I use a lot of toner. At almost $50 per cartridge, I am always looking for a way to save money on toner.
A good way to cut back on costs is to set your printer on "light" or "draft" mode. You don't have to have it letter quality all the time.
I have also found a way to buy myself an extra 200 pages for free.
With my HP LaserJet 1100, the cartridge starts to go bad before all the toner is gone. Here is the tell-tale sign: the letters in the middle of the page, top to bottom, start getting pale. Pretty soon, they fade away.
When this happens, I remove the toner cartridge, go over to the sink, extend the cartridge horizontally, and vigorously shake it back and forth about five times. This redistributes the toner inside the cartridge. Toner gets stuck on the ends of the cartridge. Shaking the cartridge evens it out. Then I put the cartridge back in the printer.
When I forget to buy a spare cartridge, this gives me a couple of days to get to the local Office Depot to buy a new cartridge.
Warning: sometimes flecks of toner escape when you shake it. This is why you should shake the cartridge over a sink.
I go to Office Depot to buy more toner cartridges. I buy their in-house brand. They give me a ream of paper in exchange for an empty toner cartridge. They make money on the cartridge, I suppose. Also, they know that I will probably buy a new cartridge from them. Once I'm in the store, I'm a hot sales prospect. That's why they have a limit of one exchange per trip.
There are toner refill kits that offer major savings: up to 50% off. If I used one, I would probably make a mess, but you may find it worth the risk. Here are two sites where you can by refill kits and cartridges. One site is for toner; the other is for discount ink cartridges.
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