Yes, I take the point on failure prediction by pro...

2010-02-27T20:36:25.167Z

Yes, I take the point on failure prediction by probabilities - though interestingly one of the guys who came to fix one of them, and worked with the printer companies all the time, basically said they set the thresholds deliberately low to make you buy replacements more often.

I don't mind the "replace part" message on its own. It's the fact that it just stops dead and doesn't let you use it that's the problem. Surely once the warning is delivered it's the user's responsibility to get the part replaced as they see fit - at that stage the printer company has already covered its behind.

Back to our printer: the nozzle/print head/cartridge are all a single unit, so when it's done you replace it, in which case it doesn't really matter what happens to the empty one, or you can get it refilled, in which case the trip to the shop and back will give it just as much drying-out opportunity as leaving it in the printer. It's still irritating when you just want one monochrome page and it's complaining about lack of cyan! :o)

Actually you have two complaints here. The first,...

2010-02-27T18:45:02.118Z

Actually you have two complaints here. The first, about individual cartridges, is probably justified, but it might not be. Depending on the design of the printer it may be difficult to keep nozzles from drying out unless there's ink in the reservoir or the print head stays safely docked. If the manufacturer lets you print with a dry cartridge you may be risking the printer breaking down and that's not good for them or you.

The same kind of issue arises with the bigger printer. The makers are actually very good at predicting failure of components, but there's a probability curve involved. They know, given engineering tolerances, that, say, only 0.01% of fusers will fail before printing 100,000 pages. Some will print 200,000, but most will fail somewhere in between. If they tell you to change the fuser at 100,000 pages they can be sure that their printer will always be working when you want to print and they won't have to deal with the support calls from people complaining that their printer isn't reliable.

It's very like the planned preventive maintenance stuff that many concerns employ - I came across it when I worked in a hospital - you track how things deteriorate and replace them before they go. Bulbs and batteries are the usual things, but I'm sure there are others.

HTH to reduce the frustration a little.

Comments on Electric Thoughts: Petty engineering design rant 4 - printer cartridg...

Yes, I take the point on failure prediction by pro...

Actually you have two complaints here. The first,...