Printers

[Yeah_Baby]

Oh wise CP brain trust, I a printer. Recommendations? Thoughts? Horror stories of how printers are almost disposable and the ink cartridges are over priced?

Discuss.

[gottabekd]

If you don't care about colour, buy the cheapest laser printer you can get. There is something so satisfying about how when you hit print, it Just Works.

EDIT

I see colour laser printers are in the ~$150 range. Does anyone know if they are any good?

[photon]

Yeah without colour an inexpensive laser is great, and probably the cheapest of all the options.

[Yeah_Baby]

I care about colour.

[ken0042]

Then get a colour laser printer then. As said cheap ones can often be under $200. As KD said, it's nice to not have to screw around with a printer anymore.

We got a monochrome laser printer last summer, and the gf didn't like the idea of not having colour. Turn out she now likes the fact that we can print out forms and stuff and have it look professional better than printing colour. And the few times we need colour I can just do it at work. I mean, take it to Staples. Yeah- take it to Staples.

(To be honest- Staples only charges 50¢ per colour print, and the 2 times per year I need colour it isn't that much of a pain.)

[photon]

I'm considering a colour laser since my kid is getting into school age, and having reports and assignments in colour would be cool.

The only downside to a colour laser is the cost.. while the printer is $200, the cost to replace all the cartridges might be double that. They last thousands or tens of thousands of pages, and the cost per page is getting pretty close to an inkjet, but still the sticker shock of paying $400 just to get all new toners is tough to swallow.

I'm trying to find a colour laser MFD that isn't super expensive but isn't an HP.. I'm done with HP and their crappy drivers. There's some out there but I'm not sure the quality is worth the expense yet.

[KTrain]

Don't worry about the price of the printer. Look at the price of replacement ink cartridges for that printer.

We bought a HP colour laser a few years back for around $450. When we needed to replace all four ink cartridges after a large print job we found out that each cartridge was $150. $600 to replace the ink. Not cool.

[photon]

Don't even worry about the cost of the ink cartridges though, look at the cost per page. I was looking at one printer where the cartridges were almost $200, so it'd be $1000 to replace them all. But I think each one did 15,000 pages so in the end the cost per page was lower than the colour laser with the $80 cartridges that only did 2500 pages.

[Yeah_Baby]

Anyone know anything about his bad boy?

[ken0042]

I have found that multi-function anything tends to not do any particular job very well.

And with all in one printer/scanner/coffee makers I have gone so far as to tell my family that if they buy one I will not support it.

[photon]

I don't know, the Officejet 7310 that I have right now is great, does everything quite well I think. I'd be satisfied with keeping it if the drivers weren't such a steaming pile. I doubt they'll even make Windows 7 drivers for it.

[DrJ]

I absolutely adore this printer.

http://www.canon.ca/english/index-pr...20&gid=2&ovr=1 (About $100 - On sale for 80ish occasionally)

I wanted a printer that would print, be easy on the ink and I didn't need a scanner or fax so this was perfect.

It automatically double sides, too. I pretty much print lecture notes and I go through about 3 stacks (1500 pages - probably closer to 2500 b/c of the double siding) of paper a year on one tank of each colour (I actually have colour ink left after the year). I just turn down the amount of ink the printer uses in the settings.

I also purchased a warranty b/c I had a friend who worked at Staples and he told me that when I run out of ink, just come in and say the printer is busted for w/e reason. You get a new printer (which has all the ink included) and you have the option of paying for a new warranty or just eating the $20 for ALL the ink and a new printer. Yes, a tad unethical, and yes a tad inconvenient, but to drop a couple of $100 on ink is just crazy. Tried it once it worked for me :P

[I_H8_Crawford]

Check out the HP OfficeJet Pro 8500 Wireless.

Get ~2200 pages out of the black cartridge (costs around $50)!

http://www.bestbuy.ca/catalog/prodde...67&catid=25113

It costs more than the cheaper colour laser printers, but is multifunction and gives better cost per page than lasers.

[alltherage]

I would highly recommend HP. They have better sealed cartridges so they dont dry out, they re-use ink used to wet print heads, so their more efficient, and they print friggin beauty photos.

Their ink is really inexpensive too.