Reports are coming in about how HP is no longer allowing non-HP ink cartridges to be used with its printers. During its last firmware update, which was released back in March, settings inside HP printers were altered to only communicate with ink cartridges that come with a genuine HP security chip. Oddly, the problems only started to take effect around 12th September.
Since then, there have been a large number of complaints by HP printer owners on how their printers are indicating third-party ink cartridges as ‘damaged’. Dutch ink cartridge retailer, 123ink, claimed that it was bombarded with more than 1,000 customer complaints in less than 24 hours after the firmware settings change was triggered.
Meanwhile, HP has mentioned that the reason for this change was to “protect HP’s innovations and intellectual property”. The company went on to say “these printers will continue to work with refilled or remanufactured cartridges with an original HP security chip. Other cartridges may not function”.
It’s worth mentioning that affected printers range from those under the HP OfficeJet, OfficeJet Pro and OfficeJet Pro X lineup of printers. All is not lost though, 123inkt is currently working on new security chips for its ink cartridges that will bypass the current printer firmware by HP – other third party ink cartridge manufacturers should follow suit as well.
(Source: BBC, Ars Technica)
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