I
am fortunate enough to take place in the HP Ink Challenge, a five (5)
week review in which I will conduct studies to compare the ink of New HP
ink versus Refilled HP ink utilizing two (2) identical HP 3510 Deskjet
printers. I originally signed up for this challenge under my Hound and
Hydrant graphics biz but I think that this blog is a better place to
showcase my findings.
The two (2) HP printers that were sent to me for this challenge
currently take residence on the end of my dining room table since I
don't have much room in my office. Notice that I have colored labels
indicating the printer with HP Refill ink and the printer with New HP
ink. I have set them up to print wirelessly which works perfectly since
my computer is set up in my office.
The most difficult task was to find a place that would refill the ink empty ink cartridges. I was lucky to find Rapid Refill
but they actually exchanged the cartridges and sold me refilled ink
cartridges. The store isn't as conveniently located to my home as I had
hoped but it's nice to know that such a store exists here. The store was
nice enough to give me a 10% off discount as a first time customer. The
#61XL Black cartridge was $17.99 and the #61XL CMY cartridge was
$20.69. The transaction was quick as I did not have to wait for the
cartridges to be refilled. I have read that other participants had to
wait anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 days for the cartridges to be
refilled. I used the pre-paid debit card that was provided to me for
just this purpose and payment went through without incident.
As
instructed, I printed test pages to compare the two inks. It is very
apparent at this stage which printer has new ink and which has refilled
ink. The HP Refill printer test page (left) is very streaky and the
color looks faded. I may need to realign the cartridges or clean the
printheads to see if that will help.
*I received two free HP Deskjet 3510 printers, supplies from HP as
well as a gift card to purchase re-filled cartridges in order to
participate in the Ink Challenge. All opinions and views expressed are
my own.*
