Epson wins litigation - aftermarket carts already in short supply

[zakezuke]

Although not yet available in Canada, and without comment about
reliability or quality or other issues, Kodak is trying to break the
business model currently in use, by charging more for the hardware and
lowering prices on the consumables considerably. So far they haven't
seems to make the splash I was hoping for (I don't know how they feel
about it).

I wasn't too excited about the prices of Kodak consumables. The last
time I looked at their prices they were on par with bci-3e/bci-6 canon
in terms of cost per page. Don't get me wrong, the printer prices
were reasonable and the consumable price was also reasonable.

 

[NotMe]

| Although not yet available in Canada, and without comment about
| reliability or quality or other issues, Kodak is trying to break the
| business model currently in use, by charging more for the hardware and
| lowering prices on the consumables considerably. So far they haven't
| seems to make the splash I was hoping for (I don't know how they feel
| about it).
|
| It might be interesting for a company/retailer to offer some type of
| consumable contract, where you would buy the hardware which came with a
| one or more year consumable contract for a flat fee (depending upon the
| item) and that would allow the person to buy consumables at a steep
| discount. The only problem would be people abusing it by buying one
| contract and using it to supply consumables for many machines which they
| didn't buy the contract for.
|
| However, that is almost beginning to sound like a lease program as some
| companies like Xerox has offered on their high end copiers...

Much of Xerox's lease business model was based on patents. When the patents
expired the lease model went away as a viable option for Xerox.

 

[zakezuke]

I'm curious about this Kodak situation. Maybe they're moving into the
market carefully and slowly. I'm not familiar with their inkjet printers
at all. I can't think of any time that anyone here has discussed them! I
can't recall ever seeing a Kodak inkjet for sale. I understand that
they've been just rebadged machines from established manufacturers with
incompatible cartridges. Anyone know?

What kind of marketing has Kodak used already? Who sells their printers?

But in this case, these are Kodak's own machines (or made for them) that
are designed for their own ink formula.

Kodak has a few "easyshare" printers. OfficeDepot offers the 5300 and
the 5500.
IIRC they use a $10 cartridge which offers 400p @ 5% yield. 2.5c/page
is decent, not ground breaking, but acceptable. The lowest model in
the chain for an aio is the 5100, which is a decent deal at $150.
http://www.kodak.com/eknec/PageQuerier.jhtml?&pq-path=10580&pq-locale=en_US&_requestid=12167

Needless to say bestbuy offers them as well.

To be honest I have yet to see one in action. based on what i'm
reading, they are using pigment based inks. That at least would make
life interesting for epson. To be honest I was presuming they were
dye based.

The biggest "boom" they seem to be offering is AIO models sub $200
with small cheapish cartridges. I can't say they are moving into the
market slowly/carefully, they sort of hit the market head on. I heard
about them from the local radio and posts here.

 

[measekite]

| Re: "If we want our rights as consumers to be protected ...."
|
| The manufacturers do have some rights also. I understand not liking it,
| it makes things more expensive for us as consumers. But the
| manufacturers did put in huge up-front engineering effort to invent
| these things, and the did get patents on their products.
|
|
| Arthur Entlich wrote:
| > I replied to this posting as though it was legitimate. It may not be,
| > but the problem does exist. Manufacturers of inkjet printers are
| > winning injunctions against many 3rd party suppliers, and I have read of
| > several just last week with Epson products from legitimate sources.
| >
| > The mechanisms are the same regardless of the veracity of this
| > particular posting below, the availability will suffer as more and more
| > 3rd party manufacturers are loaded with fines and other injunctions
| > which make the cost of continuing not worthwhile.
| >
| > If we want our rights as consumers to be protected, so we can purchase
| > 3rd party cartridges or ink and fill our printers with them, we need to
| > get the countries which have such legislation to start looking carefully
| > at the Court decisions coming down and their validity.
| >
| >
| > Art

<snip>

Most of these are design patents that are very limited in scope. While
design patents have a place the use in this instance is strictly to restrict
competition.

There is no substantial competition making a quality product. They are
protecting themselves from spending money on warranty service that is
not justified and having a fly by night damaging their reputatuon.

 

[Tony]

Art
You are and always will be intriguing. No way to hide from that ;-)
Tony

 

[Mumia W.]

I don't know how profitable it would be (I personally think that the
purchasing public are fine buying underpriced hardware and paying ongoing
costs to use it), but I though of setting up a company whose purpose is to
badge-order devices such as printers and sell them at actual fair market
value for the hardware, and selling the consumables for what they are
really worth, and not preventing 3rd party consumables.

A smarter option would be to set up a company that produces printers
that don't require bundled inks.

BTW, what do you mean by "badge-order"?

 

[Arthur Entlich]

Kodak is now making, or having made, their own printer designs with
their own ink formulations. They use pigment inks, and they claim to
have lowered the prices of image printing with their business model.

They claim cost per 4x6" at about 10 cents inclusive of paper.

What does concern me is they are using the one black cartridge and one 5
color cartridge, and I have yet to get a straight answer on how they
portion the different ink colors or how the drivers are set up in terms
of the ink use. The problem with a 5 color cartridge is that if one
color runs out that's the end of that cartridge, and with light cyan and
light magenta, those often run out much sooner than the higher color
load colors.

There has been some discussion in this newsgroup about clogs, but the
number of people currently owning these units seems to be small. Also,
the only models out so far are all-in-one devices.

The black cartridges list for $10 US, color for $15 US.

If they continue in this market, it will be very interesting to see what
comes of it.

I agree about Eastman Kodak's tape (Video). Their broadcast videotape
was one of the best I used. I believe it was made for them by TDK. I
was saddened when it went off the market.

Art

 

[zakezuke]

There is no substantial competition making a quality product. They are
protecting themselves from spending money on warranty service that is
not justified and having a fly by night damaging their reputatuon.

1) There are quality after market products available, made by major
ink manufacturers
2) Their reputation is not damaged at all, they can not by law require
their consumable as a condition of the warranty, and even so products
are locked out after the warranty period has expired.
3) How many years does a product by a given company until such time as
they are no longer considered "fly by night"

 

[zakezuke]

A smarter option would be to set up a company that produces printers
that don't require bundled inks.

BTW, what do you mean by "badge-order"?

I believe the parent is talking about... for example Dell sells
printers, Lexmark is the OEM. Dell asks Lexmark to "badge" their
printers and ink "Dell" so Dell can sell them on their own. Often
Dell offers a free printer with computer, but that printer can only
accept "Dell" ink, it won't accept Lexmark ink due to physical
differences in the cartridges possible electronic keying.

 

[Gary Tait]

I'm curious about this Kodak situation. Maybe they're moving into the
market carefully and slowly. I'm not familiar with their inkjet printers
at all. I can't think of any time that anyone here has discussed them! I
can't recall ever seeing a Kodak inkjet for sale. I understand that
they've been just rebadged machines from established manufacturers with
incompatible cartridges. Anyone know?

I don't know about the current run.
I know back in the past, they sold a line of printers based on the the HP
Thinkjet technology.

Near as I can tell, these new ones use a separate head, but a tri-color
cartridge a black text cartridge, and will be chipped.

If they use a removable head, and when they release separate colors, I'll
consider it.

 

[Gary Tait]

BTW, what do you mean by "badge-order"?

Kinda what Sears does to order Kenmore appliances.

They order so many units manufactured with their "badge" applied to it, and
will assume all support for it, either directly, or with some agreement
with the manufacturer.

 

[Gary Tait]

Somewhere in the middle there should be an acceptable medium, but at
this point I don't think it's been found.

The "point" to be quite literal would be where the consumable unit would
mate with the non-comsumable device. While the printer manufacturer could
patent ink storage and feed technology in the cartridge, they however could
not prevnt 3rd party cartridge manufacturers from supplying non patent
infringing containers and chips.

 

[measekite]

[email protected]:



The "point" to be quite literal would be where the consumable unit would
mate with the non-comsumable device. While the printer manufacturer could
patent ink storage and feed technology in the cartridge, they however could
not prevnt 3rd party cartridge manufacturers from supplying non patent
infringing containers and chips.

This is America not dumbsville

 

[Frank]

This is America not dumbsville

 

[Frank]

There is no substantial competition making a quality product.

Bullshit! You know nothing.

They are

protecting themselves from spending money on warranty service that is
not justified and having a fly by night damaging their reputatuon.

You're an idiot!
Frank

 

[Jerry1111]

Re: "If we want our rights as consumers to be protected ...."

The manufacturers do have some rights also. I understand not liking it,
it makes things more expensive for us as consumers. But the
manufacturers did put in huge up-front engineering effort to invent
these things, and the did get patents on their products.

Can't see the problem. Price all the products honestly.

 

[NotMe]

"measekite"

| There is no substantial competition making a quality product. They are
| protecting themselves from spending money on warranty service that is
| not justified and having a fly by night damaging their reputatuon.

In a word ... BULLSH|T

 

[NotMe]

Re: "If we want our rights as consumers to be protected ...."

The manufacturers do have some rights also. I understand not liking it,
it makes things more expensive for us as consumers. But the
manufacturers did put in huge up-front engineering effort to invent
these things, and the did get patents on their products.

Your point would have validity IF the patent had some utility and not
something designed and patented specifically as an obstacle to competition.

 

[Stick Stickus]

There is no substantial competition making a quality product. They are
protecting themselves from spending money on warranty service that is not
justified and having a fly by night damaging their reputatuon.

Measerkite You are talking rubbish once again!
Check out the inkjet investigation on trustedreviews.com.
Many After market producers offer a complete warranty that protects you even
when your printer is out of warranty.
Show me one oem manufacturer that does the same?

 

[Frank]

Measerkite You are talking rubbish once again!
Check out the inkjet investigation on trustedreviews.com.
Many After market producers offer a complete warranty that protects you
even when your printer is out of warranty.
Show me one oem manufacturer that does the same?

That ****wit moron will never answer you or anyone else when he's
cornered like the lying rat he is.
Frank