Call all owners of the Canon Pixma iP4200...

[basmic]

Before anything, I wish to state that I am getting my information from here and here.

1. The microchip on the cartridge colludes with the computer (calculating how much ink you've used) and notices that you've printed a suspiciously high number of pages from the cartridge, and pops up a dialog with effectively two choices:

CHOICE THE FIRST: (Cannon's preferred choice): Admit that you've refilled your ink cartridge, remove it, and place a new cannon certified cannon manufactured ink cartridge in it. I achieved approximately 420 pages in a refilled "300-page" pigment black cartridge.

CHOICE THE SECOND: (The insulting option):
Conceed that you are refilling your ink tanks, with the following consequences:
1. The warrantee is voided, and this fact is written into the flash-rom of the printer, thus barring you from claiming service under warrantee period, even if the failure is unrelated.
2. The visual ink-monitoring system is DISABLED. Completely. Without a good reason, other than scaring you into buying cannon ink. (Or, rather, if you've chosen choice the second, being spitefully punitive you for doing so. Once the "I admit I refill my ink" choice has been selected, there is no way to return to the "good graces" of their warrantee.) In plain english, the consequences of a disabled visual ink monitoring system are that you will not receive warning when your ink runs low (even though the hardware is present to do so), and that your print heads and ink plumbing will dry up into a crusty sad little crisp, squeak their last little squeak, and die. Then you purchase a non-cannon printer. (May I reccomend the IP4000, or the IP5000, neither of which have the chipped ink bottles).

Lots of people would like to know if these can be refilled, or if compatible cartridges are available. At the time of writing, February 2006, compatibles are not available for the PGI5 or CLI8 inks, probably for 2 reasons:
1. The ink formulations are quite complex - refill ink manufacturers need to make sure their inks will perform equivalent to the original Canon inks; and
2. The on-board chip has a patent from Canon on it so compatible manufacturers will have to be very careful not to infringe that patent, which could leave them open to litigation. Canon has recently won a lawsuit against a company in Japan which was refilling Canon cartridges and reselling them, so this will set back any plans for compatible cartridges.

There are refill inks available however. Refilling instructions are available from ink vendors. Canon has very cunningly adapted their printers – if you refill these inks and re-insert them into the machine, a warning message will appear on your computer along the lines of:

“You are using refill ink in your cartridges, if you continue your printer warranty will be void”, and you are prompted to press OK. If you press OK, the low ink warning facility on the printer no longer works. If this is the case, you must be very careful never to let the inks run dry as this will burn out your printhead.

So does this mean we can refill the tanks with lower-quality ink, until the software susses us out - and when it does so, we either: 1) Insert a Canon-branded cartridge; or 2) We continue to refill the tanks, and void our warranty and lose the ink-monitoring feature?

Personally I am very offended by this. If I don't want to pay for overpriced ink, then I won't. Let's hope my ink tanks last at least 6-9 months... .

 

[basmic]

*bump*