An Expensive HP Laser Printer With Fewer Than 3,000 Pages printed
Never Again — An Expensive HP Printer With Fewer Than 3,000 Pages
I bought an HP Color LaserJet Pro MFP M283cdw in November 2022. This was not a cheap printer, and it has printed fewer than 3,000 pages.
When the original black toner needed replacing, I bought a genuine HP black toner cartridge (cost about $100), expecting that using HP's own product would give me good print quality. It didn't. The black was so weak that it was only like dark grey, an uneven dark grey. It was nowhere near the deep black I expected from a laser printer.
Later, because I was already dissatisfied with the genuine HP cartridge, I bought a complete set of four compatible toner cartridges — black, cyan, magenta, and yellow. The result was even worse. The color portions of the documents essentially had no proper color, and the black became even lighter grey, an uneven light grey.
So this problem did NOT begin because I used compatible toner. I tried a genuine HP cartridge first, and the print quality was already unsatisfactory. The compatible cartridges were something I tried afterward, and they made the situation even worse.
Now the printer is out of warranty. If I want HP support, I would have to spend around $100 just to get started. And then what? Who knows what additional cartridges, parts, service, or repairs I might be told to pay for? it's like an hole with no end...
At that point I asked myself: Why am I throwing more money at this printer? Instead, I bought a brand-new Canon printer for less than $70. It prints, scans, and copies. For less than the cost of simply starting the HP support process, I got an entirely new printer.
Think about how ridiculous that is: an expensive HP color laser printer with fewer than 3,000 pages on it has become such a headache that buying a new printer for under $70 makes more financial sense than even asking HP to help me fix theirs.
I'm done spending money trying to rescue this junk -HP printer. HP didn't just lose this printer. They lost a customer, not one customer, many,,, because when I talked to a friend who has an HP printer as well (a different model), she has the same problem. My recommendation: STAY AWAY from HP printers unless you enjoy paying premium prices for the privilege of fighting with your own printer.