Amazon.com: Customer reviews: Canon CLI-281XL Black Ink Tank, Compatible to TR8520,TR7520,TS9120,TS8120 and TS6120 Printers

Top positive review

Be sure to do the math

Reviewed in the United States on October 12, 2020

I like the ink and have no complaints about the quality. No leaks, no smears, good saturation, you name it. Just make sure you do the math. As of this writing, the Canon 4 pack of XL ink is $72 from Amazon. The 4 pack of standard ink is $39 from Amazon. A Canon rep responded to a question about how much ink is in each. Standard inks have 5.6ml while XL inks have 8.3ml. Doing the math you find that the Standard ink costs $1.74/ml while the XL ink costs $2.17/ml. You would THINK that by buying more (the XL) it would cost LESS per ml but that's just not the case. Put another way, if you purchased three boxes of the Standard ink you would have 16.8ml of each color. If you purchased two boxes of XL ink you would have 16.6ml of each color - roughly equal to the three boxes of Standard ink. You would have paid $117 for the Standard ink but $144 for the (same amount of) XL ink. So be sure to do the math. (And yes - the "verified purchase" tag on my review indicates that I did NOT do the math the first time around. Lesson learned!)

102 people found this helpful

Top critical review

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Shayne

Ignore the printer warnings. Keep printing until you literally run out of ink.

Reviewed in the United States on May 16, 2018

I noticed that I was replacing cartridges all the time. So I tried to test it out, ignore the warnings, and keep printing until I actually ran out. I went past the Cyan warning, past the empty "x", and printed at least 75 more color sheets (and still going). So my recommendation on the ink is when it gives you the warning that you are out, keep printing. Especially if you're only printing a sheet or two. I wouldn't try to print 100 copies and walk away. If you're going to print that many, watch to make sure that you don't run out mid batch. I think it's a trick to get you to order ink too early.

196 people found this helpful

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From the United States

Dennis HH

Levels not the same

Reviewed in the United States on April 1, 2018

Color: Black,Cyan,Magenta,YellowSize: XLPattern Name: InkVerified Purchase

Instead of arriving as a single package, individual packages were shipped. The Cyan and Magenta indicated about 2/3 and 3/4 full after loading. The yellow indicated completely full. I don't know if it is a printer problem or if the ink supplied is not the same, but if they were all XL I would think the levels should indicate the same. Since the ink and the printer are both Canon I would think that Canon is a fault.

13 people found this helpful

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andy

Nice little printer if your needs are occasional

Reviewed in the United States on April 11, 2018

Color: Black,Cyan,Magenta,Yellow, BlueSize: StandardPattern Name: InkVerified Purchase

Nice little printer if your needs are occasional. Once set up it is easy to use. However, I had to spend time on the phone with two Canon reps to get it up and running. It works fine with Chrome Cloud printing, but "Cloud ready" out of the box? Not exactly. When I started it up, the LED screen had an error message that I couldn't get rid of. The first rep I spoke with said that I should return it, which I did - taking it to UPS in a snowstorm. Amazon's exchange policy worked fine. The next printer started with the same error message, but the next reps I spoke with at Canon knew how to clear it and led me through the whole set up process. The manual that comes with it suffers from poor translation from Japanese and was as clear as mud. If you order it, be patient and just don't hesitate to seek help from Canon Customer Service online if you are having problems. They are helpful and excellent. Don't give up - it was worth the effort.

9 people found this helpful

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Meda.Lass

Expensive ink, but what are you going to do?

Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2020

Color: CyanSize: StandardPattern Name: InkVerified Purchase

The price for individual cartridges is really not much more than the price broken out of a set, so since over the couple of years I've had my printer a few of the cartridges were getting used more than others I bought a couple individually. Now my colored cartridge are all in the same range of full and I'll go back to buying the sets until 1 or 2 get out of range of the others.

Helpful

ladymarmarlade

Suspicious Ink

Reviewed in the United States on October 21, 2021

Color: Black,Cyan,Magenta,Yellow, BlueSize: StandardPattern Name: InkVerified Purchase

How does the ink run out when I don't use it? The world may never know.

It prints beautifully when it's there, though.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

G Phelps

Good ink. Smaller containers of colors doesn't last long.

Reviewed in the United States on March 4, 2022

Color: Black,Cyan,Magenta,YellowSize: XLPattern Name: InkVerified Purchase

Great quality. Small refills fonty last long

One person found this helpful

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Gessner R. Pantley

Nice having the printer order ink, but...

Reviewed in the United States on November 24, 2021

Color: BlackSize: StandardPattern Name: InkVerified Purchase

The auto order buy the printer is cool, but the ink is way more expensive than buying from a brick and morter. Installation is super easy and takes very little time.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

mountainmover

Slow shipping

Reviewed in the United States on July 26, 2020

Color: Black,Cyan,Magenta,YellowSize: XLPattern Name: InkVerified Purchase

I needed this item for work at home but it took longer than stated to get. This is a new printer for me and the ink seems to run out very quickly compared to other printers I've had. Ink is a little pricey considering how long it lasts.

Helpful

James B.

expensive

Reviewed in the United States on January 22, 2020

Color: BlackSize: XXLPattern Name: InkVerified Purchase

Way too expensive.
Just like every other name brand ink cartridges.

Beginning to believe using generic for text printing until the print heads clog up and then simply pitch it and purchase a new printer would/will save a lot of cash.

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