Printer?

[Sportster]

. . .

 

[Judge]

I love my HP Envy 5530 Inkjet Printer-Scanner. Produces amazing prints in both black and white and full color. As for the cost of the ink, that remains probably within the realm of a heroin addiction. Something I suspect virtually all inkjet printers have in common. As for the scanning aspect of this printer, it works very easily- far more than earlier scanners with Twain drivers.

For routine document printing for work in black and white I stick to my HP 1200 Laser Printer. Ink toner goes an absurdly long way for me. One caveat though. When I went to Windows 7 I discovered the printer driver for this OS no longer worked with 1200 dpi resolution. That sucked. Yet none of the HP laser printers I bought ever failed. Their software just becomes outmoded. But it's an old printer...rather than replace the toner cartridge I may just buy a new laser printer when the time comes.

 

[clg114]

Over the years we have had a lot of printers and I think printers are evil machines. My wife and I both have PCs and until a year ago we had different brands of printers. We have always had more problems with the printers than the PCs, but the most annoying thing is cost. They both went through ink like my truck goes through gas and the ink is very expensive. I would like to know what printer ink costs per gallon. A little over a year ago I bought a couple of Kodak ESPC315 all in one printers. Their adds claimed that they did not use as much ink and several people told me that they liked their Kodak printers. They do use a little less ink and for the first year they worked OK as long as you run the jet cleaner program once a month or so. I do not know how they will work down the road, so far they are OK.

 

[Destination Unknown]

I had an HP wide format printer that worked ok until a little gear broke after about a year.
My new all in one is an Epson WF7620. I went with that because it has an 11x17 flatbed scanner, wide format printing, and 2 paper trays. Why not get 2 trays when it didn't cost much more than the version with 1 tray?
It's done everything that I want it to do. You can't use all the options on the scanner software, but for under $200 I can't complain.
I like it because it will do about everything a high dollar office machine will do. I bought it at Staples, and I've noticed that they never put the Epson ink on sale, only HP. There is a high volume black ink cartridge available, but hard to find on the store shelf.

 

[zurb]

I tend to avoid all in ones as with some models, if one component stops working all of it does. Having said that, I do currently have one.
I have stuck with Canon for inkjets as I prefer their quality. I don't know about now, but in the past many printers used canon technology anyway.
Inkjets tend to be sold very cheap and the manufacturer makes money on the ink. Which is why many people like these external ink tank hacks to reduce cost.
I was recently given an old computer and a classic old HP laser printer. These things last forever and have excellent quality. They cost a ton in their day, and toner cartridges aren't cheap, but then they last ages.
Laser printers have recently come down a lot in cost. I don't know if this has been offset by increased toner cost.

 

[Astroganga]

I have a HP1000 which only cost me £10, the cartridges last a pretty long time but it is actually a tad too long as I don't do much colour printing and they dry up before they can be used. I also have a brother laser, black and white which I use more often. I don't print out photos so don't need a printer for that.

 

[Timemachine]

I don't have a Printer. I have everything in my MacBook and if I get a Letter I take a photo, scan the Text, save it as PDF and throw the Letter in the Trash.

 

[Judge]

Even factoring in the obscene cost of ink, I adore creating my own photo prints which have zero artifacts- dust marks, scratches, developing errors. When I think of the cost of film and processing...ugh! I love the idea of quality control between me and Photoshop and no one else.

I used to develop my own b/w prints the old-fashioned way. Seriously guys, there's no comparison to the power of the digital darkroom.

 

[Mia]

I used to develop my own b/w prints the old-fashioned way. Seriously guys, there's no comparison to the power of the digital darkroom.

Agreed Judge, used to do the same, most of the b&w prints are yellowed around the edges. But you can't argue with the beauty and depth of black and white photography.

 

[Judge]

Agreed Judge, used to do the same, most of the b&w prints are yellowed around the edges. But you can't argue with the beauty and depth of black and white photography.

Another very cool thing about the digital darkroom. Where you can desaturate all the color in a picture after the fact which might have some of those attributes that people like Ansel Adams are so well known for. Ya never know....

And it's without all those fixer and developer issues that can eventually spoil a conventional photo print.

 

[Reload...]

With one of my previous employers I always pushed them to buy Epson printers. Until I took over their IT they used to buy cheap Samsung and Lexmark. We'd get maybe about 6 months out of them then they'd pack up.lol Basic Epson inkjets for the till computers to print finance agreements, mono laser-jet for the offices and I had a colour laser for my work PC as I did all the posters, tickets and adverts. Epson are a little more expensive but solid build. They are like the Duracell bunnies of printers.lol From when I took over IT to the company going under we had to replace 2 of the basic printers out of 24 and that was nearly 5yrs.

It's been a while since I've had a home printer on the go. Until recently I used to use works printer if I ever needed one. Printer I have now is an old Epson RX500 series photo lab...thing. As a scanner it is still very good. As a printer it hasn't worked for ages.lol It was a monster in regards to ink but the prints it could do was impressive.

 

[StephF]

I have a colour laser by Brother. Its great, works on both Windows and Linux
Only cost me £ 99 from Staples

 

[The Penguin]

I have a Office Jet 8610. I like it as it have individual ink departments, and it uses ink very efficiently. I like it print double sided and there a feeder that will scan documents.

 

[The Penguin]

Not that I notice though it been a long time since I printed something.

 

[zurb]

If you're printing a lot of drafts, you might want to see if your driver has an 'ink saving' or 'draft' mode. It will look a bit washed out as it uses less ink, but will still be quite useable for marking up.
If you are using MS Word with this feature, you might also find it repaginates - but if you have a well set up template, that shouldn't cause problems.

 

[nowwhat]

A few years ago we sprung for a small office color laser. HPMD451dn, I believe. It was pricey, but one of the best computer purchases we've ever made. With two kids in a very homework-heavy private school, and my wife having to print a lot for work, it has given us zero problems and made things easy for us.

 

[nowwhat]

RE: the one we bought, no special paper is needed, and relative to inkjet consumables, costs are no worse, actually better. Also, if you don't use your laser for a while, it doesn't plug up and become a large paperweight like inkjets tend to do.

 

[Judge]

RE: the one we bought, no special paper is needed, and relative to inkjet consumables, costs are no worse, actually better.

The quality of output for that laser printer is only 600 DPI. Vastly inferior to inkjet printers that can output photographic quality at much higher resolutions. Contrast and sharpness also play a big role depending on the paper you use with an inkjet printer.

I use both an HP laser printer (600/1200 DPI) for non-critical business documents, and an HP inkjet printer (1200x2400 DPI) strictly for images.

Ultimately I suppose it just depends on how scrutinizing one chooses to be over the quality of imagery printed. And how much they're willing to pay to get the results they truly want. But I suspect few people will argue over the thriftiness of a laser printer in general. Amazing how far toner cartridges will go.

 

[zurb]

Umm, laser on plain paper will be much clearer than inkjet on plain paper. Inkjets are supposed to use special paper to prevent bleed, aid drying and protect the ink from fading. On plain paper with typical bleeding, there is probably no advantage to a high resolution inkjet.
Laser printers use toner that sits on the surface. It doesn't bleed, but is more prone to cracking or being scratched. You'll get a better result if you don't just use the cheapest paper (moisture content is the biggest issue), but it doesn't require the special coated papers of inkjets.
If you are using very cheap or textured papers, you might get a better result (but with less colour saturation) with an inkjet which can get down into the hollows.
Resolution is a funny thing. Same resolution on laser, inkjet and dyesub will all look different.
'Photographic quality' is a term I'm somewhat suspicious of. It gets used too often, and printers seldom measure up. But then my eyes are somewhat better than average too.
Regarding long term costs, traditionally inkjets make money on ink, lasers on initial purchase. You might find they even out over time, but I wouldn't be surprised if laser came out cheaper long term.

 

[Mr Allen]

I have a cheap HP Wireless USB Printer, in fact it's so cheap the Ink cartridges are more expensive than the actual Printer.