Don’t Take HP’s Free Ink, Unless You Are OK Never Being Able To Use Anything Else

HP Plus Has a Huge Catch

You can get free ink for six months, an improved warranty, and even a tree in your name if you buy HP printers.  HP will remind you to sign up within seven days after plugging in your HP printer.  You will get six months of free ink if you sign up, but there is a small print that says you must agree to a software update.  Once a member of HP Plus, your printer will never accept any ink which isn’t directly from HP.  It’s a little inconvenient and not too bad, until you consider all that HP has done with printers.

HP has made a lot of news, including when it became known that their printers used more ink then necessary.  In a way, that didn’t matter because HP also included an artificial end date on the life of the ink cartridges.  After that point, your printer would not accept any ink left in the cartridge.   They’ve also tried blocking official HP ink cartridges from a different region than where the printer was bought from functioning, on top of an update which blocked all third party ink cartridges.  Legally, the majority of these attempts have failed.

By signing up for HP Plus, you agreed to limit your cartridge usage. So you’re out of luck.  If you were hoping that cancelling HP Plus would unlock your printer, apparently the firmware update is irreversible; you’ll need to buy a new printer.