In article <beg1uj$hmd$>, "Nicholas Sherlock" <> wrote:
>"Master Tech ©" <> wrote in message
>news:.. .
>> Have a read of this..
>>
>> Epson Foul Play
>> by Andrew Charnley on July 8th, 2003. 0 comments
>>
>> Dutch Consumer Association consumentenbond has released a statement to its
>> 650,000+ members advising them to boycott Epson printers because of the so
>> called 'smart' chip inside of the cartridges.
>>
>> The cartridges were recently exposed by the which? association when an
>average
>> of thirty percent more pages could be printed with the special chip
>bypassed.
>> The Dutch Consumer Association warns that the chip stops printing after a
>> number of prints rather than low ink levels.
>
>The reason for this is simple: It's too hard to install sensors inside chips
>to measure ink levels (I assume). I don't think that any manufacturer has
>sensors inside their cartridges to measure ink levels. The usual practice is
>for the printer to count how many dots it has been requested to put on the
>paper, then when the number of dots exceeds a certain level, the ink must
>have run out.
Question : why can't the user tell when the ink has run out by looking at the
most recently printed page and saying words like ... "bugger, the ink has run
out - better get another ink cartridge" ?
What benefit is there in the hardware telling us ? ... particularly if it
isn't true
On the up side, Epson actively support linux
Bruce
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