Rebuilding and refilling: the alternatives to buying ink cartridges

By Tobias Hanraths Nov 20, 2011, 3:06 GMT

Berlin - When your printer runs out of ink, there's no real other option than to go and get some more. But with many cartridges running at dozens of euros a pop, it can turn into an expensive shopping trip.

Mercifully, there are alternatives, ranging from buying refilled or rebuilt cartridges all the way to sets for sale which people can use to do the refilling themselves.

Rebuilt or refilled cartridges are the two main alternatives. 'The rebuilt ones usually come from foreign manufacturers who don't really focus too much on patents and other similar laws,' says Rudolf Opitz from c't, a German computer magazine. With these, there are always questions about quality.

Refilled cartridges are exactly that: old containers that have been topped up. The range of offerings depend on which printer you use, says Opitz. 'There is a real mini-war going on between printer and cartridge manufacturers,' he says.

That's because companies that make cartridges clearly have a vested interest in making sure shoppers buy original products. That's why many name brands come with pre-installed chips that let users check ink levels from a computer.

But those chips also serve as a kind of copyright, which is why refillers and rebuilders spend so much time trying to crack these chips' codes, so they can replace or overwrite them.

Jenny Braun of Stiftung Warentest, a German consumer products tester, has spent a lot of time checking out the various versions of ink from a variety of manufacturers.

'The refilled cartridges have gotten continuously better in recent years and have become pretty reliable,' she says. There are still differences in quality, but mainly with challenging printing tasks, like printing photos. 'Most laypeople only see the difference when they have both printouts right next to one another.' Paper quality tends to have a much bigger effect on print quality.

'The longer a cartridge has been on the market, the higher the likelihood that you'll be able to find a high quality alternative to the original,' says Opitz.

But there are additional factors to consider beyond this rule of thumb. That's because not every cartridge is the same.

In cheaper models, the print head and the ink container are one unit. Some devices separate the head and the container, but that still means you have to replace all colours at the same time, even if only one colour has been depleted. In the ideal, there are separate containers for all the major colours - black, blue, red and yellow - that can be swapped out individually.

'Actually, the most important thing is how widespread a printer and a cartridge are,' says Braun. After all, rebuilding or refilling cartridges is only profitable if a business can be sure that there are enough potential customers out there.

But how much do you save? It varies with the printer, says Braun. Usually savings are about 30 per cent of the price of a new cartridge. Sometimes that can reach to 90 per cent.

The only real test is to see how many pages can be printed from a particular cartridge, providing a kind of price-performance ratio. If you decide to opt for original cartridges, you can usually save some money by opting for XL-sized cartridges, which tend to provide more bang for the buck.

For those people who find no good refill or rebuild alternative for sale and feel they are stuck buying original cartridges, there's always the option of taking matters into your own hands. Many specialty shops sell refill kits with ink and syringes.

But Braun only recommends this step for skilled users. 'It requires some fine motor skills. I would always use a smock and gloves.'

Opitz is even more emphatic: 'Refilling can turn into a real mess.' The ease of the refill depends a lot on the kind of cartridge. 'Original manufacturers also like to make it difficult for refillers.' On top of that, the quality of refill ink varies greatly from manufacturer to manufacturer.

Refilling or rebuilding cartridges can also put a device's guarantee at risk. 'A guarantee is a voluntary service of the company,' says Dunja Richter of the consumer central of the German state of Baden Wuerttemberg. 'That's why they can link this service to certain conditions.'