Beware Lexmark Inks: Made to Gel, Made to Fail

I've been puzzled about how rapidly I run out of ink in my Lexmark printer. I only print a few pages a month, and yet after one or two months the computer tells me that I am out of ink. This has happened several times. At first I wondered if someone was printing hundreds of pages when I wasn't looking, but now I've learned what the problem is after consulting with an experienced employee at Cartridge World: Lexmark adds a gelling agent to their inks in order to defeat refillers. The gelling agent results in cartridge failure for those who try drilling a hole in the cartridge and refilling it with ink, for the Lexmark ink at the printer head will gradually gum up so the cartridge can't be reused many times. The gelling agent isn't a problem in normal use, but if the opened cartridge sits around unused for a couple weeks, it can plug up the print head and result in an "out of ink" alert.

Lexmark, what you're doing is crooked. I've spent a lot of money on your inks that gummed up and quit working because of a built-in failure mechanism.

If you have a Cartridge World shop in your town, you can take your Lexmark cartridges in and they will refill them with ink free of the ridiculous gelling agent that Lexmark adds. They don't just drill a hole and dump in ink; they take the cartridge apart, clean out the Lexmark "shoe polish" that may be building up in the cartridge, and give you a cartridge that is essentially as good as a new one without the tendency to gel up and waste your money.

Shame on you, Lexmark!

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