The truth of the matter is, printer ink is not cheap. An inkjet cartridge for your $50 printer can cost you $30. That means that the cost of two inkjet cartridges will be more than the cost of your purchase price.

A much better way to determine if you are getting a bargain on your inkjet printer is to try to figure out what it will cost you over the period of one year. That means you have to add the cost of your inkjet cartridges to the purchase price of your printer. To give you an idea of your cost, here's a simple way to estimate your cost.

First, look up how many pages you inkjet cartridge will print. Then, make a rough estimate of how many pages of print you print each week. Multiply your weekly estimate by 52 to get the total pages for the year. Finally, divide the total number of pages per year by the number of cartridges your printer is rated to print. This will tell you how many inkjet cartridges you will need to purchase in a year.

For example, suppose your ink cartridge prints 200 pages and you estimate you print 20 pages per week. That means you'd print 1040 pages in one year. If you divide 1040 pages by 200 pages, you'd have to buy 6 cartridges to cover your printing for one year.

Now, how much does each cartridge cost? Multiply that by the number of cartridges you'll need for one year and you have your answer. This simple exercise may surprise you. If an ink cartridge cost $30 each, you'll spend $180 in one year on ink. If you only paid $50 for the printer, that's over three times the cost of the printer.

If it cost you $180 to print 1040 pages and the printer costs $50, you'll pay $230 for your one-year printer cost. That comes to 22.1 cents per page. Now do the same thing for a different printer and compare. You just might be surprised.

One more thing… go online and look at some reputable printer companies. There are several recommended on this site. Check out the cost of their discount inkjet cartridges. These are brand new ink cartridges that are guaranteed to be as good as the original ink cartridge. They just don't have the “brand name” on the box. You'll probably be able to cut your printing cost in half. Now, you can make an informed decision on your next inkjet printer. You'll at least have an idea on how much it really costs.