Recently, there has been a huge legal and investigative battle with people selling “compatible” laser toner cartridges. Often, a distributor will sell their defective, ineffective, or even damaging laser toner cartridges to unsuspecting resellers. These cartridges will make weak prints, cause messy ink spray, and may cause serious damage to your printer. So be sure to buy cartridges from an authorized reseller that the manufacturer audits. Check the manufacturer’s website to obtain a list of authorized resellers.

Beware of laser toner cartridges that are priced way below market standard. Bad or old packaging should also send up a red flag for phony laser toner cartridges.

Finally, if your cartridge runs out of ink too quickly, gives messy prints, or damages your printer, don’t buy from the same retailer again.

This is not to say that all compatible toner cartridges are bunk. But if you’re going to spend tens of dollars on a cartridge, why risk it?

Remanufactured Laser Toner Cartridges

Most manufacturers, and some third-party distributors, will give you money or discounts in exchange for your old laser toner cartridges. They in turn replace the guts of the cartridge, refill it with toner, and resell it at a big discount. In many cases, the quality is almost exactly the same as new. For example, a black-ink cartridge for an Epson Stylus Color 880 costs $27 from Epson, but only $12 from Rhinotek.