Printer ink pricier than champagne finds Which?

[Zaphod]

@Tedc

I think it would be useful if potential buyers of printers put together a total price comparison list e.g.:-

Printer A - £ 300 to buy + X pounds for whatever amount of ink I think I might use, at the advertised ink prices.

Printer B- £50 to buy, Y pounds for whatever amount of ink I expect to use, at the advertised ink prices, for whatever I think is the lifetime of that printer. (example 3 years).

I think that we will all find that the lowest cost printers are burying their printer cost in the prices of their inks. (They might all cost much the same if we do the arithmetic)

We have to think about the total cost based on the amount of ink we use.

Hope I worded this well enough to be understood.

I understood it easily enough.

But IMHO you’re missing part of the scheming manufacturer’s equation in your “A” and “B” + “X” and “Y” theorising, and it is this:
Nowadays the more price-friendly inkjet printers from a number of manufacturers (most of them, in fact) come only with low-capacity or “starter” ink catrdidges supplied.

So you merrily depart the shop with your £50 printer thinking you’ve got a bargain, because the full set of ink cartridges costs that much - only to find that they run out after not very many pages of printing and you need more ink cartridges PDQ!

So while I agree with your theory in principle, the reality is that the manufacturers make it really difficult to make accurate comparisons.
And who is going to go to the time and trouble of testing and comparing?

[Bruce]

As a laser printer owner, and after much research, in my experience champagne tastes much nicer than printer ink. I wonder if Choice mentioned this?