Epson - 786 Ink Cartridge - Black

These ink cartridges are what you're stuck with if you're using an EPSON WF-4630. And they work great for as long as the equipment will allow them to work. Unfortunately, the cartridges will stop working when they're about 50% empty. There's no way to override the shutoff because it's governed by a little computer chip implanted into the ink cartridge. Sooo, you'll spend $20+ per cartridge, get $10 of use out of them, then your printer will stop working any time any one of the cartridges hits that "empty" (half empty) status. That means even if you're printing an all black and white text document, if your yellow ink decides it's finished, the whole printer shuts down on you. Even if this black cartridge is still completely full of ink. It's expensive, it's frustrating, and it's your only option after you've spent $250 for the printer... which really does work well... it just costs an arm and a leg in this ink every month to keep it running.

These inks for the WorkForce Pro line of Epsons give us a LOT more prints per cartridge than the non-Pro WorkForces we have used. The cost efficiency has been good enough that I don't miss using laser printers. The only catch is that, like every other brand, Epson printers develop hardware issues over time. For that reason, I would recommend this cartridge over the XL version if you do not print frequently so that you won't be throwing away as much ink when the printer finally fails. If you do print a lot, though, the XL will cover the difference over time even if you end up throwing away a brand new cartridge while trying to troubleshoot a problem.

This is my second Epson 786 black cartridge. The first had a good life span (FAR better that the Kodak 9250 cartridges that this Epson 4630 printer replaced). But this 786 cartridge occasionally smears small font text; i.e. blurred. It does not appear to be in the same location on each document, just intermittent in random places on a given document. Since I don't remember the first cartridge doing this, I will have to wait for a replacement cartridge to conclude if this is just one faulty cartridge.

I bought an Epson WorkForce Pro printer with the corresponding ink July of 2016 and absolutely love the printer. As far as the ink is concerned I have yet to change it. The cartridges are easy to install, competitively priced and seem to last forever. If you're tired of constantly buying ink, try going with an Epson product; you won’t be asking: got ink? . . . anymore.

As I had previously purchased my Epson WF-4630 from Best Buy, I went back for ink cartridge refills. Luckily I was able to find two (2) black ink cartridges of the regular size--not the XL version. The supplies on the shelf were almost nonexistent!! I would expect the store to have a greater inventory of this item. I purchased the last two in stock. I am rating the product as "good" --4 stars--but the store gets a "2 stars" for lack of supplies.

I had been using after-market cartridges as they worked just fine but were a good bit less expensive. I made a mistake when I upgraded my printer firmware and now the aftermarket cartridges no longer work (and I cannot undo the firmware update). Last time that I let that happen but it is too late for this printer. However other than the higher price with the branded cartridges, no problems.

This ink is bright, and it dries fast. For it's price, it doesn't last as long as claimed on normal mode. I usually get approx. 350-375 pages out of one cartridge. I do a lot of printing of paperwork. Nothing that would require a great amount of ink. I will probably try the xl cartridge next time. Hopefully Best Buy will begin to stock in store soon.

These are solidly constructed and deliver good strong sound. For quick convenience, I prefer ear bud style Bluetooth headphones like the AirPods that don’t have any wires between them, but the trade off is these are much louder and powerful.