Swings and roundabouts
I've had both good and bad experiences with 3rd party inks... so it goes both ways. Had an old Epson £300+ printer that got fudged up with blocked heads after a series of power outages (8 outages inside an hour, that fried some other equipment) that meant the heads never parked/cleaned properly and basically got gummed up.. cleaning them didn't work.
Insurance replaced that one thankfully as it was so expensive back in the mid 2000's along with a new surround amp and alarm clock (all plugged into the non surged protected socket (PC was thankfully).
I'm currently using a WF2660 with 3rd party inks and haven't noticed any issues so far... I paid around £50 for that on sale and Epson inks (4 carts) would cost close to that price each time, whilst alternatives are £10.
My mum's old printer died after failing to maintain it properly... So we got her a cheap £30 HP printer and signed her up to their instant ink... it costs her £1.99 a month for 50 pages of anything she likes... which is more than enough and allows her to print pics if she wants... £24 a year for ink is fine with her and me.
If Epson did something similar for the same price... I'd probably use it myself. Until then... 3rd party inks every time. Ink is not worth more than the most expensive champagnes, it's nothing more than a scam and why they sell printers so cheaply.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
