I can only write that as prices came down from the thousand dollar mark for printers and headed into the under 200 mark, the tradeoff was to make printers that work for a couple years. Service costs are fixed so you are not aware that people costs have risen.
As such, a 3 year printer is not worth much discussion at what you paid for it.
Sorry, but I've got to put this in some perspective.
Bob
I have a CANON BJC-2010 PRINTER that has been problematic since I got it. The printer works fine, it is just the printheads that are a pain in the rear.
We do not print a lot. Probably baout 5 or 6 reams of paper, mostly text: letters and the like. Yet I have been through 3 color print heads since we got the printer. Also one black print head. Usually before I have to replace a cartriidge, the printing becomes iffy. I have never made it through three cartridges of ink before I am getting nothing but littles spits and splats of in on the page. I mean, almost nothing is coming through! I have pulled out almost new cartridges, thinking they were the problem, but are obviously are not.
I think the problem is that the ink is drying in the head jets, ergo, unless I can figure out a way to clear them, I will be faced with replacing the whole thing at around $50 a pop.
My question is in two parts:
1. Would it help to run the clean cycle more often to prevent this problem? How often should it? What exactly does that do? There never is any signs that anything happens -like ink globs or something. Just a lot of noise.
2. Is it possible to salvage a head by cleaning it in a solvent of some sort? I have tried those solvent-filled cartridges with no results. I have tried setting it in a little water, with no results ( I was skeptical of this anyhow as I doubt water is the solvent in the ink). I may be able to answer this myself as I am getting what has been promoted as a print head cleaner soon, altho I had to buy a cartridge to get it. I would think a common solvent available at any hardware store would do it, but what?
CANON, incidentally, provides minimal advice on this problem, before and after it occurred. They don't say "run the cleaning cycle once a week" or anything else for that matter. Oh, I could take it to a CANON representative who would look at it for $55! Maybe they would clean the head. then I would have a cleaned printer cartridge for only $5 more than a new one.

Chowhound
Comic Vine
GameFAQs
GameSpot
Giant Bomb
TechRepublic