HP wants you to print things through its cloud service, wherein you pay a subscription fee for ink and your usage is routed through its servers. To encourage you to do this, it covers the USB port …
DANGER, WILL ROBINSON! Removing this sticker will reveal a consumer-friendly communications port that will deprive HP of even more money than it’s already milking you for with overpriced ink!
I’m kind of surprised they just didn’t remove the usb port entirely
Design revisions are expensive
Yeah but they could save 50 cents a printer, how can they just pass up those savings?
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You may jest, but that is exactly what will come if we don’t regulate against it
Kinda baffling that anyone’s still buying HP - isn’t it common knowledge that they’re one of the worst printer brands?
They’re also the cheapest among well-known brands, so the average person buys these
HP has decent enterprise models. So office drones will have a positive image of HP. Also old people who have been out of touch with the market for 20 years or so.
Used to sell printers. It’s the old people 100%
I work at a retirement place doing tech. Have had 3 hp printers shit the bed exclusively because of software in the 6 months I’ve been there. Hp smart is so bad.
Such a shitty company. As most of these people are former professionals they get an hp because they used it at work then get talked into the subscription ink because they aren’t 21st century tech savvy.
One printer stopped printing because they did not have the subscription ink. They placed a normal ink cartridge in with a subscription one and the software would not allow printing because it recognized non subscription ink. Disgusting.
So many companies want to enter this subscription hellscape.
After being in IT and software development for over 25 years, the only printer brand I bother with any more is Brother. It’s unbelievable how much better they are than everyone else. No nonsense drivers and they’re not constantly trying to force you to buy expensive ink.
People complain about them supposedly having DRM now or whatever but, to be frank, the fact that I can just click “print” and it actually prints makes it miles ahead by default. My printer actually functions now so I can’t say I have any regrets.
… what?
From a repair standpoint, Brother are definitely the best option (that I know of). I do authorised repair work for them, and their support guides, technical support team and range of spare parts is absolutely amazing. The biggest problem I see is aftermarket toner wrinkling up the fuser of laser models, but that’s not like it’s something Brother’s introduced to be anti-competitive slime bags.
I’ve got a second-hand HL-5370DW (from 2009~) that’s been through the wringer of a medical practice - I still use it to print without any issue, despite the Web UI insisting that all the non-toner consumables need to be replaced immediately.
Not to defend HP[1], but if you look closely at the picture, the sticker has an arrow suggesting you to peel off the sticker. I would still say that the intentions of even putting this sticker there is malicious though.
[1]: I’ve also been “scammed” by HP. I have a DeskJet 2130 bought more than 5 years ago. (I guess you could say it was from before HP went greedy.) It was under only very light use (occasional school stuff that needed to be printed out). Every time I came back to the printer after not using the printer for several months, the ink cartridges would have dried out. I would swap them out because they wouldn’t work even after shaking, none the wiser that half of the “empty” cartridges probably could have been revived by wiping it with a tissue. (I discovered this only 1 year ago when I tried it.)
Inkjet printers need to be used regularly, or go through several cleaning prints (which are features of HP printers). That’s not HP scamming you, that’s just how inkjet printers are…
That said, IMO, most people are infrequent printers and would be better served by a laser printer. Toner doesn’t dry out. I have had a brother laser printer for 3-4 years now and haven’t had to change the toner once. Every time I need to print something, it fires right up, and prints it without a fuss.
Yeah I eventually figured that out, hence the quotes. When my HP printer dies, I will replace it with a Brother printer.
I have a question about that. It’s a US thing, isn’t it?
I had to install one for a relative and I never needed an app or software or connecting the printer to internet. I simply ran the windows tool and it installed the drivers while the printers couldn’t access the internet. Everything works perfectly. But, I’m in Europe.
That works for most printers I’ve used in the US too.
People will still buy it when they suffer economically or techonological ignorance. If there was another system where people could vote on a business death penalty… HP and other printer IP holders have already earned my vote.
Nothing like having to pull out the official ink to clear a paper jam and be told afterwards that the ink you just took out is not the same official ink or gasp reused so the printer punishes you by using more ink so you buy the official ink next time that you already bought.
Fuck HP.
Country make atomic bomb.
USA invade the country.
“Hide the atomic bomb button with a sticker”
See ? We don’t have an atomic bomb.
USA : it seems like it but you got oil tho.
Shit , we forgot to print the “not an oil pump” stickers. We’re fucked !
Yet another reason I’m glad I got my Canon Pixima 5000 series a while back. Individual cheap replacement ink carts with no electronics in them. I can (and have) buy 5 sets of carts for $20 that last me years.
If it wasn’t for photos, I’d have picked up a cheap laser printer.
Never buying HP printers again, not after I got a Brother one last year. It works OOTB even with linux and there’s no such lockdown bullshit.
You would never know it from the brand name, but Brother is a Japanese company, and the Japanese are known for making elegant, well made, and easy to use stuff. Konica Minolta is also Japanese and makes pretty good stuff, but for a basic printer I prefer Brother. And don’t bother with inkjet, get a Brother all in one laser printer, and you’ll have a very reliable machine that isn’t expensive to operate. The ink won’t dry up if you don’t use it, and the drivers aren’t constantly trying to sell you anything.
Canon is Japanese too, can’t say the same about their fairly recent practices…
@gogosempai @stopthatgirl7
I ran my business with two Brother laser printers for 20 years, with NO maintenance problems.In the past year, I’ve discarded two new HP printers as they are just crap. And expensive-ink hogs.
Damn 20 years?! That’s a commendable vouch for Brother.
My brother hl-2070n from like, 2006-2007 is still going strong. Drivers aren’t in macOS anymore, but the generic one works fine. I think I’ve only replaced the toner once, maybe twice since i got it. They are excellent printers, fuck hp.
HP small business printers are almost as bad as their home printers.
Around 2006, I started at a company it had a couple of small business MFPs. I spent more time fixing the printers then they spent printing on them. I ended up talking them into a couple of Enterprise class MFPs They were fantastic but we spent several grand on printers. It’s kind of a shame we don’t print so much, but we scan to email and fax a lot and it was worth it to have something that just works all the time.
I kind of regret not going with brother at this point though we probably could have gotten away much cheaper.
Like 15 years ago I bought the cheapest Brother laser printer. It’s still going strong. The ink never dries out or fucks up. I’ve never felt like the company was trying to rape my asshole. Why anyone still plays the ink jet game I do not fuckin know. I’ve boycotted HP decades ago and to this day I continue to see reasons to never change that decision.
We got a Brother laser as well. Only print a few times a year, and the toner is always good to go when it does get switched on. Love my Brother!
Ink and dye printers still rule the photo print space. Laser printers simply don’t have sufficient image quality.
Other than that I completely agree that laser printing is the way to go.
I went with a laser and small dye sub printer. If you only need occasional 6x4 photos it’s probably the best option.
This is true but you can always order photos online from Shutterfly, etc. or go to local drug store
Sure, but that’s also less fun than doing it yourself!
5 years ago with a reasonably priced Samsung colour laser scanner combi. No complaints. When I turn it on, it just prints.
Why anyone still plays the ink jet game I do not fuckin know.
Space. At least for me, space is the reason. I’m flatting at the moment and can only keep the printer in my room, and it’s already quite cramped with all my gear here. If I could get a compact color laser MFD within the same dimensions as my current Brother inkjet, I’d switch in a heartbeart. Most of the compact laser printers I’ve seen are either monochrome, or don’t include form-feed scanning, or have some or the other shortcomings.
Initial cost as well. If you only print very small amount, you’re not going to spend couple hundred bucks on the laser printer and then 100 or so bucks on a cartridge for it if you’re not going to print often
The thing is since inkjet printers dry out you spend way more on cartridges over time. Sure toner is more expensive, but you but it way less frequently.
Yes, but they usually last a few years before they completely dry out to where you can’t use them. I’ve been using the same ink cartridges in my printer for going on 3 years now and it still works
True, but they require a lot of test prints until you get back to an acceptable print quality in my experience
Think I’ve bought 4 cartridges since getting mine six years ago, so about £120. £20 a year isn’t bad… We don’t print much, but getting a laser mono is 5x the cost of our printer for the cheapest brother…
The cheapest brother is $120 (USD) https://www.brother-usa.com/products/HLL2300D
If you want color, sure that’s more ($250). Still not a long shot from what you paid for your HP, plus that ink (and I’d wager you’d still be going without a single follow up purchase of toner).
For context (per their own product claims):
- Brother Genuine TN227 High-yield replacement toner delivers rich, vivid professional laser print quality you can rely on for up to 3,000 pages (black) and up to 2,300 pages (color) (2)
- Additional replacement toner option available for this model: TN223 Standard-yield (1,400 pages black/1,300 pages color) (2)
Yep just replaced the black toner on my 10+ year old brother. $16 dollar for an off brand.
My Canon ink jet has done well for years on cheap third party ink. It does color and even decent photo, and created many excellent school presentations for my kids. However it’s likely my last printer.
I don’t even know the last time I printed something, it’s always been for the kids’ schools and now they’re old enough to have no more of those
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Wow, HP. Way to make even Lexmark look like a paragon of corporate virtue in the home printer market.
Remember it’s not cloud storage it’s just somebody else’s computer.
JFC! HP sucks. Just buy a Brother laser printer used and never worry about it because it’s bulletproof and a workhorse.
And will work OOTB on Linux with CUPS. Easiest process ever.
I don’t know what CUPS is, but I had 3 major reservations about switching my barely functional computer to Linux:
- Ive never worked in Linux before
- My dive computer only uploads to proprietary software using a proprietary cable.
- My Brother laser printer was working SO well wirelessly. It’s the first time I’ve ever not hated my printer
Turns out some amazing people made open source dive logging software so I can still download my dives.
And for printing, I meant to get around to setting it up, then one day I forgot and accidentally printed something and it just worked. I was so shocked that for a bit I assumed that reformatting the hard drive and changing operating systems must’ve somehow preserved my printer settings.
- Is your device supported by https://subsurface.github.io/SupportedDivecomputers/ ?
Yup! I had a little difficulty communicating with the computer, but all I had to do was add my user to the “dial-out” group and it worked like a charm.
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Start with something simple like Mint or Fedora. It’s quite easy to use.
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Can you be more specific about the specific cable and software? Odds are it works, or it can work with some tinkering.
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Brother printers work great in Linux in my experience.
While your advice is sound, I think you might not have read @jrubal1462’s comment in full. They already installed Linux, found FOSS alternatives for the proprietary dive software and their printer, to their shock, worked OOTB.
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Exactamundo!
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I bought the printer when I was living in a place where the nearest library was 10 miles away and I only had access to a bus. I couldn’t afford a car.
If you print more than twice a decade, you can get that down to about 2 cents a page with a brother laser printer and third party cartridges.
The original mastodon post that kicked off this controversy: https://haunted.computer/@netspooky/110832978569741892
the original mastodon post
Unrelated to this post:
IMO it’s stuff like this, original content that shows up on Mastodon/Lemmy/Kbin first, that will get people to switch over.
Slow organic growth is nice. Keep making good quality content and people will shift over
