Calidad = crap

Recently I have had some unsettling experiences with my printer, and the process of trying to get it fixed properly!!

It all started about a year ago when my previous printer - a Canon bubblejet something or other - died. What happened is that black suddenly stopped printing, which indicated that it needed a new printhead. No longer being under warranty, I decided to put the $150 for the new print head towards a new printer for about $230. I got a Canon Pixma IP4000, which I love. It has been a faithful little worker for all of my homework needs, and has the great features of printing onto DVDs/CDs and a range of paper sizes including 6X4 photo paper (although who prints photo's out these days anyway??).

Fast forward to about two weeks before my warranty was up this year, and my beloved printers little head stopped working - it had the same problem as the last one, the black no longer came through!! I couldn't believe my bad luck, but on the other hand I was lucky enough for it to happen before the warranty ran out.

I was rather nervous about taking the printer back to be fixed under warranty because I hadn't exactly been looking after it 100%. Being a student, I found it difficult to justify spending $20-$25 per cartridge (it takes 5 in total!) as I use it everyday and need new cartridges on a regular basis. Kmart provided me with a nice alternative, Calidad brand inks, which cost between $10-$12 for what I believed to be equivalent quality ink with good colour matching. My nerves were settled after consulting with the place of purchase. I was advised that Canon would fulfill their warranty requirements even though the printer had been fitted with non-Canon inks, which impressed me. I was very happy that they replaced the print head and got the printer working again, it's just a pity that it then cost me $115 in Canon inks before they would test it and release it back to me!!!

In the end, I have a printer that works (sort of, there's an ongoing saga there - a whole other story), a whole new set of inks, and have been on the recieving end of multiple lectures about not using any alternate brand inks (especially Calidad) as they tend to clog the print head and cause numerous other problems. My advice to anyone who wants to save money on inks is to wait until Kmart have a sale thoughout their whole store and stock up. It just isn't worth the hassle of having to get your printer fixed/replaced every year beacuse of sub-standard ink cartridges.