Why aren't there any Open Source laser printers?
arbitraryuser.com
arbitraryuser.com
Back when I was involved in the laser printer business (at the beginning, in 1980, where we (Imagen, a Stanford TeX project spin-off) built the first typesetting-quality low-end laser printers), the main bugaboo was avoiding the PostScript licensing cost. (I think Adobe charged $100's of dollars per printer, depending on quantities sold.) We built a clone ourselves, but some of the big hardware manufacturers just licensed GhostScript cheaply from L. Peter Deutch. (Of Berkeley/PARC/ParcPlace fame, one of the great hackers.)
Peter first wrote GhostScript on a lark, just to see how hard it could be (not hard for him ;-), then it became serious when he realized the demand for such a product. (He released slightly older versions as OSS and licensed the bleeding-edge version commercially.)
We've put a generation's worth of engineering into our printers and have a huge supply chain advantage so for any price point you pick it would be very hard to build a competitive laser printer, since printer manufacturers typically take a very large loss on each unit sold.
But that's not really the question here - on my homebrew projects I usually don't try to be cost competitive, it's about the learning, fun and pride in the finished project.
I think the main reason there aren't any open source printers is that the refill/counterfeit ink and toner markets somewhat solve the problem of expensive supplies - you already get better hardware than you can build yourself and you can get cheap non-brand toner/ink.
I did that in the 1990s, except I would send it PostScript files. IIRC the printer I used was some Epson dot-matrix fan-fold thingy, but I could have used anything supported by GhostScript.
Edit: Look down for an explanation.
I have a few reasons.
Companies would have no incentive on lowering price on laser technology when most people are encouraged to buy inkjet.
I believe there is a rather small cost difference between a $100 and a $2,500 printer. Yes, the $2.5k printer is bigger, but it's just more mechanical parts. I believe most of the cost is in development and the printing technology itself.
Some Printer/Toner combinations have a much lower TCO than others, and the lower TCO does not reflect in a higher then average price for the printer itself (on the contrary).
Companies are pushing forward a lot of models. My Lexmark X203N is in no relevant way better then Lexmark X202N. I believe companies would not waste resources on creating so many compatible printers if they would not make money out of them.
Companies are also pushing forward incompatible models. Toner for your old printer becomes prohibitively priced and you just buy a new printer because of lower TCO. If companies were having a loss from the printers themselves, they would't try to make you buy a new one so much.
However, it's very clear that the low end models are loss leaders so the worst thing you can do to us is buy a new printer and never buy supplies or buy off-brand ink.
On the higher end models the cost curve changes since lower volume = higher relative price. But those business-targeted printers tend to be compete on TCO, like you're saying, and customers analyze cost per page and support cost, the initial purchase price doesn't really weigh in that much. The $2500 printer will have to last longer, use better materials and have some warranty cost factored in. You're absolutely right that it's not a linear scale-up from your $49 dollar printer at home.
Which apparently happens by magic.
> Open Source Hardware creates a unique ecosystem. It is naturally competitive, pushing prices down on consumables and making sure that people pay for build and print quality rather than brands.
Right. That's the theory anyway, but "for some reason" (I'm sure somebody'll find a nice conspiracy theory) there's pretty much no open-source consumer hardware.
The question is this: what's the incentive? What's the incentive for a designer to create open-source hardware (open-source software requires time and a box worth a few dozens to hundred bucks, but that's pretty much it. Open-source hardware also requires potentially expensive machines and a serious investment in materials), and what's the incentive for a "reputable manufacturer" when he already makes money hand over fist with "proprietary" hardware? Why would that manufacturer (whether he's currently legit or counterfeit) drive his whole business (especially consumables) into the ground?
Existing open source software was all pretty much designed to run on existing hardware. Free and open print specifications and interfaces couldn't run on existing hardware, and hardware R&D sort of requires substantial financial investment. It isn't really in the realm of your average hacker in his dimly lit home office at 3AM.
Hopefully the success of projects like Arduino will make free and open hardware standards a thing of the very near future, someday enabling us to develop complex machines using unencumbered hardware standards, but like you pointed out that just isn't today's reality.
The blog post describes an ambitious undertaking, and I think that's a good thing. It really is something that feels long overdue, given how obviously exploitive the current SOHO printing market is currently.
That's the subject of my comment, but I'm sure somebody will assert a conspiracy by "Big Printing".
> The blog post describes an ambitious undertaking
The blog post does not describe anything, the blog post asserts that 1. somebody should design and manufacture open-source printing hardware 2. Sprinkle fairy dust, rainbows and unicorns 3. Everything is awesome
And the starting point is mostly that TFAA thinks hardware is too expensive and obtaining counterfeit consumables is a pain.
I don't understand why you're taking such a negative attitude with the suggestion. Not every blog post on the world-wide web is written with the intention of outlining the solution to the described problem, unless that's really what you're taking issue with.
Unfortunately it wouldn't work, because there's no way it would be able to compete price-wise with the massive economy of scale afforded by the big players in the industry.
Open source 3d printers are great hobbies. I love them, but they're certainly nowhere near production ready.
I think the most sophisticated part of a laser printer is the toner. It has to stick on the drum but also on the paper at the right moment and at the right temperature. And it should stay on the paper for a long time without loosing it's tint.
Maybe they should build an open source laser cutter weak enough to just burn the surface of paper.
Huh? One can buy a laser printer for under $100, and print hundreds of pages with the included cartridge.
Also, the logic in this post would equally well apply to computers, cars, houses, pacemakers :-), whatever.
So, the main claim made here is "open source stuff is cheaper". From that, the question "why isn't everything open source?" follows. IMO, that discussion has been beaten to death multiple times.
There's a trick to stretch the starter toner cartridge too, cover the optical window with tape or black it out with a sharpie. You typically get hundreds of more pages out of it (as someone who doesn't print much, it usually lasts years).
Not when you own a HP 2605dn.
http://www.amazon.com/HP-LaserJet-Tri-Pack-Cartridges-CE257A...
And despite the fact that that is most of the purchase price of the machine when new, it does not include the black cartridge.
And yes there are alternatives, but this is the price the typical consumer sees.
So about ~$0.03 per b&w page, ~$0.11 per colour page.
The toner is also super cheap and lasts forever.
Then for paper you do what I did, you wait for a great bogo sale on two cartons of paper and craigslist the 2nd carton to get free paper for nearly a decade.
I am not sure what an open-source printer would bring to the table unless it's to remove the yellow tracking dots in color printers which the government would probably immediately outlaw.
Surely some of the subsequent patents have been related to making the printer cheaper, so that could lead to a price disadvantage, but it should be possible to make a fine patented free laser printer.
(of the many printers I've had subsequently, none have performed as well in the "paper jam" and "mysteriously hung network printer" category. The IIg was unable to reliably feed 6x8 envelopes, but other than that was perfect.)
Surely part of the point of patenting is that the solution is published?
Absolutely not. That's half the point of patents, research and personal use are absolutely allowed. Commercial use is disallowed without a license and [sensible] licensing can be forced by recourse to the courts in most jurisdictions.
You can build the printer in private, you can't use it commercially or sell it.
US Law: an infringement may occur where the defendant has made, used, sold, offered to sell, or imported an infringing invention or its equivalent.
UK Law (where I am): infringement occurs ... by the making, disposing of, offering to dispose of, using, importing or keeping a patented product.
In both cases "making" counts as infringement, but IANAL, so those words may well have special meanings which I don't understand.
The UK SS60 does the same thing, "Subject to the provisions of this section" (SS60(1)) means that you have to read the whole part, even down to UKPA Section 60(5) which makes it clear that experiment and personal use are allowed (not withstanding bad caselaw to the contrary that someone may raise??).
cisions later distinguished between commercial and non-commercial research.
'In 2002, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit dramatically limited the scope of the research exemption in Madey v. Duke University, 307 F.3d 1351, 1362 (Fed. Cir. 2002). The court did not reject the defense, but left only a "very narrow and strictly limited experimental use defense" for "amusement, to satisfy idle curiosity, or for strictly philosophical inquiry."'
I wasn't fully cognisant of the Madey vs Duke decision but it does address the situation of attempting to hide commercial action behind a guise of scientific experiment. The "philosophical inquiry" (sic) surely covers experiment that is not motivated by commercial interests.
They've gone too far IMO, the German position appears to hold most closely to the purpose of the patent system where they are more liberal in allowing commercially motivated experiment (and rightly), how else can improvements and developments be made.
Merck vs Integra appears to reverse this to some extent but is specific to the area of FDA testing and is thus quite hard to apply generally IMO.
As far as the European/UK position most states appear to follow the once proposed but unimplemented CPC Art.27(b) and thus have statutory exemptions for research use.
In particular in the UK, Patents Act as amended, SS60(5) states that use of a patent is not infringing if:
(a) it's for personal use (b) it's done for experiment ...
See for example the MPP, www.ipo.gov.uk/practice-sec-060.pdf. The 2006 Gowers Review gave as it's first recommendation that this section should be clarified to make it clear that research was an allowed, non-infringing, activity.
There seems to be plenty of competition and economies in printer manufacturing. As opposed to cable companies for example.
If I remember correctly the initial Apple Laserwriter or HP Laserjet cost about $8000 in today's dollars.
As others have mentioned I don't think the prices are outrageous at all. Additionally you can get a great used 65 page per minute HP printer that takes the high volume cartridges on ebay for < $350. (With postscript). (HP 4350 a great volume machine). The ink costs much less per page with the high volume machines and the used ones if properly vetted work great.
This is really ridiculous with respect to the cartridges:
"They do this purely to make money. The fact that they do this is clear evidence that they’re ripping you off."
> "They do this purely to make money. The fact that they do this is clear evidence that they’re ripping you off."
It sounds pretty ironclad to me. I think it's even been established in court cases that manufacturers put chips in toner cartridges to create planned obsolescence and prevent recycling. Are you trying to invent some hairsplitting distinction between "create planned obsolescence and prevent recycling" and "ripping you off"?
The only actual paper stuff I've printed in the past year was contracts for signing and rescanning.
I think an open source laser printer would be an insanely cool hardware project. Although probably not cost effective due to the complexity, at least you would know exactly why the paper jams occur!
But you never know, the IP0X open source hardware project has had great success with getting chinese manufacturers to produce affordable hardware: http://www.rowetel.com/blog/?page_id=440 some of which can compete with very expensive "mainstream" offerings.
It is worth noting that almost every printer I have installed in the last 20 years comes with the settings on 'best quality' which is code for 'use the most toner/ink'. You can often get much greater life and printing speed by changing the default settings to 'economy' or similar. Usually the only time you would notice a lack of quality would be when you print photographs. For the vast majority of printing that I do (office conditions) the quality difference is negligible. The speed and toner savings are not.
I feel that a company that would deliberately program its toner to stop functioning, is questionable on moral grounds. It is purposeful destruction of value. It hurts the environment and is wasteful.
Sorry OSS doesn't really meet people half way on this. And for a company to remove the profit motive and make a printer that could infringe on patents for printing tech is blowing smoke.
OSS has never been very good at the last mile. So I don't see any manufacturer looking at the OSS plans and drivers and thinking that all the work is done. It's probably half done.
As the OP said, the manufactures of printers ALREADY designed their own printer. And they are making money from it. So why would they take some not entirely complete design and use that while it hollows out how they make money?