Lower end printer experiences/opinions?

[bigred]

Looking to buy an inexpensive printer - even the lower end ones often have fax ability now so I am determined to get that, but beyond being inexpensive yet "decent" I have no other requirements.

So - brands? Models? Best places to buy? I've scoured Best Buy, Amazon/etc but haven't had a printer in awhile and not up on what generally are or aren't considered the better or worse ones. My girlfriend has a low end Canon which seems to work well and I hear the cartridges are cheaper than for most others, which would be nice.

Thx

[Phage0070]

This day and age you don't really buy low-end printers; you buy cartridges, and they will pretty much give you a printer to go along with it.

[Christian Klippel]

If you want a low price per printed page, and don't need color, go with a laser printer. They are fast and they are cheap. A new toner cartridge holds for several tens of thousands of pages, it doesn't dry up when not used.

If you need color, you may check color lasers, they are quite cheap nowdays too. But i have no clue about the follow-up costs for toner, etc.

Inkjet printers are the cheapest to buy, but the ink costs more than gold. No kidding.

Greetings,

Chris

[El Greco]

My -limited- experience says: Stay away from Epson.

[N.Texas]

I have an Epson CX 9400 fax and would echo Christian and El Greco's opinions. My Epson is an ink pig.

[FreshHat]

My girlfriend has a low end Canon which seems to work well and I hear the cartridges are cheaper than for most others, which would be nice.


I'm still using my turn-of-the-century Canon BJC-210 inkjet printer. I think I paid $59.99 for it, back in the day.

I only use it for text, so I let the colour cartridges dry up, but I have yet to buy a new black ink cartridge. I made a small hole in the side of it, and I occasionally squirt ink in it (two 18 ml bottles for $10 is an outrageous price for ink, but it lasts me for years), then place a piece of tape over the hole, and it's good for another six months.

The little BubbleJet has given me a good feeling for Canon products.

[BenBurch]

My experience says stay away from Lexmark.

[Morrigan]

My experience says stay away from Lexmark.

Same.

[Ian Osborne]

Lexmark has largely put its bad days behind it - like Skoda cars, Lexmark printers are much better than they used to be. Epson has gone the other way, producing very mediocre machines that are prone to clogging. Canon printers are great if they take five ink tanks, average if they take any less. For a decent cheap deal, go for a Brother. Their print-outs are a little dull, but the inks are incredibly cheap.

[BenBurch]

I bought a Samsung WiFi laser printer for only about $300 6 years ago and it is still going strong. It is not a PostScript printer, but its not hard at all to make it work under OSX or Linux as though it were one, just the right software stack in the drivers.

And though I bought a spare, I am still on the first cartridge.

So, maybe really low-end is not what you want if you want to save money long term.

[geni]

This is the 7th computer issue thread you've started this month.

[bigred]

I'll bite: "wifi?" Wireless?

[BenBurch]

I'll bite: "wifi?" Wireless?

Yes. Common name for it here.

[Lolly]

and I hear the cartridges are cheaper than for most others, which would be nice.
I have an HP and a Brother.

The Brother announces that you have to change the cartridges even though they aren't even close to empty and it won't work with an "empty" cartridge (including the fax function). I found this incredibly annoying - but it can be overridden by a bit of masking tape on the cartridge to fool it into thinking the cartridge has ink in it. The Brother also seems to have done only a few pages before announcing that it needed new cartridges, so it seems that they only give you a small amount of ink when you buy it. Even though the cartridges of a brand might look cheaper than a competitor's, the manufacturer might implement a sneaky way of getting you to buy more than you need to, like Brother has apparently done. The HP will still work with empty (colour) cartridges in it.

Check the features of the one you select - my hp does double sided and multiple pages on one sheet and it will print out in a booklet form (it figures out the page order), but the Brother doesn't. It saves heaps of paper and I use it a lot, so it is something I'd definitely look for if I had to replace a printer.

The HP also has some picture software that I find useful. Overall, I've been quite happy with the HP, except for the cost of the cartridges which is outrageous. They seem to last a reasonable length of time, though.

[Pantaz]

I'll echo the (monochrome) laser recommendation. Cost per page is less than any inkjet. Plus, it can sit unused indefinitely and return to service perfectly without intervention.

If you want color, then inkjet is fine. But, be sure to get one that uses individual color ink tanks.

Due to the growing demand of digital cameras and home photo printing, there are now several providers of high quality ink refill kits. This brings the operating costs down significantly -- as long as you don't mind the little bit of labor required in doing your own refilling.

[Beanbag]

My mom's HP Deskjet ran out of ink this weekend, and I got called in to handle the situation. My sister gave her the printer years ago when she got a new one, so we're talking old printer here. Anyhow, I popped the cartridges (two -- one black, one color) and copied down the numbers. My mom asked about the second cartridge, and I told her it was for color.

Her reply: "It does COLOR?" This should clue you in to exactly what level of printing my mom requires.

Anyhow, went to Fry's and priced a set of replacement cartridges. A single black cartridge and color cartridge ran about $80 USD. Meanwhile, over in the printer sales section, a brand-new Samsung ML-2510 laser printer (with a toner cartridge) was on sale for $59.

The short of it was that Mom got a new printer that day. I warned her that when it was time to replace the toner cartridge (in a year or two at her printing rate) that it would probably be around $80. I can live with that.

I have an HP 6L that refuses to die, so I keep using it. Damn thing's indestructable. I use it for printing on card stock. Most new laser printers have puny fusers that don't work well on thicker stock. My "regular" printer for manuscripts and stuff on normal-weight paper is a Samsung ML-1710. For photos, I have one of Canon's wide-carriage inkjet printers, plus a Kodak 8500 dye-transfer printer that is almost impossible to find expendables for these days.

Oh, yeah: there's a Panasonic dot-matrix impact printer in the closet, one that takes tractor-feed paper.

Beanbag

[bigred]

What no daisy wheels? :cool:

Thx for all the replies. The cartridge expense thing continues to baffle me.

[dasmiller]

What no daisy wheels? :cool:

Thx for all the replies. The cartridge expense thing continues to baffle me.

Think of the printer companies (Canon, Epson, etc) as being in the ink-supply business. Selling a printer cheap is strategically similar to, say, DirecTV giving you the satellite dish. In both cases, they're taking an up-front loss to lock you into making regular payments for their service (ink cartridges, DirecTV programming).

P.S. I'm not complaining about my DirecTV service, just making an observation about their business strategy.

[BenBurch]

What no daisy wheels? :cool:

Thx for all the replies. The cartridge expense thing continues to baffle me.

It's the Gillette theory; Give away the razor, and mark up the blades.

[Zax63]

Another vote for a laser printer here. If you only need color occasionally you can go to a Kinko's or similar or even an online printing service. It will almost certainly be cheaper than $70+ worth of ink cartridges that need to be replaced every 6 months whether you use them or not. I swear I used more ink on head cleaning than I ever did on printing.
Newegg and Amazon reviews are great places for research even if you don't end up buying from them.

[Dymanic]

My printer needs are quite modest. I have a Lexmark 1300. It was a birthday gift from my kid, or I would have dashed the thing to pieces on the concrete long ago. As it is, I guess I'm stuck with it. It was cheap, and I know why: it's little more than a remote point-of-sale for ink cartridges. I'll bet they sell the printer itself at cost. Maybe even at a loss. As soon as a cartridge is something like half empty (which happens fast), it starts throwing up a window every time I invoke a print job, wanting me to order cartridges online. There is an opt-out button that allows completion of the print job, and because of this, I know that I'd be thowing away a LOT of ink if I went for the okie-doke. Many scores of pages worth, at least.

It also has this ridiculous robot voice that announces "printing started", and "printing complete" -- as if I were too stupid to figure out when those events had occurred simply by looking at the printer; I mean, it's sitting on the desk right next to me, for crying out loud. If obtaining satisfactory performance from a device requires disabling of half of the features it comes with, that evidences bad design in my opinion.

I have nothing but utter contempt for Lexmark, and probably always will. It's not based solely on my experience with this one printer, either. A few years ago, somebody gave me a new Lexmark, just out of the box (just back in the box, obviously, after a very short period of use). And I know why: it was presented as a black-and-white/color printer, but get this: there was only one cartridge station, so the deal was, you were supposed to run it once for black, swap cartridges, then run the color! (And good luck getting it to register up perfect). The neighbors half a block down the street probably got to hear what I thought of that idea.

Boy, am I glad for this opportunity to vent about that. Just imagine how dissatisfied I'd be if I had actually paid for either of those printers!

Hey, I think I have a couple of HP inkjets (circa 1995) in a closet somewhere I'd sell ya mighty cheap.

[Christian Klippel]

As soon as a cartridge is something like half empty (which happens fast), it starts throwing up a window every time I invoke a print job, wanting me to order cartridges online.

Sssshhh! Be quiet! They may get the idea to have it print order-forms for new ink instead of a simple pop-up window. Be happy with the way it is now!

:D

Greetings,

Chris

[Christian Klippel]

Just wanted to add something.

In case you go for a laser-printer, try to find one where the drum and the toner-cartridge are separate units. Usually the drum holds much longer than the toner. I really hate these "all in one cartridge" solutions. Sure, still cheaper (in terms of cost per printed page) than an inkjet, but it needlessly fills up the landfills.

However, it may be pretty hard nowdays to find such a printer.

Greetings,

Chris

[Bobert]

This is the 7th computer issue thread you've started this month.
:gasp:

[bokonon]

I gave up on laser printers years ago, because they're not compatible with vinyl notebooks -- the toner softens up, and the pages stick together.

[bigred]

Since I will be printing pictures, I doubt I will go with a laser. I toyed w/the idea of getting one of those "photo printers" but thinking I can probably get an inkjet which prints respectable pics and is far more versatile.

Wow opinions on these things are all over the place.

[CelticRose]

The Brother announces that you have to change the cartridges even though they aren't even close to empty and it won't work with an "empty" cartridge (including the fax function). I found this incredibly annoying - but it can be overridden by a bit of masking tape on the cartridge to fool it into thinking the cartridge has ink in it.
Where exactly do you have to put the masking tape to accomplish this?

I own a Brother -- never again.

A tip for inkjets: leave them plugged in all the time or they will clean themselves every time you plug them in and eat ink.

[richardm]

Since I will be printing pictures, I doubt I will go with a laser. I toyed w/the idea of getting one of those "photo printers" but thinking I can probably get an inkjet which prints respectable pics and is far more versatile.

Wow opinions on these things are all over the place.

If you're planning on doing ordinary printing most of the time and photo printing only occasionally, I'd seriously suggest that you might consider getting a photo printer for the photos and a cheap laser for everything else. It'll cost more up front, but it might be worth it in the long run.

I have a Canon photo printer that produces results at least as good as anything I ever did in the darkroom. I have no idea how much it costs to run per page, but I don't care because I print rarely and the results are so good. If I ran all my day-to-day printing through it as well, then the costs might become a bit of an issue.

This might be of interest regarding print costs (http://www.nifty-stuff.com/inkjet-printer-tco.php). I don't use compatible cartridges, since I tried them in my old printer and got dubious quality followed by a broken printhead when one of them gummed up.

[Lolly]

Where exactly do you have to put the masking tape to accomplish this?
I found it online, but I don't think I've enough posts to post a link. If you google "Trick your brother inkjet into working when an ink cartridge runs dry" you should find the page I found - it has pictures which show where to put the tape - my cartridges aren't all clear (probably so you can't see how much ink is still there to be wasted if you install a new cartridge) but the spine is clear and similar to the picture. I found that I had to put it over the whole of the spine widthways, not just on the "sticking-out" bit like in the picture.

[Ian Osborne]

Is this the link? (http://journal.drfaulken.com/trick-your-brother-inkjet-into-working-when-an-ink-cartridge-runs-dry/)

ETA: No one will shoot you if you do this - http:// tinyurl .com /5kuhjn - and let the enquirer remove the spaces. The limitation on new users posting links is there to help prevent spam bots saturating the forum with junk links. The administration wouldn't mind you circumventing this to post a relevant, useful and on-topic link like this.

Welcome to the forum! :)

[Lolly]

Is this the link?
Yes, that's the one, thanks.

Welcome to the forum! :) Thanks:)

[Beanbag]

I gave up on laser printers years ago, because they're not compatible with vinyl notebooks -- the toner softens up, and the pages stick together.
They've changed plasticizers in the vinyl to something not as aggressive. Most notebooks in the stores these days are listed as "copy-safe," which includes anything printed in a laser printer. Just to cover all bases, I usually put a blank sheet at the front and back of the pages.

Beanbag

[Beanbag]

The important thing to remember with inkjet printers is to print at least one sheet with a color image a week. Doesn't have to be a full page. I usually print a draft-quality 4x5" color picture on plain copy paper. Keeps the ink in the nozzles from drying out. Considering a full set of cartridges for my Epson 1400 runs about $120 USD, it's a good habit to get into. For those times I forget, cleaning the print nozzles on each cartridge with a cotton swab dipped in alcohol usually salvages a clogged cartridge.

Beanbag

[CelticRose]

I found it online, but I don't think I've enough posts to post a link. If you google "Trick your brother inkjet into working when an ink cartridge runs dry" you should find the page I found - it has pictures which show where to put the tape - my cartridges aren't all clear (probably so you can't see how much ink is still there to be wasted if you install a new cartridge) but the spine is clear and similar to the picture. I found that I had to put it over the whole of the spine widthways, not just on the "sticking-out" bit like in the picture.

Is this the link? (http://journal.drfaulken.com/trick-your-brother-inkjet-into-working-when-an-ink-cartridge-runs-dry/)

ETA: No one will shoot you if you do this - http:// tinyurl .com /5kuhjn - and let the enquirer remove the spaces. The limitation on new users posting links is there to help prevent spam bots saturating the forum with junk links. The administration wouldn't mind you circumventing this to post a relevant, useful and on-topic link like this.

Welcome to the forum! :)
Thanks, folks! :)

I've made a note of the information and the next time this #&%$% printer tells me it's out of ink I'll try this.

[bigred]

The important thing to remember with inkjet printers is to print at least one sheet with a color image a week. Doesn't have to be a full page. I usually print a draft-quality 4x5" color picture on plain copy paper. Keeps the ink in the nozzles from drying out. Considering a full set of cartridges for my Epson 1400 runs about $120 USD, it's a good habit to get into. For those times I forget, cleaning the print nozzles on each cartridge with a cotton swab dipped in alcohol usually salvages a clogged cartridge.

Beanbag

Good tips, thx

I almost bought the Canon Pixmark today but holding off for now. Too many other more important expenses at the moment as it turns out...thx all

[Pantaz]

I have a Canon photo printer...

Which one?

[Beanbag]

One thing to remember -- if you're printing photos, the estimates for how many pages per cartridge will be way the hell off. Unless you're printing a lot of pictures of people in the snow, the ink coverage is going to be considerably more than the 10-15% they use for estimating print life. For me, it's usually 100% color, and I usually do full-size 8x10" prints. I go through A LOT of cartridges or expendables, regardless of what printer I'm using.

I finally broke down and bought one of the stick-on monitor calibration gadgets that plugs into a USB port and sets the monitor adjustments so what you see on the screen is pretty much what the print will look like. I figure it will pay for itself in about 6 to 12 months, eliminating wasted test prints.

Beanbag

[TheDaver]

Avoid the low-end Lexmark printers like the plague. They tend to die in less than a year.

… Not that that's economically such a bad thing, since you can replace the whole printer for the cost of its ink… but it can be annoying having to install new drivers, and throwing out all those printers can’t be all that good for the environment.

ETA: My sister and I use HP Photosmart all-in-ones. They’re really nice, though I think the software is a bit daffy. Our mother has been happy with Canon inkjets for the last ten years.