I saw this topic occasionally pop up before. With the recent changes by Brother, I really hope Framework starts looking into making a printer at some point. Everything out there is garbage now or has massive security issues now.
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Yeah I saw that Brother has joined the dark side as well. Come on Framework, make us a printer. I’ll buy it and trash my Brother. Either a B/W laser or a color laser is fine by me!
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Want to stick it harder to the companies that make printers? Stop printing as much.
One smaller solution is purchasing an inkjet tank printer. Nobody has a DRM built into their Ink…yet.
Aren’t those expensive?
How bad has Brother gone exactly?
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There are reports that recent firmware updates, including some automatic ones, are removing support for third-party ink. There are reports that folks with a third-party ink/toner cartridge in their printer has a firmware update and the printer suddenly doesn’t work, because the cartridge that was working perfectly fine before the update, no longer works.
There is one big issue I see with Framework making a printer. Until they get big, there won’t actually be third-party ink options. So you will be stuck buying first-party ink, regardless of whether or not they allow aftermarket ink. Don’t get me wrong, that’s no reason not to do it. And if it works out, the aftermarket ink will come. But I bet the price of the printer itself would have to be a lot more if there was no guarantee of a revenue stream from ink, not to mention the initial R&D for the printer itself. Again, not a reason not to do it. But it’s something to consider. I think a Framework printer could be awesome, and open, and probably pretty expensive.
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That’s basically what I decided to do a long time ago, when I got sick of various inkjet printer issues. I have a cheap, Brother laser printer that I’ve had for like 10+ years. I had to replace the “starter” toner cartridge that came with it a few years ago. I only print when I have to, which is rare.
But I’m sure there are people who need to print a lot more than I do, for various reasons.
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Damn. Our one good printer company… I thought brother didn’t even have chips in their toner and ink cartridges that allowed DRM, but I suppose they would have been planning this and made sure recent models all had DRM chips. Or IRM? Ink Rights Management 
Iirc Framework commented on the question of the producing a printer once. Saying that there are just too many printer patents held by the major printer companies for it to be possible. Perhaps I am misremembering that it was someone from Framework directly who said it though.
Interestingly, when I search for more details about this issue, it seems to have been the case for at least two or three years. Louis Rossmann made a video about it recently, which is probably why it’s suddenly getting attention.
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Brother isn’t the only company to ban 3rd party only in their firmware. HP has done it to my printer. Saw an article about how most printer companies will do the same. They need the steady ink income for profit. The printer sales are not very profitable.
I think for a long time people have kinda thought Brother was the only printer company that didn’t do this. But it seems like they, too, have been doing this for at least a few years. At least to some extent.
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Digital Restrictions Management
A quick search turned up a refurbished Epson printer for $140 and it comes with a boatload of ink. Not sure how much anyone spends on cartridges but even if it were new it is $200 and that is direct from Epson.
yeah, the epsons ecoTank line is pretty great, i’d say epson in general is the best option at the moment, never had one of those break yet. Though my old one sometimes tells me third party ink cartridges are empty, when they are obviously not (with ink running out of the used cartridges after changing).
In any way, even epson printers are not exactly what I would call easily repairable, so there’s still a good case for a frame.work printer.
Also, framework could be pretty unique if they would produce a printer that doesn’t print Printer tracking dots, maybe even with open source firmware/software.
Since framework doesn’t own any production facilites, as far as I know, are there even OEMs for printers that framework could partner with?