Discussion summary
A discussion about HP potentially making money on printer sales and the possibility of open-source printer firmware. Users compare HP printers to other brands and discuss repairability.
What the discussion says
- Some users are skeptical about HP's plans and want to see proof.
- Others are hopeful for repairable, professional-grade printers.
- Users compare HP printers to Brother and other brands.
- Concerns about print quality and paper curling are raised.
“I'll believe this when I see it on GitHub”
“It’s about time a company makes a repairable and pro consumer printer.”
Join the discussion
Write your take first — we'll ask for email only when you're ready to publish.
- Hacker News
- This is just the thing I needed 30 years ago :-(
To be less facetious though, this seems like a nice project (*), but I print so much less these days than in the past. I printed a lot of color stuff when I was in school; but these days I just settle for black/halftoning from a laser printer, for when I actually need something printed, and color on screen only.
---
(*) - except perhaps for the NC restriction in the license.
by einpoklum - Laser printers are so much more economical.
I use Brother black and white laser printer with after market toner cartridges from eBay .
Print around 200 pages a day.
Around 5000 pages for 37 AUD ie around 25 USD.
The paper costs more per page than the toner.
Just make sure you stay away from HP branded printers...
by Alien1Being - Or get a good old LaserJet 4050 used somewhere. Indestructible workhorse.by jsilence
- yeah, I have a cheap brother laser printer, I don't print that much, but it's been solid for several years. I did have an HP, but it was incredibly problematic, would jam rather easily. Works fine under linux as well.by keithnz
- I really love the idea of a paper roll rather than individual sheets. Being able to print out to the size you want rather than only in pre-set sizes is quite cool.by dinkleberg
- I do wonder if they print end of page lines for you to cut afterward (sorry couldn't read the whole webpage, maybe they explained it)by agumonkey
- > Open Printer is distributed under the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
Non commercial licences are not open source. https://community.oscedays.org/t/why-are-non-commercial-lice...
by RobotToaster - I had an Epson Ecotank for a couple of years. The printer heads got clogged all the time. We bought a series of cleaning products to address it, they often solved the problem for only a few prints. We finally gave up and bought a Brother laser printer.
This project seems like it's trying to address a similar market to the Ecotank. What assurances can the project team provide that OpenPrinter will have better reliability?
by williadc - It sounds like OpenPrinter will be using existing ink cartridges with the print heads built-in; I presume they will therefore have the same reliability.by cwillu
- I also had an Epson ink-tank printer (I don't think it was an Ecotank model name, but similar idea) for several years, battled print head clogs all the time. Found that Windex worked pretty well for dissolving the clogs. (The dad from My Big Fat Greek Wedding was right about something!) But what eventually got me to switch was that the maintenance cartridge — the big sponge under the printer that soaks up the ink pushed through the heads during a head-cleaning operation — was getting full, and it's not a user-serviceable component in Epson printers! They wanted me to ship it off to their service center, and pay who knows how much to swap out the maintenance cartridge. Nope, not gonna do that.
Ditched Epson for Canon. I've had my Canon ink-tank printer for a couple years now. Had ONE serious clog that required multiple flushes to clear the clog, but mostly it's been clog-free. But the best part is that I can just order a new maintenance cartridge from Canon for about $12 + shipping. So when it fills up (probably in another couple years) I can just swap it out myself and keep on printing.
Won't ever buy another Epson printer again. Canon has been great so far.
by rmunn - Just bought a Brother ink tank printer (they have a whole line). Let's see how long it lasts.by slashdave
- If you print occasionally then laser is the best option. It's just not usable for photo printing. You ideally want to be using the printer every week or two with inkjet.by Gigachad
- Ecotank printers are worse in terms of clogging problems, because there is a tank and a hose vs a sealed cartridge. The ink has to flow through the entire system and that means you will have to print at least once a week.by imtringued
- I have an Ecotank and my parents have one too (data set size of 2 :). I've had it for 4-5 years now and it's superb for my simple use case (occasional low cost printing at home).
I did initially run into clogged heads too, until I scheduled a test print every month which uses all colors. That way no single color stays unused for too long, and it's been working like a charm ever since.
If the heads are already "degraded" there are two (or more?) cleaning programs available from within the official printer driver settings dialog. They did resolve my initial issues.
Epson could definitely do a better job of informing users though by slapping a big warning on the thing saying "you need to print something every X days to avoid issues".
by eKIK - > Open Printer is distributed under the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
So not open source.
by ssddanbrown - OpenPrinter is the same as OpenAI. Nothing open about it.by system2
- For anyone else looking for the source of that quote, it seems they edited the text slightly:
https://www.crowdsupply.com/open-tools/open-printer
> Open Source
> Open Printer will use the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 license for all of its files, including electronics and mechanical design files, firmware code, and the bill of materials.
Calling CC-BY-NC "Open Source" is a blatant lie.
by yencabulator - The license doesn't apply to the things you print with it.
Are you miffed by the restriction on you selling derivative open printers?
by einpoklum - From their FAQ:
> Open Printer is distributed under the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
The non-commercial clause makes it non-open by the commonly accepted term of "open" in this context.
by abetusk - This is interesting, but it seems to be a crowdfunding campaign only. I wish them the best of luck (the cause is worthy for sure), but buyer beware at this point.
(I myself don't 2D print enough that an ink based printer makes sense for me. Ink tends to dry, so for me a laser printer that can sit for months at a time makes more sense. I use the scanner as well as my 3D printer far more often.)
I wonder how they will handle the nonsense around yellow tracking dots[1] etc. Hopefully that doesn't become a problem.
by VorpalWay - Unfortunately they mainly use Discord and Instagram. They post updates on Instagram regularly but are quite active on Discord and often ask for community feedback there and post updates there as well. I've been closely following them for a few months
The printer surveillance is my main draw to this project. EFF basically came to the conclusion that all Western printers likely have some sort of surveillance like that. I've confirmed with them on the Discord that they are not required to implement any such surveillance
by culi - > I wonder how they will handle the nonsense around yellow tracking dots[1] etc. Hopefully that doesn't become a problem.
What's there to handle? They just don't include them and there's no statute that requires them to.
by 15155 - Unless I'm missing something using this in a commercial application would be a license violation:
> Open Printer is distributed under the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
> This means that everyone is free to use, share, and modify the project, provided they credit the original author, share derivatives under the same license, and do not use it for commercial purposes.
It's also not opensource yet, there's a vague mention of "when its ready" it'll be released.
by esskay - This is probably inevitable at this point and at least it's a legit licence and not the weird sad bespoke wobbly nonsense Prusa went with. They clearly need something like this for exactly the same reasons.by dofm
- What about that license makes you think you can't use the device (i.e. print things) for commercial purposes?
The license applies to the thing, not the thing you print using the thing. Me writing software or prose on a computer running Linux using a GPL editor wouldn't change that the copyright of what I write belongs to me, the author.
You can't make a commercial competitor of this printer using their design, but using the printer for its intended purpose (printing) is obviously unrelated to that.
by SwellJoe - > With Openprinter, you are free to choose between standard sheets or a roll of versatile paper.
A few other comments have concentrated on the printer head and ink cartridge, but the roll vs sheets interests me. Manipulating sheets of paper is actually quite a difficult problem to solve - and there is only a demonstration of paper placement. Loading page after page is actually really not easy at all. There is no example of it printing.
I see they got a nomination for a design award [1], which in my personal experience has been a negative signal for successful projects. On the same page they mention that they also mention that they don't even know how much this will cost yet:
> We know this is your most frequently asked question! Final pricing depends on a moving puzzle of production volumes, BoM costs, industrialization expenses, regulatory certifications, and final engineering developments.
On the crowd funding page it mentions for parts [2]:
> Main board: Raspberry Pi Zero W
> Cartridge board: STM32 MCU
Not a specific MCU variant, and the specifics of the Pi variant (i.e. RAM) are not mentioned. I would expect these parts would be locked in by now. I have a feeling that this is not quite as ready as made out - I think there is still R&D going on.
[1] https://www.crowdsupply.com/open-tools/open-printer/updates/...
by bArray - Pi Zero seems overkill to me for a printer.by sschueller
- > specifics of the Pi variant (i.e. RAM) are not mentioned
I agree with the rest but Pi Zero W is a specific machine with 512 MB RAM:
https://www.raspberrypi.com/products/raspberry-pi-zero-w/
It's also the one everyone can buy online for $19, not Pi Zero 2 W (always out of stock)
by igoose1 - I think the top-ranking comment about complexity is off base: they're not inventing inkjet printing from scratch. It's basically a bunch of existing modules in a new package, presumably with the promise that you will not need to buy subscriptions or DRMed ink cartridges.
Is robustness and reparability a compelling pitch? If I'm counting right, I owned eight different printers in my life. Dot matrix, dye sublimation, inkjet, laser. I don't think a single one ever required any serious repairs beyond replacing consumables, clearing paper jams, and pulling out lint. I upgraded as the technology improved. My first laser printer needed about 4x as much desk space as the current one.
by zerobees - Yeah maybe you're lucky but I've had 3 printers in my life, ink jets, and those are the three individual worst tech experience I've ever hadby Oxodao