If you're like most people, when its time to buy an inkjet printer for your computer, you find the best printer at the lowest price, right? Most of us do. But then we go out and think nothing of spending at least 100 times that much in black and color cartridges over the 3-5 year lifespan of that printer, at grossly over-inflated prices. I do it...you do it. But why?

We do it because the manufacturer says we can't use those aftermarket inkjet cartridges or else our warranty will be voided. Also, we get so many Spam popup adds from those aftermarket ink companies that we feel like we might be buying the equivalent of a sawdust injected used car from the greasiest salesman in the country.

I always had a policy of not using aftermarket ink products. But one day I looked at how much my business was spending on inkjet cartridges for 3 full-time printers every month. It amounted to over $170 per month for 6 cartridges that cost Hewlett Packard about $5 per cartridge to make. Over a single year's time my small company was spending almost $1,800 alone on new color and black inkjet cartridges. Gee wiz, these three printers only cost me $1,300 to buy (including tax), and yet over a three-year duty cycle I was forking out over $5,400 in inkjet cartridges!

"THIS IS A FREAKING SCAM!! IT'S…ONLY…INK!! #@$%&*!"

After regaining my composure I decided to check out several remanufacturers of inkjet cartridges for my HP printers.

In 2002 almost one billion toner and inkjet cartridges were shipped worldwide, according to Lyra Research. This resulted in total cartridge sales worth almost $20 billion in 2002. Printer companies practically give away their printers because they know they'll rob you on ink sales. They're doing practically everything possible in the manufacture of ink cartridges, collecting used cartridges, and through legal means, to make you buy or SCARE you into buying their products.

On the consumer's side, printer manufacturers are slowly loosing the battle with ink and toner cartridge remanufacturers, but not without a huge legal and technological fight (for more information about the ongoing battle between printer manufacturers and ink/toner cartridge remanufacturers, go to www.rechargermagazine.com).

To begin the ink cartridge test, I contacted the marketing and media representatives of www.carrotink.com, www.pacificink.com, www.printpal.com and www.myinks.com. Only Carrot Ink and Pacific Ink elected to participate in the test - a real-world evaluation of their products for 3 months, including the use of their remanufactured color and black cartridges, ink-refill kits, and cartridge mailers. The performance of their products would be compared with OEM cartridges from Hewlett Packard ("HP").

And the results are:

Carrot Ink Remanufactured Cartridges: Carrot's remanufactured black and color cartridges for my company's HP printers and all-in-ones rate 95% to 100% to HP's in packaging and print quality (as examined through a magnifier glass and comparative test pages). In fact, the packaging of Carrot Ink cartridges is superior to HP's! The longevity of Carrot's cartridges is about 90% to 100% of a new HP cartridge. However, the price of a remanufactured Carrot black cartridge is $17.95 as compared to $29.95 for HP's. Remanufactured color cartridges run $23.95 compared to $35.95 for new.

Note: One of Carrot's black remanufactured cartridges arrived defective. I called their toll-free number 877-322-7768 and received a replacement cartridge via FedEx within 2 days. Now that is service!

InkTec Refill Kits: Carrot sells InkTec black and color refill kits that allow you to refill your own OEM cartridges, saving even more money.

Note: To successfully refill an inkjet cartridge, as soon as it is empty, immediately clean the print heads with warm water and dry with a tissue. Then place the cartridge in a small plastic sandwich bag and squeeze all the air out. That way, the print heads and cartridge ink sponge won't dry out, which causes less ink capacity, fouled print heads, poor print quality and a substantial amount of wasted ink required to prime (force clean) the cartridge once it is refilled.

The black refill kits are easy to use, offer exceptional print quality (equal to HP's), and yet sell for a fraction of the price of a new or remanufactured cartridge. An InkTec black refill kit sells for $10.95 and will fill a large black HP cartridge twice. That's less than $6 per refill. I even refilled a Carrot remanufactured cartridge (not recommended) and got about an 80% lifespan from it. Carrot suggests that new OEM cartridges can be refilled up to 6 times, if you are very careful to clean and store each cartridge in a sealed plastic bag when empty, and after refilling.

However, when it came to InkTec's color refill kits, even after carefully reading and following the detailed instructions, I was unable to successfully refill my empty OEM color cartridges. In every case (I tried it 3 times), one or more color chambers bled into another chamber, resulting in muddied colors. The price of an InkTec color refill kit is $14.95.

Inkmail Pre-paid Mailers: It's simple - pay $16.95 for a color or black mailer. When your OEM cartridge is empty, place it in the shipping box with a self-addressed label and send it off (prepaid) in the mail. After about 10 to 15 days you'll receive a remanufactured cartridge in the mail. The printing results of these cartridges are good (90 to 95% of original), but not as good as Carrot's remanufactured cartridges, or the black refill kits.

Note: On the Inkmail packaging they state that your cartridge is cleaned, refilled and returned to you. This is false. In three cases I marked the cartridges so I would know they were mine, and then sent them away. In every case I got back another cartridge, not mine. Now that might not seem like a big deal, except that the contact points on the back of cartridges can be dimpled severely enough that they don't work consistently in your printer, requiring several attempts at reseating the cartridges in your printer. The contacts on my OEM cartridges were clean and barely dimpled (I don't force my cartridges into the printer). I would have preferred that they refilled my cartridges and sent them back to me…as stated on their packaging.

Pacific Ink Remanufactured Cartridges: Pacific Ink's remanufactured black and color cartridges for my company's HP printers and all-in-ones rate 90% to 98% to HP's in packaging and print quality (their cartridge labels are very cheap, but that's just superficial). The cartridges looked like they were remanufactured several times (more scratches and deeper dimples on the printer contact points). The price of a remanufactured Pacific black cartridge is $16.99 as compared to $29.95 for an HP cartridge. Remanufactured color cartridges run $23.99 compared to $35.95 for HP's.

One of Pacific's color remanufactured cartridges arrived defective. It would not print cleanly, with many jets were permanently clogged. I primed and cleaned the cartridge several times, including using hot water to attempt unclogging the print heads but was unable to fix the problem myself. The cartridge also revealed severe dimpling on the printer contact points, resulting in sporadic results.

I called their toll-free number 877-838-6843 and received a replacement cartridge within 10 days. However, the replacement color cartridge suffered from the same dimpled contact point problem, but I eventually got it to work. To make matters a little more frustrating, they enclosed a pre-paid mailer to send them the defective cartridge. It was under-posted by .55 cents, requiring me to pay the extra postage to send back their defective cartridge (I didn't).

InkTec Refill Kits: Pacific Ink sells InkTec black and color refill kits. The black refill kit sells for $10.99 (.04 cents more than Carrot Ink). The color refill kit sells for $15.99 ($1.05 more than Carrot Ink). See my review of InkTec kits above in the Carrot Ink section.

Inkmail Pre-paid Mailers: Pacific Ink sells the same Inkmail pre-paid mailers as Carrot Ink. Pacific charges $15.99 (.96 cents less than Carrot). See my review of the Inkmail mailers in the Carrot Ink section.

Summary

Overall, Carrot Ink remanufactured cartridges (black or color) were superior in condition (wear and tear), quality of print, packaging and labeling (more professional) to Pacific Ink cartridges. Carrot's black cartridges cost .96 cents more than Pacific but the extra attention to detail is worth it.

Both manufacturers sell the same InkTec refill kits and Inkmail pre-paid mailers. Pacific charges .96 less than Carrot for the Inkmail mailers, but charges $1.04 more than Carrot for the InkTec color refill kit (which I do not recommend). Prices on the InkTec black refill kits are the same.

So, what do you do? If you want to save over 30% of what you'd spend on new OEM cartridges, buy Carrot Ink's remanufactured black and color cartridges. It's easy using their web site or toll-free number, they offer an excellent product, and their service is top-drawer.

If you want to save 80% of what you'd spend on new black OEM cartridges, buy the easy-to-use InkTec refill kit for your empty OEM cartridges from either Pacific Ink or Carrot Ink. It takes some skill (about the same that you need to bake a cake) and a little time (about 20 minutes per cartridge, including cleanup). However, if you take care of your cartridges, you'll get between 3 to 6 refills out of each cartridge (that's a savings of $70 to $117!).

I do not recommend the InkTec color refill kits. I'm very detailed oriented and if I can't get it right after 3 tries (yes, I have read the new revised instructions with color pictures and labels), then something is very wrong with the kit or the instructions.

For color cartridges, either purchase the Carrot remanufactured cartridge, or use the Inkmail pre-paid mailer, which will save you an additional $7.00 over the remanufactured cartridge that sells for $23.95.

You can also use the Inkmail mailers for black cartridges, which will save you $1.00 over buying a Carrot Ink remanufactured cartridge and over $13.00 when compared to buying a new OEM cartridge.

Of course you could just buy a new HP OEM color cartridge for $35.95 or a new black cartridge for $29.95. After all, "a fool and his money are soon parted," or "there's a sucker born every minute." Which one does that make you?

One Final Note: I have read several reports about discounted OEM cartridges that are being sold over the Internet. Warning!!…they are made overseas of inferior materials. The print results and damage to your printer can be horrible. In other words, stay away from pirated ink cartridges, or…you'll…be…sorry.

When not refilling his ink cartridges or cursing the unbridled greed of printer manufacturers, Todd Hewey is Creator and Executive Producer of Honor Squadrons International ("HSI"), a 10-part, 10-hour High-Definition aviation series for PBS PLUS, currently in production for a 2006 release. For more information about HSI log onto www.honorsquadrons.com.

The humble, unbiased opinions expressed by Todd Hewey do not necessarily reflect those of the staff and management of ViewOnline.