostensibly Canon wants me to use Canon brand ink for my printer, but there’s nothing stopping me from buying some off brand and dumping it in the tanks
Tank inkjets tend not to be subsidized because of the lack of lock in. They’re considerably more expensive than those that use cartridges. So you are paying for the ability to put in whatever you want.
Which to me is a no-brainer. (I do have a laser printer though)
Yeah, mine did cost like $160, but it is nice to know that canon can’t decide to end support and brick it in 10 years
That’s actually a good deal for a tank inkjet last I saw.
I want to support this but what stops me is ink. Is ink the best choice over toner or laser?
laser printers or toner
Laser printers use toner.
Laser printers are also more complex devices.
Thank you clearing that up.
There is still work to do before it lands in users’ hands. The team says it is optimizing the ink-drying system, refining printhead cleaning cycles, improving paper insertion, and trying to boost print speeds. On the software side, work continues on Wi-Fi and Ethernet connectivity, as well as dithering algorithms designed to improve image quality.
Here’s the video of it in action:
For a reasonable price and good reviews, this could be my next printer.
Dude just get a powder toner laser printer. I’ve been filling the stock toners in my Lexmark instead of buying ink. Fuck, ink.
It’s cool, but “It uses refillable HP cartridge bodies – HP 63 in the US and HP 302 in Europe” worries me. I used to have a high-end inkjet for art prints, and then they discontinued the ink cartridges. You can still technically get them on ebay, but they’re at scalpers mark-up. So I don’t hold much hope for this lasting in the long run.
I would be surprised if a cartridge being discontinued would kill an open source project like this. They could switch to a different cartridge.
I’d assume they’re doing the one for now because it’s cheap-ish and has widespread availability. There’s little reason not to expand to other cartridges once the rest of the printer is more stable.
Good thing this is just a prototype
