Canon iPF8300 Ink replacement – 330ml or 700 ml?

[Johnny_Boy]

I've been using my printer for about 6 months now for my business and I have a first tank that is running low – Yellow. I have 3 more that are not too far behind.

I was wondering whether 330ml or 700ml made sense and what you guys do?

700ml seems to be a better options in terms overall cost. However, I wasn’t sure whether I will be using all the new 700ml tank before the heads need to be replaced?
 
If heads and a lot of tanks need to be replaced, it almost is cheaper to just buy a new printer with the rebate at the end of the year. In which case, I will lose a lot of the ink from the 700ml tank.

For guys who are using ipf8300 how much ink did you consume before expensive things like the print heads had to be replaced?

[Johnny_Boy]

Well, I decided to order 700 ml for the yellow one for now. It seems like that is the most frequently used color for my photos, so I think I will use that up quick. For someone reason I am not using as much blue, photo black and etc. so those might get the 330ml treatment, if I ever run out.

[MHMG]

Well, I decided to order 700 ml for the yellow one for now. It seems like that is the most frequently used color for my photos, so I think I will use that up quick. For someone reason I am not using as much blue, photo black and etc. so those might get the 330ml treatment, if I ever run out.

Wise choice. I don't think cartridge replacement has much to do with head replacement cycles, new printer rebates, etc. It has mostly to do with shelf life of the ink. You probably want to avoid two year old inks in your machine. Unless you are a high volume user, this will mean 330 ml cartridges make a lot of sense, but you may find one color (like yellow) that can benefit from the 700ml cartridge. For high volume users, all of this is academic....700ml cartridges are the way to go.

I'm a relatively low volume user when it comes to my iPF8300 since I mostly print my own personal work. As such, 330ml cartridges are still a little bit too big for me. But I manage by going somewhat past recommended shelf life which is about 1 year. I've had no problems running inks in the 1-2 year range after installing, but I suspect that going past 2 years might be inviting premature head failure as the color balance may shift due to pigment settling and head clogs will force the iPF8300 to remap to new nozzles more often... which is what will cause less than average head wear.

best,
Mark
http://www.aardenburg-imaging.com

[bill t.]

Somewhere in the Accounting tab of the printing monitor dialogue it will tell you how much of each color of ink you have used.  Based on that, I buy whatever size cartridge of each color that I think I can use up in 6 months, which is what Canon recommends for in-machine cartridge time.

Yup, Yellow is the 8300's favorite color!  Normalized to yellow, here's what my machine has used so far.

Yellow 1.0
Gray 0.92
(Black) 0.75
Photo Magenta 0.73
Photo Cyan 0.59
Blue 0.55
Photo Gray 0.42
Cyan 0.40
Red 0.34
Green 0.25
Magenta 0.23

3.5 maintenance tanks and 3 heads for just over 20 liters of ink.

One of the head deaths was unnatural, due to an argument with an insect coated into some budget canvas.  One of the maintenance tank changes was caused because I was in denial about needing a head change.  And I think I use unusual amounts of Blue due to a couple mood-indigo photos that I sell a lot of.

Yes, I've thought about picking up a machine on sale as an economical way to restock ink, heads, and spare parts.  However, that would be very uneconomical in terms of logistics, so I'm just gonna keep buying more carts and heads until either the 8300 dies, or the 9300 comes out.  No mechanical failures so far other than knocking off and losing most of the stupid little v-shaped swingy-thingies, knock on wood.

[I.T. Supplies]

Depending on how much you use, 700 ml is a better saver in $$.  What I found out from our tech is that the printheads usually need to be replaced around every 2200ml (roughly 3-700ml tanks).  It's not always like this, but it's a rough estimate.  You could print past that without problems and before it hits.

The IPF8300 is on a pretty nice discount right now through us if you're looking for another one.

If you have questions on this, you can definitely give us a call.  We have the IPF8300, Epson 9890 and 4900 in our office which we print on all the time.  They are all great models and the IPF8300 actually comes with a full set of 330ml upfront.  Pretty nice savings on that vs other models that come with a starter set.

But, depending on how much of certain colors you use, we recommend going with the larger one for better savings and the rest in the smaller ones.

Hope this helps on your question.

Chris W
800-327-2822