My Canon i9950 A3+ printer is now deceased. Bit disappointing really as it's only 15 years old!
Canon stopped supporting it in October 2016 and I could no longer buy genuine Canon inks, so I used good quality 3rd party inks a couple of months ago when my supply of Canon inks ran out. It may just be a coincidence about using 3rd party inks, or it may have been a contributory factor, either way, I have an ex printer. Checking the error codes, the print head needs replacing, but I went through a process of cleaning the head and the electrical contacts, but it still came up with change the print head. They are available from the USA at $155, plus $40 postage and some import duty, but for a 15 year old printer, time to call it a day. Just out of interest, the serial number was 000085, which makes it a very early one.
What to do next?
The easy answer is just get a replacement model. I will stick with Canon so that means the Pro 1 at around £600, Pro 10s at around £530, or the Pro 100s at around £370. For various reasons, I would go for the Pro 10s.
But life is never quite that simple. On further analysis, I do around 30 large prints a year which need to be of high quality. I do hundreds of smaller prints, mostly for family and they only need to be of reasonable quality. Then I do a few hundred document prints on plain paper. So, if I was sensible and had my thinking head on, I could buy an inexpensive A4 printer to do nearly all of my printing and leave the high quality big stuff to specialist labs, who do the work for quite reasonable prices. The downside to being sensible is I would have to ensure my high quality prints were sorted well in advance of need and the very high cost of inks for the less expensive printer. Difficult to quantify, but just in ink alone I could probably fund the Pro 10s within 3 years and with the better printer, I am in full control and if required, could print at a moments notice. Not a deal changer, but on my previous i9950 I could print directly onto printable CD's and I always considered that facility a nice touch and this is also available on the Pixma Pro 10s.
Back to my earlier thought ................ what to do next?
Canon stopped supporting it in October 2016 and I could no longer buy genuine Canon inks, so I used good quality 3rd party inks a couple of months ago when my supply of Canon inks ran out. It may just be a coincidence about using 3rd party inks, or it may have been a contributory factor, either way, I have an ex printer. Checking the error codes, the print head needs replacing, but I went through a process of cleaning the head and the electrical contacts, but it still came up with change the print head. They are available from the USA at $155, plus $40 postage and some import duty, but for a 15 year old printer, time to call it a day. Just out of interest, the serial number was 000085, which makes it a very early one.
What to do next?
The easy answer is just get a replacement model. I will stick with Canon so that means the Pro 1 at around £600, Pro 10s at around £530, or the Pro 100s at around £370. For various reasons, I would go for the Pro 10s.
But life is never quite that simple. On further analysis, I do around 30 large prints a year which need to be of high quality. I do hundreds of smaller prints, mostly for family and they only need to be of reasonable quality. Then I do a few hundred document prints on plain paper. So, if I was sensible and had my thinking head on, I could buy an inexpensive A4 printer to do nearly all of my printing and leave the high quality big stuff to specialist labs, who do the work for quite reasonable prices. The downside to being sensible is I would have to ensure my high quality prints were sorted well in advance of need and the very high cost of inks for the less expensive printer. Difficult to quantify, but just in ink alone I could probably fund the Pro 10s within 3 years and with the better printer, I am in full control and if required, could print at a moments notice. Not a deal changer, but on my previous i9950 I could print directly onto printable CD's and I always considered that facility a nice touch and this is also available on the Pixma Pro 10s.
Back to my earlier thought ................ what to do next?
Comment