3 Ways To Save Money on Your Personal Printer

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If you have a personal ink jet printer at home, there’s no doubt that you’ve seen the ridiculous prices it costs for new cartridge. You can be set $30-$40 each time you buy a replacement and each cartridge only gives you about 200 printed pages. It doesn’t take very long before you’ve spent more on ink than on your printer/scanner/copy machine that you have at home. The truth is that printer companies make most their money selling ink, not printers. How can you save money in this area? Check it.

• Get a Laser printer. While you’ll have to refill the toner in laser printers, you get much printed pages than you would with an ink jet. So you get more bang for your buck. Additionally, it prints much faster then the ink jet. Brother makes cheap laser printers. My father-in-law calls them disposable printers because they’re so cheap and only last about a year. It’s just cheaper to throw the thing out and buy a new one than it would be to replace 4 ink jet cartridges.
• Print in draft mode. If you don’t want to buy a laser printer, at least print in draft mode with your ink jet when you’re printing documents. It uses much less ink then the normal printer setting and it prints faster. I honestly can’t tell the difference between a document I printed in draft mode and one that I printed in the normal mode. However, you can definitely see a difference when you’re printing an image.
• Refill your cartridges. Instead of buying new cartridges, save some money by taking them to get refilled. There are several businesses offering cartridge refilling services. I use Cartridge World. Office Depot and Wallgreen’s also offers cartridge refill services. You can save up to 40% on the cost of ink by refilling. Not only are you saving money, you’re helping the environment out as well.

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6 Comments

1. Improvilaw on 12.05.2007 at 18:15 (Reply)

   I like saving money too, but not if that means buying a low quality printer that will end up in a landfill in a year. We all have a duty to keep the earth in decent shape for our children, don’t we?

2. The Frugal Law Student on 13.05.2007 at 15:20 (Reply)

   Thanks for commenting. I agree we should take of the earth. How about instead of just throwing it out, we take it to the recyling center or donate it to a computer parts store where they can fix it up?

   By the way, I really enjoyed reading your blog!

3. My Open Wallet: Carnival of Personal Finance #100: A Personal Finance Blog about Money and Life in New York on 14.05.2007 at 08:21

   […] Pinching presents More Questions that Will Prevent Impulse SpendingThe Frugal Law Student presents 3 Ways to Save Money on Your Personal PrinterDawn’s 30+ Ways to Save a Dollar a Day at Frugal for Life.Kimber at No Limits Ladies suggests that […]

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5. Jim@toner, ink, recycle on 13.09.2008 at 14:15 (Reply)

   Now let’s talk about the planet.
   Remember to recycle your ink and toner cartridges as well as your old cell phones. It takes 2 quarts of oil to make one new cartridge so recycle them so companies like mine can refill them and sell them again.

   Never pay to recycle your cartridges make sure you use programs that also benefit the environment like ours www.thinkofgreen.com/websiteinfo.asp?fc=12, we plan trees in your name with the Arbor Day Foundation. We also donate 1% of your yearly purchases to an environmental charity of your choice.

   So save the environment while saving money…

6. Jagad Guru on 01.10.2008 at 04:54 (Reply)

   thanks for the tips. I usually just set it to draft mode, if its just for regular printing such as texts. simple and easy way to start saving up money as well as the environment.

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