i960

The Canon i960 is a desktop photo printer that pairs two ink families on one shelf: the dye colors of the BCI-6 Black line — BCI-6 Cyan, BCI-6 Magenta, BCI-6 Yellow, photo cyan, photo magenta, red and green, each rated at about 280 pages — handle photographs, and a pigment BCI-3E Black rated at about 420 pages handles documents. A photo session and a letter do not draw on the same ink here.

That split gives the i960 its stop-and-start economics. A session can draw on all of the color tanks in an afternoon, then the machine may sit quiet until the next set of images is ready, while a week of paperwork touches only the document black. Compatible tanks fit the pattern well: they cut the cost of each busy session sharply while every cartridge keeps its rated output, so the saving arrives exactly where the spending happens — per tank, at the moment it runs dry.

Ink Cartridges for i960

Which cartridge should you buy?

Buy at the tank level. The i960's shelf is built for singles: replace the shade a session emptied, keep the document black on its own replacement cycle, and let sets handle the rare full refresh — the BCI-6 Set of 6 for the core colors, the Set of 8 or Set of 14 as spares accumulate, and the Set of 18 when red and green need stocking too. The mixed Set of 5 and Set of 11 suit a machine coming back from a long rest, when several tanks across both lines are likely to be tired together.

Ink levels and everyday use

Levels on these tanks are read optically, through the tank itself, so none of them carries a chip that can fail, expire or demand a reset — the technology question that haunts newer printers simply does not arise. The maintenance that matters is moisture and motion: print something every few weeks so the heads stay wet, swap a tank when the printer flags it low rather than shaking it on a hunch, and store sealed spares at room temperature, where they wait without deteriorating between sessions.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which ink cartridges fit the Canon i960?

The dye family — BCI-6 Black, cyan, magenta, yellow, photo cyan, photo magenta, red and green — for photographs, and a pigment BCI-3E Black for documents. Nine tanks, all individual.

Is there a chip I need to reset after changing a tank?

No. The printer senses ink optically from the tank, so a change is a plain swap — out with the empty, in with the full — and printing resumes. There is no counter to clear.

The printer sat unused for months. What should I do first?

Run a cleaning cycle and a test print before judging the tanks. Heads that sat dry often recover; replace only the tanks that still print weakly after the cycle, starting with the colors your test page shows missing.

Which set restocks everything at once?

The BCI-6 Set of 18 covers all eight dye tanks including red and green. Add a document black single if that tank is also low, since documents run on their own cartridge.

More printers that use the same cartridges

The same ink family covers far more than this one model — it also serves: the S Series, S400, S450, S500, S520, S530D, S600, S630, S750, S800, S820D, S830D, S900, S9000; the i Series, i550, i560, i850, i860, i865, i900D, i950, i9900; the MultiPASS all-in-ones, MultiPass F50, MultiPass F60, MultiPass F80, MultiPass MP700, MultiPass MP730, Multipass C755, Multipass F30; the BJC desktops, BJC-3000, BJC-6000, BJC-6100, BJC-8200; and the PIXMA range, PIXMA MP750, PIXMA MP760, PIXMA MP780, PIXMA iP3000, PIXMA iP4000, PIXMA iP4000R, PIXMA iP5000, PIXMA iP6000D, PIXMA iP8500