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Brother accused of locking down third-party printer ink cartridges
- duxup 2y agoBummer if true, my brother printer is the one I hate the least.
- B1FF_PSUVM 2y agoThe day is coming no one will print anything because it's so painful. Who knew that "save the trees" would come from printer manufacturers. (I know pulp trees are farmed, but I too have a Brother printer ...)
- chii 2y agofarmed trees could theoretically cause more harm than good, if the plantation was from bulldozing a native area which had biodiversity. It really is circumstance based, rather than always good.
- bobthepanda 2y agoIn Japan an overabundance of farmed trees is actually thought to be responsible for larger, worse allergy seasons: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/06/japan-declares-war-on-pollen-as-hay-fever-epidemic-grips-the-nation https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/06/japan-declares...
- gblargg 2y ago"You will print nothing and be happy."
- jmholla 2y agoMy Brother printer is not allowed to talk to the internet. Here's hoping a windows machine on my network doesn't accidentally update it. I forget what, but this isn't the first shady move from Brother. They seem to be well on in the enshittification phase of their business.
- voltaireodactyl 2y agoThere was talk a while back about them silently degrading print jobs that used third party ink. I forget the exact details but it was arguably more heinous than the HP stuff since at least that happens out in the open — this was special code to make third party ink look worse without explanation.
- neilv 2y ago> My Brother printer is not allowed to talk to the internet. Here's hoping a windows machine on my network doesn't accidentally update it. Same here. I keep my HP LaserJet isolated from the Internet (both directions), as well as from LAN devices that haven't been allowlisted for it. Only devices that are limited to generic open source drivers can print to it, since you can't trust the battleship-sized HP "driver" packages not to update firmware. My Brother color laser printer, I don't use very often, so I just carry the Debian laptop over to it, and plug in the USB cable, as needed. This isn't perfect, and I can still think of sneaky ways to update the firmware of the small fraction of the installed bases that do isolation like this. But it's the best reasonable compromise I can find right now, without spending hundreds of hours on what I suspect is the next step of protection. (Which would be "data diode"-like filtering that's aware of application layer protocols and file formats, and only passes validated-safe bytes to the printer. I suspect that an even harder approach would be trustworthy open source replacement printer firmware, unless someone finds and pursues a GPL legal attack, like the situation that birthed the wonderful OpenWrt.) AFAIK, Brother seemed to have pretty universal word-of-mouth goodwill among techies until the last maybe couple years. But even if that goodwill had significant effect on the balance sheet (relative to the primary marketing methods), my layperson impression is that it'd be a rare CEO who didn't cash in goodwill (especially goodwill built up by a predecessor). And with US government being sabotaged right now, maybe regulators like the FTC will also not be barriers to brands doing whatever a CEO wants, even more than in recent decades.
- b3ing 2y agoI guess it’s time for people to come up with open source printers
- ishtanbul 2y agoYou could probably 3d print most of the parts quite easily except the print head
- RobotToaster 2y agoPaper handling is hard, that's why sprocket feed paper used to be popular.
- DaiPlusPlus 2y agoHypothetically... can't you just print a 2D document directly on a 3D printer?
- aqueueaqueue 2y agoYes but it is expensive and slow, rarely big enough for A4 (or Letter) and would be plastic. Additionally it would be maybe up to 4 colours. Not as in CYMK but as in 4 colours total no mixing. Unless you do a lithographic print but they need a light source to be seen. Also you can print pixels. You convert to G code so it is made up of lines.
- chongli 2y ago3D printers don't have anywhere near the resolution of 2D printers. Take something like a $300 Epson photo printer [1]. It has 5760 x 1440 dpi with 6 colours! [1] https://epson.ca/For-Home/Printers/Photo/Expression-Photo-XP-8700-Wireless-All-in-One-Printer/p/C11CK46201 https://epson.ca/For-Home/Printers/Photo/Expression-Photo-XP...
- Sohcahtoa82 2y agoA Creality Ender 3 Pro, a common budget 3D printer, has an accuracy of 0.1mm. That's an equivalent of about 254 DPI. Of course, that's just the positioning. If you're 2D printing on a 3D printer by mounting a pen to the end, you're also limited by the thickness of the pen tip. In any case, you could certainly draw text, but you'd only want to use a font that relies on thin lines, nothing thick. Filled in spaces would be difficult, and of course, photos are just completely out of the question. As mentioned in a sibling comment, really you'd have just reinvented plotters which have existed for decades.
- brcmthrowaway 2y agoWhy is there no open source printer or hacker friendly printer? Surely Eric from Pebble should focus his energy on that.
- dv_dt 2y agoBecause the paper and ink handling mechanicals are even less common than say PC grade electronics which are largely commoditized for an ecosystem of multiple designers. Eg Framework or MSI etc can design and build motherboards in the ecosystem. But, print engines afaic aren't design components packaged for multiple design partners.
- dmonitor 2y agoit's crazy that 3d printers are so hackable but 2d printers are malicious spyware machines with no alternatives
- throwaway48476 2y agoThe government has their tentacles in them to make sure the microdots are printed. They're trying to lock down 3D printers too in NY state.
- alpaca128 2y ago> They're trying to lock down 3D printers too in NY state. Good luck with that. Unkess they inspect every single vehicle and delivery entering the state they could only make it a little less convenient and force a few more people to buy a kit instead.
- p0w3n3d 2y agoSolution: put colourful pens into 3d printer "hands"
- DaSHacka 2y agoThis unironically may be what needs to be done. A video by Stuff Made Here covered what is essentially one such machine [0]. That specific machine is meant for generating handwritten notes, but I imagine it could likely work for general purpose documents too with some tweaks. [0] https://youtube.com/watch?v=cQO2XTP7QDw https://youtube.com/watch?v=cQO2XTP7QDw
- thot_experiment 2y agoJust here to yet again say that updates are bad and you shouldn't update things that work because the only outcomes are that they either continue working or they stop working. Don't roll the dice.
- jeremyjh 2y agoWhat if there are security vulnerabilities that you don't know about? You think its working, but it isn't.
- adamtaylor_13 2y agoI’ll go ahead and roll the dice that my printer isn’t a gaping security hole in my home network.
- CGamesPlay 2y agoWhat can a hacked printer do? https://techyoulike.com/what-can-a-hacked-printer-do/ https://techyoulike.com/what-can-a-hacked-printer-do/
- gymbeaux 2y agoThat’s a terrible article. It includes nothing to backup the claims it makes- that printers have a plethora of vulnerabilities. The reality is your printer probably isn’t a realistic attack vector. Your average network firewall will keep you safe, but certainly in theory physical access to the printer could serve as a gateway to the rest of the LAN, and certainly physical access in theory facilitates accessing recently-printed documents.
- CamperBob2 2y agoTsk, don't you know that on Hacker News everybody is assumed to have the same threat model as a 3-letter spy agency, and is required to behave accordingly?
- gruez 2y ago
- clarkmoody 2y agoHere's how a printer company could gain massive market share: - Open firmware and interfaces to the hardware - Make a profit on the sale of the printer hardware - Open spec for any ink manufacturer to create cartridges
- gymbeaux 2y agoIt’s like unlimited data cell plans, if one does it they’ll all have to do it.
- chongli 2y agoI don't think so, unless you're talking about professional-grade printers for businesses who print a LOT and look at the TCO of printers before buying them. Consumers buy literally the cheapest printer available at the store. Manufacturers have had to start shrinking the amount of ink in starter cartridges just to get consumers to buy any cartridges at all since otherwise people would buy a new printer instead of buying cartridges. A printer that's actually profitable without any ink sales is going to cost hundreds of dollars more than any consumer would be willing to pay.
- jabl 2y agoI'd love to see it, but realistically that's not the world we're living in. 99% of people will just pick whatever box in the store that looks snazzy and is cheap.
- shellfishgene 2y agoThere are probably a gazillion patents around printing, I wonder if it's even feasible to bring new hardware to market.
- Almondsetat 2y agoHere's how a printer company could go bankrupt immediately: - Fixate on open firmware and force all third parties to open source their code (because yes, third party firmware vendors are necessary to develop a working printer system) - Make a puny profit on durable hardware - Miss out on the only true recurring revenue you can have
- pabs3 2y agoI wonder when eink is going to end printing.
- Gigachad 2y agoI use my printer for two things, printing shipping labels, and printing sewing patterns. E ink is useless for both.
- chii 2y agoif e-ink "paper" could be made as cheaply as real paper, so much so that you could just post it like a letter, then i do think it can end print. But at least as of now, it doesn't seem like that's the case.
- recursive 2y agoNo sooner than you can put one in an envelope and send it for the cost of a normal postage stamp.
- Prickle 2y agoI can confirm this from my own, anecdotal experience. My current brother printer no longer recognizes refilled ink cartridges and some third party cartridges.
- SwtCyber 2y agoKeeping the printer offline and avoiding updates is probably the best move now
- spl757 2y agoEnshittification is like metastasized cancer that will spread to everything. Firefox TOS crap, Brother becoming HP. If it's connected to the internet it will wither and die.
- 51Cards 2y agoWe have a large inventory of Brother printers we use onsite at events. We use Samsung for 12+ years until they pulled out of the printer business. We chose Brother mainly because they weren't HP with their toner practices. Now looks like it may not make much of a difference.
- alsoforgotmypwd 2y agoThere are zillions of cheap, chipped third-party HP toner cartridges for Pro and enterprise printers.
- globular-toast 2y agoMy Samsung ML-1910 is 15+ years old and still going. USB only so it's plugged in to a box running CUPS. I used to use a Raspberry Pi for it. I don't print an awful lot, only on my second ever toner cartridge, the initial "starter" one lasted ages. Hope it lasts forever. I didn't realise Samsung pulled out.
- javawizard 2y agoI gotta say, switching to an Epson EcoTank printer was one of the best decisions I've ever made. It has ink reservoirs rather than cartridges, and small, permanently plumbed tubes that go from the reservoirs to the print head. Not only does that mean there's no way it can tell what kind of ink I'm putting in it, it also means the tanks are fucking massive. It's so nice being able to go O(years) without refilling. It cost about twice what a comparable, cartridge-based printer cost at the time. To this day I still consider it one of the best purchases I've ever made.
- mcpherrinm 2y agoIs there any mechanism to ensure you use "genuine" ink, or can you just dump whatever in?
- jdiff 2y ago> Not only does that mean there's no way it can tell what kind of ink I'm putting in it
- javawizard 2y agoNope! As long as you've got a bottle or a syringe with an opening small enough to fit in the refilling ports, you're golden.
- dataflow 2y agoDo you have a recommendation for a particular color model? Preferably with a scanner (but it's fine if not)?
- javawizard 2y agoYes - mine is an Epson EcoTank 8550. It has a flatbed scanner and can print up to 13x19. They also make one that can only print 8.5x11 but that has a document feeder on the scanner. It's otherwise the same printer. I'd recommend either one, depending on how useful a document feeder would be for you and whether you need the larger print size of the one I have.
- blackeyeblitzar 2y agoHP does this with their printers. The trick is to refuse all the updates so you can use 3P ink.
- SV_BubbleTime 2y agoI had a brother for 12 years. It finally died. It took about 5 minutes to see that I would not be replacing it with another. Canon for now.
- viknesh 2y agoJust replaced a 17 year old Brother with a new one. Seems to work just as well, although I've always been using first party cartridges.
- wazoox 2y agoI had a Canon about 20 years ago. Getting it to work with Linux was incredibly difficult and finicky, and required some piece of proprietary software at some point. So my gut feeling about Canon is "never again", though the situation may have evolved.
- SV_BubbleTime 2y agoWorks right away in Linux. No special drivers, auto recognized over network.
- ciiiicii 2y agoCan the firmware be downgraded to a version that doesn't do this? That is, assuming the older firmware images are archived somewhere.
- dlenski 2y agoYes, with https://github.com/sedrubal/brother_printer_fwupd https://github.com/sedrubal/brother_printer_fwupd it's frequently possible. (I've contributed to it. Very useful tool.)
- 3abiton 2y agoIs there anything useful usually in those fw updates?
- dlenski 2y agoNot in my experience. No user visible changes. There might be some fixes to bugs
- wazoox 2y agoProbably some dubiously useful features such as a nicer web UI (I never use it anyway), some utterly useless features like "scanning to Dropbox/GDrive", or most probably now some "AI assistant" that tells you how to switch cartridges.
- MostlyStable 2y agoThat tool appears to be getting the firmware from brother servers. They have removed the old firmware as of more than a year ago (this issue is not new)
- samlinnfer 2y agoI want to see this confirmed before we hop into it. I've been using aftermarket toner with Brother all the time and it's working well. All the posts on Louis' wiki (https://wiki.rossmanngroup.com/wiki/Brother_ink_lockout_%26_quality_sabotage https://wiki.rossmanngroup.com/wiki/Brother_ink_lockout_%26_...) are 2-3 years old and the only primary sources from people on reddit and there are a total of 3 people saying this. He's long winded video adds nothing new, this tomshardware article just repeats what he says in the video. Literally these are the only three sources I can find of people claiming this: 1. https://www.reddit.com/r/printers/comments/s9b2eg/brother_mfc_firmware_update_nongenuine_toner_now/ https://www.reddit.com/r/printers/comments/s9b2eg/brother_mf... 2. https://github.com/sedrubal/brother_printer_fwupd/issues/9 https://github.com/sedrubal/brother_printer_fwupd/issues/9 3. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31860131 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31860131
- philipodonnell 2y agoHi. Maybe anecdotal, Brother MDC-J480DW, had it about 3 years, always bought third party ink, two weeks ago I had to replace the color ones and it started saying there was no ink even though ink was clearly visible, it failed on two different colors from two different sources, and the three different black cartridges, then bought legit from Walmart and worked perfectly. I can’t speak for everyone’s experience, but mine was definitely changed recently to always say third party ink was empty, and I’ll junk it once this ink runs out.
- viraptor 2y agoWorth noting that this looks like a different issue. You're reporting high ink level not being accepted, but the other post reports high misalignment.
- PennRobotics 2y agoI don't know about every Brother model. On ours, there's a key sequence you can press to reset the toner cartridge odometer letting you squeeze out toner until the text is a satisfying light grey.
- 2y ago
- john01dav 2y agoSo which printers are good to get now? I have a brother printer that I got for $30 off Facebook marketplace, which I'll keep for now, but it'd be good to know which brands are safe should I need to get another one or make a recommendation to less technical people in my circle. I'd prefer laser printers since they handle bursty workloads better (for example I had to print 100 resumes for a career fair after 6 months of nothing), since the ink can't dry out.
- omoikane 2y agoIf it's really few months of not printing anything, would it be more economical to use one of those print services instead? You lose the convenience, but you also gain a bit of shelf space for not storing the printer and all related printing supplies.
- dakiol 2y agoBut what about privacy? Don’t you mind printing a copy of your passport or payslip or any sensitive doc via a print service (e.g., in a kiosk)
- bluGill 2y agoMy time in not going to those places to pick up a job is worth more than the cost of a printer. I use those places for large prints - so far once in my life - but it takes valuable time.
- nosioptar 2y agoThe library's even cheaper. My library offers something like 400 b+w pages or 200 color pages per month for free.
- epoxy_sauce 2y agoI got an old dell mfp 3115 from a business that was moving for about a hundred bucks. I've never replaced the toner since I got it almost a decade ago and still have a compatible replacements. I've printed hundreds and hundreds of pages. I'll probably use it for the rest of my life or until I can't get the drivers to work. If you have the space something like that is an option.
- rf15 2y agoDamn, I used to buy them over any other brand exactly because they didn't have this scummy behavior.
- WarOnPrivacy 2y agoI'm a brother shill but a while back they experimented with a consumer-hostile firmware update for one of their models. Since then, I've been edge blocking the rdns of update.brother.co.jp. It usually resolves to 4 IPv4 addys. Depending on the DNS resolver, they should lie in one of these subnets. 3.164.143.0/24 # per asia dns 13.249.98.0/24 # per us dns 18.154.219.0/24 # can't recall 18.155.68.0/24 # per alibaba dns 18.160.225.0/24 # per he.net edit: It looks like Brother is using cloudfront to provide CDN services. Every region I try I get a diff subnet. Better to query yourself than rely on my IPs.
- viraptor 2y agoThese are Amazon ranges. You're most likely blocking random aws load balancers including more than just brother servers. Also the brother servers can be redeployed at any point. It's likely better to prevent the dns name resolution instead.
- hyperman1 2y agoI'd suggest switching from a blacklist to a whitelist mindset. In this case, allow the printer only access to the local network.
- account42 2y agoI'd be even more paranoid and connect the printer via USB only. You can then run your own print server if you want to support printing from multiple devices.
- codedokode 2y agoThe printer might be using encrypted DNS.
- viraptor 2y agoVery unlikely. At least not without a fallback. Lots of corps will not allow encrypted dns because they want good traffic monitoring for threat detection. It may be an option, but it almost certainly won't be enforced.
- p3rls 2y agoI have a bunch of annoying spammers from India that keep coming to my webapp and try to annoy users about buying their Brother printer cartridges. I've always wondered how the economics of that work.
- quanto 2y agoEt tu, Brother? Nevertheless, isn't Brother still the cheapest per page even with official cartridges? I would like to get some recommendations.
- loeg 2y agoYeah, I think I've bought replacement toner 2-3 times in more than a decade. It's still a good deal.
- ahoef 2y agoI block my printers from doing any Internet requests for this reason. They're only allowed established and related traffic on the LAN.
- waltercool 2y ago[dead]
- nicman23 2y agoalways have a bitch tier wlan/lan for printers
- ustad 2y agoI have one of the popular cheap Brother BW laser printers and it was my first laser printer after years of crappy ink printers. Everything is great about it apart from using 3rd party generic toner cartridges. It senses they are not original, does warning messages etc. and forces me to open/close the toner door every time i switch on the printer to get it to function again. This ball breaking forced me to buy a legit brother toner cartridge at 3x price. Now, I’m not to pissed off because laser printing is pretty cheap and as long as you are ok with BW prints its pretty good quality and convenient. Never going back to inkjet printers.
- MostlyStable 2y agoIt's worth looking up how to swap the drm chip. It was pretty easy (<10 minutes) when I did it.
- alpaca128 2y ago> forces me to open/close the toner door every time i switch on the printer to get it to function again My first HP printer forced me to spam the Stop button for 10 seconds every time I turned it on as it would always try to print a colored test page with generous amounts of ink.
- asdf6969 2y agoWhat are you guys printing in 2025?
- globular-toast 2y agoWhen I do the kind of work that involves technical spec sheets and papers etc I print them out. It's so much nicer having a copy on the desk instead of trying to view it in your monitor. It's basically an extra screen. The last semi-regular thing I'd print were postage labels for when I sell stuff on eBay. But in the last few years it's changed, now I can just go to the post office with a QR code and it's all done.
- Aardwolf 2y agoA pdf to sign a signature on to then scan in again
- ahoka 2y agoI have used https://lookscanned.io/ https://lookscanned.io/ with success, but you mileage may vary.
- alpaca128 2y agoPDF annotation with a cheap drawing tablet works well enough for my insurance and others, and is a lot more convenient.
- tristor 2y agoIf they'll accept a PDF at all, just using a digital signature annotation in Mac Preview is sufficient for every use case I've found. The ones that won't accept this generally require physical hard-copy, not a scan.
- globular-toast 2y agoLast time I did this, I printed, signed and sent only the last page, which had the signature on it. They rejected it because I didn't print and scan the entire document.
- 2y ago
- Tepix 2y agoOh no, i updated the firmware of my monochrome brother laser printer the other day :-(
- awruko 2y agoI have color laser mfc-9340cdw. It has outdated firmware version za1.10. There is newer firmware version zb1.10q dated 9.7.23. It looks like there is no automatic update. Just to be sure, I have created a static dhcp entry for it on a router with misconfigured default gateway.
- wazoox 2y agoI've very deliberately NOT updated the firmware of my Brother printer, ever. I mean, it works just fine (but complains that there's some updates available). What could an update add? Probably nothing. What could it break ? A whole lot. If it ain't broken, don't fix it :)
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- jbaber 2y ago[flagged]
- alkonaut 2y agoLuckily for laser, the warranty is likely to last as long as the original toner for most users. I don't think it's right you can't use third party toner/cartridges, but I also don't expect manufacturers to honor warranty after third party parts are used.
- asddubs 2y ago? the accusations aren't about warranty. And I absolutely do expect manufacturers to honor warranty after third party consumables are used
- bluGill 2y agoLegaly the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnuson-Moss_Warranty_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnuson-Moss_Warranty_Act applies. They will say it doesn't though: legal fees will be more than a new printer.
- alkonaut 2y agoIt seems sketchy as hell legally. The problem is that unlike e.g. car manufacturers, there is no specification or standard for what consumables must satisfy (like SAE10W30 engine oil). If you use the right oil, you should be fine. If someone uses some $0.50 ink cartridge from wish that completely gunks the printer I'd probably say "you used bad ink, sorry" if I was the manufacturer. I mean in practice there's probably great ink that's half price and as good as the original. But in principle.
- asddubs 2y agoto me, it sounds like a made up scenario. Are there actually any such cases of printers being destroyed by third party ink? Even then, you could say the warranty is void if the printer is damaged because of the ink rather than across the board. But it sounds like just navelgazing "what ifs" to me rather than a practical concern
- alkonaut 2y ago
- varispeed 2y agoCorrect. I bought new laser printer from Brother and I can't use 3rd party toners. They also have extortionate prices for them like £150 for the whole set that doesn't last very long. I have older model of the printer and it works with 3rd party fine and I can get whole set of toners for £35. This practice should be illegal.
- _factor 2y agoIt’s not just their paper printers. Their label makers recently drm to work only with overpriced Brother tape.
- jonplackett 2y agoOf all the things the EU have taken a hard line on why can’t printers not being total assholes be one of them? This is way more annoying than cookies.
- saalweachter 2y agoAre there major printer manufacturers in Europe?
- stuff4ben 2y agoDoes that matter? I would think it's whoever wants to sell to European consumers that matters.
- mystified5016 2y agoIrrelevant. The law would mandate requirements for printers sold in the territory. If it's non-compliant, it can't legally be sold. Doesn't matter if HP is an American company, their products would be illegal to sell in the EU. They have to produce a compliant product or just not sell anything.
- saalweachter 2y agoI'm actually wondering the opposite. If 90% of printers in the EU are manufactured by foreign companies that's more in line with their consumer-friendly regulations targeting US tech companies, than if there's a local printer monopoly benefiting from outrageous ink prices.
- jonplackett 2y agoThe big ones are either American or Japanese
- Johanx64 2y agoThis has been going on for a long bloody time. My old brother ink printer (10-15years ago) had an internal counter which upon reaching some threshold value (20k pages or whatever), would stop printing and would show some error. To fix it, you had to go into special secret "Maintenance/Service" mode by pressing the right combination of keys and then resetting this value. Which means it had to be thrown out or sent to "repair/servicing" after N number of pages by design. The number one thing to do when buying a printer is to check how hackable/refillable it is, and which printer has the most active hacking/refilling systems available from China and other countries that can't afford to buy overpriced originals, etc.
- phito 2y agoIt's the same with toner levels. Printer was saying toner was empty. I reset the toner levels of the printer using that hidden maintenance button combination. It kept printing just fine for a looong time after that.
- yencabulator 2y agoMy HP laser predates most of this idiocy, but even on it the toner levels are brazen lies. I've printed just fine for some 2+ years after the "very low" toner warnings started across all colors (though admittedly quite low volume; it's more a scanner than a printer).
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- NotYourLawyer 2y agoPeople still use inkjets? Lasers are better in every way.
- mschild 2y agoExcept when it comes to printing quality of photos. Have a laser myself, but my mom, who does print a lot of high quality images on proper photo paper, does not get the same results with laser. For you everyday documents though I fully agree.
- Brajeshwar 2y agoIs this where we insert the ever popular meme, “You Were The Chosen One!” https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/you-were-the-chosen-one https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/you-were-the-chosen-one
- tristor 2y agoWell that's disappointing. I have recommended Brother for years, and I have a number of Brother laser printers I'm responsible for across my own home and that of friends and family. I wonder if Kyocera laser printers are still good, unfortunately they're quite a bit more expensive, but I am fine paying more for something that will last and stay in my control.
- account42 2y agoDisappointing but unfortunately not really unexpected in this world. AFAIK Brother didn't even make any official commitments to not pulling this and hasn't been pushing they previous above industry standard behavior in their marketing.
- kbmn 2y agoPersonal recommendation: A while ago I bought a bw laser printer from a brand I've never heard of: "Pantum". Specifically the Pantum P2500W, for 49,95€ (~ 53$). I have never seen them in a store in (western/central) Europe either. It does not have a display, in general it's the simplest, minimalist printer I've ever owned I'd argue. CUPS configuration exist in the Arch AUR (for usage with USB), and driverless printing with AirPrint (which also works with CUPS) is supported. This new driverless stuff works really nice in general, glad to use this instead of unreliable driver printers (which sometimes are not even available in low quality for Linux). It does not require an internet connection and appears to not have any DRM on the cartridges: I use a 20€ (~ 21$) no-name toner cartridge from Amazon, and it works perfectly fine. In fact it doesn't have a display to complain about this (like my 10+ year old HP, which even back then showed me ads for their own cartridges, and HP paper).
- mamonoleechi 2y agoThanks to share! any estimate on how many regular text page can you print with your 20€ cartridge? I have some questions: - what model did you buy for 50€ ? was it second hand? (i only see 150+€ pantum laser printers) - any links to buy the printer/cartridge ; i'm super interested!
- kbmn 2y ago> - what model did you buy for 50€ ? was it second hand? No, it was new. A "Pantum P2500W". However, it's from a retailer (iBOOD) known for buying surplus/overstock/special-purchase items from the US and UK market (at reduced prices), and reselling it in the EU. I would imagine the prices to be slightly lower there than in typical big-box stores, but I have simply never seen the brand in any physical store, so can't really compare it obviously. > any estimate on how many regular text page can you print with your 20€ cartridge? According to the toner manufacturer, it's 1600 pages. And generally, all toner cartridges that come up when entering "P2500W" into Amazon suggest 1600 pages. I don't print that much that I can verify it; with just the occasional shipping label every couple weeks I would last quite a number of years if that was correct. > any links to buy the printer/cartridge For the cartridges, I see a plethora of options when entering "P2500W" into Amazon.de, the majority of which are between 19€ - 23€, 4.5 to 5 stars, all of them mention 1600 pages. Regarding the printer itself, I don't have a good recommendation. iBOOD (where I bought it) does not sell it anymore (iBOOD mostly sells a quantity-limited amount of surplus/overstock/special-purchase items, and it was in September 2023, so there for sure is no stock anymore). When looking at the price graph of a popular price aggregation site (https://geizhals.eu/pantum-p2500w-a1474488.html https://geizhals.eu/pantum-p2500w-a1474488.html), I can see that the price started out at 55€ in July 2016, the lowest price a store was selling it for was 35€ in 2017 for a month. Then it was available for 50€ a couple of times for a few weeks - months per year, and otherwise out of stock; until it seems to now be sold at Amazon.de by a third-party seller from China (without going out of stock constantly) for reliable 90€-110€ (this very second for 109,90€).
- hangonhn 2y agoThis fear is exactly why I have never purchased a WiFi enabled printer and added wifi printing via the use of a Raspberry Pi Zero attached to the USB port of the printer.
- bluGill 2y agoAfter thinking about this for a bit - I bet the third party ink refill manufactures would win in court if they sued for the codes needed. There are many laws in place already - most of them were written with cars in mind, but they are broad enough to apply to printers. However it would be several million in legal fees to do this and I'm not sure if they make enough on refill to pay the lawyers. Unless they can convince the courts to give them legal fees as well.
- lallysingh 2y agoMaybe it's time for frame.work to start making printers. Probably a fantastic bump to their brand if they're the only non-crap printer vendor.
- ChrisArchitect 2y agoUpdate from Brother on Arstechnica: > We are aware of the recent false claims suggesting that a Brother firmware update may have restricted the use of third-party ink cartridges. Please be assured that Brother firmware updates do not block the use of third-party ink in our machines. ... https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/03/brother-denies-using-firmware-updates-to-brick-printers-with-third-party-ink/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/03/brother-denies-using...
- SwtCyber 2y agoIf I buy a device, I should have the right to use whatever consumables I choose
- wurzeltrick 2y agoAbout 5 hours ago, Louis Rossman posted a pinned comment below his video and changed its title asking you to read it. He says Brother contacted him, denying any firmware changes that hinder the use of third party toner. He states that he has send them a series of questions to explore the issue further. https://youtube.com/watch?v=bpHX_9fHNqE&lc=Ugxbi1fUIxpbKI5YTDZ4AaABAg&feature=shared https://youtube.com/watch?v=bpHX_9fHNqE&lc=Ugxbi1fUIxpbKI5YT...