abcink.com

[mikesd]

Wandering if anyone has had any luck with 3rd party inks like the following, [or horror stories]. Thanks. http://store.yahoo.com/abc-ink/canon-i960-photo-printer.html

[mwinog2777]

Stick to Canon. Hammered to death in this forum.

[mikesd]

Sorry about that, did a search for Canon ink in this forum and found two threads in 17 pages and only one was answered.

[mwinog2777]

Go to "Search This Forum", put in inks, and multiple threads will come up.

Conclusion is all the same, stay away.

[Scottes]

Mike, I definitely recommend sticking with Canon inks for Canon printers, Epson ink for Epson printers, etc. There are a few exceptional 3rd party inks, but these are high end inks, not cheap stuff.

A couple of points from discussions here.... One person used 3rd party inks and found that the print head kept clogging. The pigments used in the 3rd party aren't as finely ground as the printer company's ink, so the tiny particles of pigment were getting stuck in the nozzle. The pigments were bigger than the hole in the print head.

Another reason is that a company's paper is very closely matched to that company's inks. The ink will soak in correctly - it won't blotch on top and not dry or soak in too much and bleed into the next "dot" on the paper. Company ink will absorb correctly, dry correctly, and will last (won't fade) correctly. It's a fine science, matching ink to paper.

There *are* 3rd party companies for both ink and paper that are very good and highly regarded. I can't think of a single ink company for some reason but one paper company is Ilford. Chances are *very* good that Ilford paper will work correctly with your printer, but even still it doesn't always. It requires a bit of experimentation to see if you like the results.

But if you're trying to save money stay with your printer company's inks and papers. You'll save money by not having to get the printhead fixed, or by not getting ruined prints, etc. It's a much safer bet to play with paper - you almost can't damage the printer by using different papers, though you might not like the results. But you can damage/clog the printhead by using cheap inks, as noted above.

[Scottes]

Mike, see this thread: http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=54038
And the sticky about Canon BCI-6 ink has some good info, too.