Freedom to Print!

The HP 940 Series Cartridges:

** Take a look inside this cartridge here **

The quick verdict? Not terrible for small office use (text), and not designed for lab quality pictures.  Still way more expensive than color laser, compatibles, or CI systems. Link to cartridges on HP’s website here.

Hewlett Packard Officejet Pro 8500 & 8000

This series of HP Officejet series inkjet printers are positioned as an “eco-friendly” alternative to color laser printers who have a large carbon footprint -  to use the parlance of our times.  Technically they are right, but its the consumer that pays the full cost of going green – HP just gives you the opportunity to pay a higher cost-per-page with the inkjet printer option instead of the light-dimming “drain on the power grid” laser printer.

Printers that use these cartridges include:

• HP Officejet Pro 8000 (around $180.00)
• HP Officejet Pro 8500 (around $275.00)

Great printers, but consumables are going to kill you over time. The XL series of cartridges are about $95.00 per set, for 2k pages* (*average of all carts).  That is four (4) reams of paper.  $100.00 for every four reams of paper you use.  Wow.

HP 940 XL black got ink…

The HP 940 XL black cartridge contains a whopping 49ml of ink – it is unusual to see an inkjet cartridge with so much ink.  The 940XL is priced at $35.99, which is roughly $2800 per gallon, and a bargain price in the printer market as other HP, Epson, and Canon will run you upwards of $11,000.00 per gallon (HP 21, HP 22 – Epson T088, T069 – Canon CLI-221, PGI-30).

Games HP plays…

There are 2 “different” versions of the 940 series cartridges.  The HP 940, and the “more full of ink” version, the HP 940XL.  Prices vary, so keep your eyes open.

• HP 940 Black – 22ml or $1.18 per ml of ink
• HP 940XL Black – 49ml or .73 per ml of ink

There are also versions of the 940XL color cartridges as well, but the difference is much smaller:

• HP 940 Color – 10ml, or $1.99 per ml of ink
• HP 940XL Color – 16ml, or $1.62 per ml of ink

If you print mostly black, make sure to set your printer driver to black only – printers will use color ink when printing black only documents unless you tell it otherwise (driver setting).  Obviously if you can get cartridges for less, the cost per ml will change more in your favor.

HP 940 Cartridges:

The "standard" 940 color cartridges contain 16ml of ink - HP 940 black cartridge contains (has) 49ml of ink. About $75 for a set of these cartridges.

Cartridges contain pigment based inks for durability.  If you want to print lab quality photos, color quality will vary widely with differing paper selections – not recommended for a dedicated photo printer.  They are cartridges, however they could also be easily called ink tanks.  There is no “revolutionary” technology on the cartridge.

• HP 940 Black (C4902AN) 22ml – $25.99 1k pages*
• HP 940 Cyan (C4903AN) 10ml – $19.99 – 900 pages*
• HP 940 Magenta (C4904AN) 10ml – $19.99 – 900 pages*
• HP 940 Yellow (C4905AN) 10ml – $19.99 – 900 pages*

Based on experiences with ink cartridges over the years, it would appear HP is overly optimistic on the page count estimates.  These cartridges are weak – if you do not print very much (ream of paper of less per quarter) these might be ok.  But for just a few dollars more you can have completely full cartridges.

Pay more, get “a little” more…XL = $$

The XL color cartridges contain 16ml of ink - black cartridge contains 49ml of ink - About $95.00 for a full set.

HP also offers the 940 Series “high capacity” series ink cartridges (indicated by the XL).  They are the same basic size and shape as the 940 cartridges.  If you are printing mainly black documents, this is the cartridge you need to be purchasing.  The black cartridge contains a good bit of ink @49ml

• HP 940XL Black (C4906AN) 49ml – $35.99 – 2200 pages
• HP 940XL Cyan (C4907AN) 16ml – $25.99 – 1400 pages
• HP 940XL Magenta (C4908AN) 16ml – $25.99 – 1400 pages
• HP 940XL Yellow (C4909AN) 16ml – $25.99 – 1400 pages

Where did we come across this information? We used the “live chat” feature on HP’s website, and the response was very quick.  We searched for hours on the HP website to try and find the information, but could not find it.  We were not pointed to a URL for future reference.

Note: — Does this cartridge look familiar?  If you owned a Hewlett Packard inkjet printer that used the HP 88, or HP 10 series cartridges, they are identical in basic shape, and design.  Printers are the same as well, using both a cartridge-type-printhead, and an ink tank (ink cartridge).

Individual cartridges do not move.

What about the fine print?

The ink cartridges for this printer are nothing more than complicated ink tanks, or ink holders.  The 940 ink cartridges,  hold the printer ink, and supply it to the printheads inside the printer as needed.  There are two print heads present when using this cartridge series – a combo yellow/black, and a combo cyan/magenta. If they are replaceable, that means they usually will need no be – replacements will run you a cool $59.99 per printhead.  We could not find any information about the expected life of the print head on HP’s website.

HP Print Heads – HP 940.
C4900A - HP Black and Yellow Printhead $59.99 list.	C4901A - HP Cyan and Magenta Printhead $59.99.
What you might not know about the printheads on this printer series is that there is a warranty usage limit of 560ml.  After that, the printheads are out of warranty no matter the warranty status.  Translation, if you print a bunch, there is a guarantee that HP will not warranty the printheads beyond the 560ml target. Let’s take the HP 940 black and yellow printhead.  Using the XL cartridges as a benchmark (49ml+16ml = 65ml) that would be around 8-9 cartridges used until the printheads are considered out of warranty (10-17k pages).  You can see HP’s explanation here – http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c00206040&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=es&cc=pe&product=3564605&lang=es So really consider your printing habits before purchasing any type of “extended warranty” for this printer series.  If you plan on using a CIS, or CISS system with this printer (perfect candidate) the printheads will still need to be replaced at some point.

CI system, the way to go.

Overall you could do much worse. This printer looks to be absolutely perfect for a CI system as the cartridges do not move along with the printhead.  If there are no moving parts, that means less hassles during installation, and also while using the system.  CIS, CISS, CI systems are just now coming out for this cartridge series, and we expect to have some in the shop mid April.  The chips on these 940 series cartridges cannot be reset.  For this reason HP original OEM cartridges are used – You can also supply your own chips (from the included cartridges) with some systems thus reducing the cost.

Filed under: Cartridge Info, HP Cartridges Tagged: | 8000, 8500, 940, 940 ink cartridge, 940 ink hp, 940XL, Cart, Cartridge, HP 940, hp 940 ink, hp 940 inks, hp 940 series, hp 940xl, hp officejet pro, hp officejet pro 8000, hp officejet pro 8500, Ink, officejet pro 8000, officejet pro 8500, officejet pro ink, refill 940