repairability at Susan Labandibar

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Call 1-800-GOT-JUNK?

Printers are the poster child for e-waste, aren’t they? Especially those cheapo inkjets that don’t even come with a full cartridge.
I have a Lexmark X2650 printer that was priced so low it cost less to buy the unit than to purchase the replacement cartridges–which are practically impossible to find. Nor can you refill the original ones. On the other hand, the printer cartridges for my trusty Canon S330 cost as little as $1.50 each. The secret? You don’t replace the print head with every cartridge.

Now, imagine that your cheap printer stops working. How strong is your motivation to spend money fixing it? I have seen plenty of people throw out printers simply because they stopped working and they were reluctant to take the first troubleshooting step, which is to replace the cartridge. In case replacing the cartridge didn’t fix the problem, they would then be stuck with an expensive new cartridge as well as a non-working printer. Read the rest of this entry »