[alankearn]

My EPSON 660 STYLUS COLOUR printer has two cartridges, one black and one that is a tri colour .Recently I decided to change from EPSON original cartridges to the PRINTRITE cheaper compatible ones. At present I have two different manufacturers cartridges in my printer, a Epson black cartridge and a PRINTRITE colour cartridge.Will these two different makes of inks mix because I now seem to have trouble reproducing colours such as dark green that came out true to colour using EPSON black/colour catridges. With the mix of EPSON black and PRINRITE colour the dark green is now almost reproduced as black. Has any one had this same problem I just want to check before I bin a almost full EPSON black catridge and replace it with a PRINTRITE black cartridge to see if this cures the problem.

Thanks

[bonk]

Depending what genetic ink cartridges you use will depend on the quality of true color......ie: I used Epsom ink and the colors were very true to the color on the image I was printing......Then I changed to non Epsom ink and the colors were different just like your experiencing.....two things about generic inks is that if in direct light they will fade and the color reproduction will not be as good


If you doing a lot of pictures and you want them true to life then use original ink and good quality paper

[alankearn]

Originally Posted by bonk

Depending what genetic ink cartridges you use will depend on the quality of true color......ie: I used Epsom ink and the colors were very true to the color on the image I was printing......Then I changed to non Epsom ink and the colors were different just like your experiencing.....two things about generic inks is that if in direct light they will fade and the color reproduction will not be as good


If you doing a lot of pictures and you want them true to life then use original ink and good quality paper

Thanks for the printing tips

What i was trying to figure out was to reproduce dark green does the printer use any black ink to help darken it. If it does will the two different inks ( Epson/Prinrite) mix.

[bonk]

It will mix...but as to the resulting color......back to my first post

[thecoalman]

Interesting question... I guess it would be possible for them to react too if they have different chemical makeups. Anyhow my experience with generic cartridges was that they tended to clog to print heads more forcing me to clean the heads more... negating the savings.

[buck52]

Howdy

My 2¢ ... Unless you are doing many many prints and using lots of ink, I would suggest you use Epson factory ink for best/consistent/quality results... They can be bought for a reasonable price from HERE

buck

[erick295]

Originally Posted by alankearn

What i was trying to figure out was to reproduce dark green does the printer use any black ink to help darken it.

Most printers will not mix black ink with color ink, because the two are usually completely different and they won't work together. Chances are you're not seeing black ink mixing - you're seeing your printer trying to mix Epson's ink when you've given it something else that probably doesn't match. Cheap ink will almost always give you cheap results. You get what you pay for

[redhat9]

I once used to use the low cost refilled generic cartridges but now I have gone back to the ones straight from HP, my only complaint with them was the fact that the tri-level cartridges were filled at different levels for each color. I also though the quality of the print with the cheap cartridges wasn't worth it.

[slipe]

The black pigmented ink is pretty much the same in all printers. It would not likely be much different from a good generic. I doubt changing out the cartridge would change your results on plain paper.

If you have set your printer to print to any glossy photo paper it will not use the black pigmented ink. It mixes colors to get black on glossy paper because the pigmented black ink leaves a discolored flat reflection on the surface of glossy paper. Even with Epson photo printers that use all pigmented ink, the photo black particles are smaller than the carbon in the big pigmented black tanks in the general purpose printers with three colors. If you are setting the printer to print to glossy photo paper you can probably eliminate the large black tank as a contributor to color problems.

Aftermarket ink varies a lot in quality and in how close it comes to the original. Results can vary from very close to poor according to how specific the ink is to your printer. You normally have to make a profile for both non-Epson ink and paper. If you use the better aftermarket inks and paper you can often find profiles already done for your combination.

I’ve been refilling Canon and HP tanks for at least 10 years now with excellent results. But I don’t use ink I’m not very familiar with or have seen reliable tests for my specific printer cartridge.