HP Discontinues Online-Only LaserJet Printers
Last May, I told you how HP’s bestselling printer can lock you to the company’s own subscription ink for life, with no way to cancel, with its dastardly HP Plus scheme. But HP has decided to remove those shackles from future laser printers, at least.
Christopher Harper (via Slashdot):
HP has finally been forced to discontinue its cheaper e-series LaserJet printers due to customers experiencing problems with their online-only and always tied to HP+ subscription requirements. Among other things, HP+ requires a permanent Internet connection, and customers only use HP-original ink and toners, not allowing for third-party alternatives to be used at all. There are benefits to HP+, including cloud printing and an extra year’s warranty, but the forced online requirement for a cheaper printer left a bad taste in the mouths of many consumers.
In any case, it’s important to clarify that this discontinuation of HP printers will only impact HP LaserJet printers that have an “e” added to the end of their model name to denote the alternative business model.
Previously:
3 Comments RSS · Twitter · Mastodon
Hrmph. I guess it's good news I can still buy a quality printer from HP, if I'm minded to. Now the question is, after all they've done to enshitify the experience, would I want to? Those Brother AIO models seem quite agreeable to me, I only need monochromatic laser and document scanning, not even a feeder. I think perhaps if it weren't for the now largely obsolete cloud printing, probably I'd have no real need for HP at all. I do appreciate that they are very good choices for IT admins because of their decent networking support for autoconfiguration and zero-touch setup, but I can live without those—the most important thing is full-featured driver support for all the OSs, and Brother seems to be doing an excellent job there.
I accidentally bought three of these last year, not noticing the e on the end, and was quite incensed because each one meant I’d need to run another 100’ of Ethernet cable to a processing station in the warehouse or buy a switch for a printer. One of them bricked itself during the activation process and had to go a warranty replacement. It was the final straw after years of driver issues (PDFs randomly print slow unless you unplug the printer, power button doesn’t suffice), now I pay 3x as much to an obscure Okidata laser reseller and it’s worth it because they’re built like tanks and they just work like it’s 1994. I can put up with a lot of pain the but the “e” line meant they lost an industrial customer for life
So if HP is finally stopping this nonsense, what will become of all of their victims who previously bought these printers? Is HP going to turn off the servers and brick all those devices (as we've seen all too often in the news these days) or will the do the right thing and push out firmware to turn them into normal printers?
I think we all know the answer already, but I'd love for my pessimism to be proven wrong at least once.
