[lug] CUPS question

[Ken MacFerrin]

Sean Reifschneider wrote:
> On Thu, Jul 20, 2006 at 06:46:31AM -0600, bgiles at coyotesong.com wrote:
>> The bottom line is that it comes down to your needs.  If it's mostly
>> printed material with some color (e.g., syntax coloring, UML diagrams,
>> accent colors in reports, logos, and the occasional picture) a laser
> 
> One of the things I really like about the color laser is that the "ink"
> doesn't expire nearly as quickly.  We had this Brother MFC that we mostly
> used as a fax machine, and we'd regularly have to replace the 3 color
> cartridges even though we rarely used them.  The printer wouldn't print
> black if the color cartridges needed replacing.  Total pain.

This isn't as much a failing of inkjets as it is crappy Brother
equipment.  I had a nice color fax machine from Brother which I used
almost exclusively with black & white printing but the Brother had a
built in, excessive cleaning routine that would drain the three color
ink cartridges dry every 4-6 months.  This in itself wouldn't have been
so bad except that Brother designed the machine so that it would stop
functioning when just one cartridge ran dry.  It wouldn't just refuse to
print color, it refused to print b/w or even to send a fax.  It was
obviously designed to ensure I purchased $90 worth of color cartridges
at least 3 times a year, even if I never used the color function.  I did
finally figure out a way to stop the optical readers from being able to
detect that I was out of color ink but the experience was frustrating
enough that I'll never purchase Brother equipment again.  As a
counterpoint, I have an HP Photosmart printer that sometimes doesn't get
used for up to 6 months at a time but everything works just fine when I
need it..
-Ken