Anyone know anything about printers?

[DeeFrag]

I figure going 3 years without a printer at home is about enough. I was thinking about getting a reasonable photo printer that can also do some light document printing (no mini 4 x 6 printers).

I've been out of the loop RErinters for quite a while. All I know about printers these days is the printers are relatively cheap, ink cartridges are rip-offs.

I've heard Epsons are great photo printers but they waste a ton of ink on cleaning cycles, and epsons do a lot of cleaning cycles. I had an HP Deskjet before, still working and it's about 10 years old now except it's 1700 miles north of me with my family.

I don't care about price as long as the cost can be justified.

Any suggestions from personal experience would be greatly appreciated.

 

[OPUS1]

I'm using an Epson for foto and docs. Works great on both.
I leave it off all the time except when I know I will do printing(cuts down on the cleaning)
Also setting the quality levels of printing help save ink. Agreed the cardtridges are a rip.
Heard good things about Canon also.

 

[Laforge]

I figure going 3 years without a printer at home is about enough. I was thinking about getting a reasonable photo printer that can also do some light document printing (no mini 4 x 6 printers).

I've been out of the loop RErinters for quite a while. All I know about printers these days is the printers are relatively cheap, ink cartridges are rip-offs.

I've heard Epsons are great photo printers but they waste a ton of ink on cleaning cycles, and epsons do a lot of cleaning cycles. I had an HP Deskjet before, still working and it's about 10 years old now except it's 1700 miles north of me with my family.

I don't care about price as long as the cost can be justified.

Any suggestions from personal experience would be greatly appreciated.

Well, I tell all of my customers to buy color lasers nowadays. The signifigantly reduced costs of printing justifies the higher initial cost..

What am I talking about?

Well..Color inkjet cartridges such as the ones for HP's $150 7550 color printer cost $20 a piece, and yield about 300 pages.

Conversely.. The 4500 Page yield of my toner cartridges for my minolta 2300DL cost around $100 each.

15x the page capacity, for 5x the price

Conversely..my ink costs 1/3 as the ink for that hp printer.
Cost of replacing all 4 ink cartridges if you print, say, 10,000 pages, and you've gotten a 100% even depletion rate across all 4 colors [c,m,y,k]

$750

Same cost for the toner on my laser?

Well, guess what.. You won't HAVE to have replaced it yet.

SO.. 0

In addition to that, lasers print faster, [the hp inkjet says you can have a 4x6 image in as little as 36 seconds! woohoo! -- Feel that speed! j/k ]

My printer prints at 21PPM, and that's not BS. -- That is, once the data is parsed, anyhow

Additionally, my laser already HAS a network port on it, so I just plug it into my router. - No need for extra usb cables, and it doesn't need to be shared in windows. Lastly, since it's a TCP/IP printer, I can even use Cupps printing in linux on it.

Best feature yet, is that it has it's own web server for it's status info.

Now.. Keep in mind that the cost of ownership is based on if you BELIEVE hp and konica, but, I would say that they "both exaggerate equally".. that 300 page ink cartridge probably gives a lot more like 100 page yield.. My 4500 page toner probably gives more around 1500..

That only increases how fast the lasers pay for themselves

 

[DeeFrag]

RE: Color lasers

I took a glance at a couple of those online but how's the image quality on them for photos, are they nearly as good as a 6 or 7 color inkjet? or even a 3 color inkjet?

Since I mainly print documents out at work, I would mainly need the printer for photos so photo print quality would be the first priority.

I agree cost per page of lasers is far better than inkjets which is why if the need to print a lot of documents at home comes up, I'll just pick up a b/w laser, maybe color if necessary.

btw, thanks for the suggestions so far.

 

[Mr_Evil]

I took a peek at a sample print from a Konica Minolta Color laser at Office Depot the other night...OMFG! It was an amazingly vibrant print that showed cans of different colors of paint. Even the polished exterior of the cans came out looking awesome....of course the DPI isn't quite as high as an Inkjet, but I'd rather have the cheaper to operate laser printer, plus when a laser breaks it's worth the money to repair them.

 

[Tiny]

I have the Epson R300M, and have had it since it came out.

It does great on photos, but I wish it had the crispness on text that my old HP did. It does well on the text, but it doesn't "pop" like it did on my old HP.

Also, a bonus, it prints on ink-jet printable cds and dvds. Very nice job there as well. The R300 has built in card slots as well. In fact I would just take a look around the Epson Rseries, they go from R200 and up.

As for carts, yeah they are a ripoff, but I used generics in my Epson that are aproved for the Epson R300M. Not once have I had a problem with the generic carts and I have used around 45 sets (yes I do a lot of printing).

 

[RandysWay]

I own a Xerox Phaser 6250 laser, and I'll tell you that I'll never buy an inkjet again. Ever. Prints amazing photographs and the best part is that when I print out 500 pages of photos at a time, every single one is constant color.

 

[Laforge]

RE: Color lasers

I took a glance at a couple of those online but how's the image quality on them for photos, are they nearly as good as a 6 or 7 color inkjet? or even a 3 color inkjet?

Since I mainly print documents out at work, I would mainly need the printer for photos so photo print quality would be the first priority.

I agree cost per page of lasers is far better than inkjets which is why if the need to print a lot of documents at home comes up, I'll just pick up a b/w laser, maybe color if necessary.

btw, thanks for the suggestions so far.

One thing to consider is that optimal print quality is only acheived with the right paper.. but, that being said, My opinion is that a 1200DPI laser can far outperform a 4800 dpi inkjet.. I don't care how many ink cartridges it uses. Here's the thing.. monitors are only really "RGB" if you think about it. and that produces quite realistic imagery, wouldn't you say?

 

[Laforge]

I took a peek at a sample print from a Konica Minolta Color laser at Office Depot the other night...OMFG! It was an amazingly vibrant print that showed cans of different colors of paint. Even the polished exterior of the cans came out looking awesome....of course the DPI isn't quite as high as an Inkjet, but I'd rather have the cheaper to operate laser printer, plus when a laser breaks it's worth the money to repair them.

My sentiments exactly

I now own not only a konica/minolta 2300DL, but a samsung CLP-500n [duplexing printer]
which makes things even NICER as I only use 1/2 as much paper!

 

[DeeFrag]

My sentiments exactly

I now own not only a konica/minolta 2300DL, but a samsung CLP-500n [duplexing printer]
which makes things even NICER as I only use 1/2 as much paper!

Hey Laforge, of your two color lasers, which would you say has the better photo image quality? Newegg has them both for a bit over $400 after a $150 MIR on the Konica.

The Xerox is kinda steep for home use at $1800 The max. duty cycle of 100,000 pages per month is a little excessive. I'll probably use about 25. lol

Might go for one of Laforge's recommendations after I do a little more research.

Thanks again for all the great info.

 

[DeeFrag]

Found the Samsung 500N on buy.com for $350.

Might order that one.

 

[Laforge]

Hey Laforge, of your two color lasers, which would you say has the better photo image quality? Newegg has them both for a bit over $400 after a $150 MIR on the Konica.

The Xerox is kinda steep for home use at $1800 The max. duty cycle of 100,000 pages per month is a little excessive. I'll probably use about 25. lol

Might go for one of Laforge's recommendations after I do a little more research.

Thanks again for all the great info.

I personally think the 2300DL offers slightly better printing, but! ... the duplexing of my samsung makes it a nicer all around machine

The minolta 2300DL can do up to 2400 x 600 DPI...Where the Samsung is limited to 1200 x 1200 Dpi

Another bonus to the minolta, is it uses standard, every day, PC100 168pin ram [i've got a 256mb stick I've added to it, for 288Mb total system ram]

The samsung uses 100pin proprietary ram.. but, you can get it only for $149 for a 256mb module [even though samsung says it can only take a 128].. I got that module from cheapcomputer.com

All in all, my statement would be .. "I wish my konica had duplexing"

But, as I got my samsung for $226.40 !!!, (which is $100 less than the duplexing option for the minolta) i can't complain.

There are upgraded models to my 2 year old 2300DL.. You may want to look at some of them...

the 2350EN, and the 5430 DL, and the 2430 DL which can be ugpraded to 544mb, and has a front USB port for direct plugging in cameras, etc..
If you don't care about network ports, I believe that the only difference between the 2300DL and the 2300W is that the 2300W is a "windows printer"

ALso.. directly from konicaminolta, the 2300DL is $399, and NO mail-in rebate required!

and $349 at pagecomputers.com

 

[burningrave101]

I would pick up a nice All-in-One printer from Staples or Office Max with rebates if i were you. It doesn't make much sense to spend $400 on a printer unless your planning to do ALOT of printing and very few home users do. An All-in-One can print, scan, copy and most of them have fax capabilities as well.

Canon, HP, and Epson are the three brands i'd stick with. Lexmark are pretty much crap. HP is likely the best but their ink cartriges are very expensive. Epson is one of the best for photo quality. Canon has excellent customer service, cheap ink cartriges and their printers are good quality for a lesser price.

I have the Canon MP390 that i got from Staples for $110. I missed the $50 MIR they had on their All-in-One's the week after my purchase but i still got it for less then other retailers have it for because of a $30 off $150 coupon and i pricematched with Amazon.com for another $12 off. The black ink tank runs around $6-$7 and the color is around $18.

If you want top photo quality then i would get something like an Epson RX500. Staples just had it on sale with several MIR's as well.

I dont print a ton of stuff so for someone like me a laser jet would be a complete waste of money.

 

[Laforge]

I would pick up a nice All-in-One printer from Staples or Office Max with rebates if i were you. It doesn't make much sense to spend $400 on a printer unless your planning to do ALOT of printing and very few home users do. An All-in-One can print, scan, copy and most of them have fax capabilities as well.

Canon, HP, and Epson are the three brands i'd stick with. Lexmark are pretty much crap. HP is likely the best but their ink cartriges are very expensive. Epson is one of the best for photo quality. Canon has excellent customer service, cheap ink cartriges and their printers are good quality for a lesser price.

I have the Canon MP390 that i got from Staples for $110. I missed the $50 MIR they had on their All-in-One's the week after my purchase but i still got it for less then other retailers have it for because of a $30 off $150 coupon and i pricematched with Amazon.com for another $12 off. The black ink tank runs around $6-$7 and the color is around $18.

If you want top photo quality then i would get something like an Epson RX500. Staples just had it on sale with several MIR's as well.

I dont print a ton of stuff so for someone like me a laser jet would be a complete waste of money.

All in one printers are a fools choice

What are you paying for with an all-in-one

A subpar scanner, that if that, completely seperate part breaks, you'll have to buy another scanner.
A fax machine that you don't need, since your computer can already send and receive faxes anyhow
and usually, a sub par PRINTER, too.

If you need a scanner, fax, and printer, buy a scanner, fax, and printer

 

[OPUS1]

INkjet printer heads have become pretty much generic at a given price point and within brand names.
Your all in 1's have the same heads as a comparable stand alone.
While I buy seperate stuff , the price of all in 1's it's pretty darn good.

 

[burningrave101]

All in one printers are a fools choice

What are you paying for with an all-in-one

A subpar scanner, that if that, completely seperate part breaks, you'll have to buy another scanner.
A fax machine that you don't need, since your computer can already send and receive faxes anyhow
and usually, a sub par PRINTER, too.

If you need a scanner, fax, and printer, buy a scanner, fax, and printer

Who wants to go out and buy all of those individually when you can get them in an All-in-One? Not everyone has the money to blow on $400 printers along with an individual scanner and a copier. And for the home user that prints out three or four dozen documents a month tops and scans three or four things it would be EXTREMELY pointless to take your route.

If i was setting up a home business then that would be a good suggestion. For a home user on any kind of realistic budget its not.

And if you will check reviews for the AIO models like the Epson RX500 and Canon MP390 you'll see almost nothing but perfect scores and 5 star votes from more then satisfied customers.

Not everyone needs a printer/scanner/copier that works on a professional level lol.

Staples is running deals on printers all the time and is probably the best place you can order one because they have free shipping and you can return the printer for any reason and return shipping is also covered by Staples.

 

[Kevin003]

Surprisingly my dell photo printer is working at 100% and has not failed me yet. One of the first dell products that i have owned that has not crapped on me. Decent quality printer if you ask me, but others may think likewise.

 

[Laforge]

Who wants to go out and buy all of those individually when you can get them in an All-in-One? Not everyone has the money to blow on $400 printers along with an individual scanner and a copier.

You don't NEED a copier if you have a scanner and a printer.
You don't need a FAX machine if you have a scanner and a FAX MODEM

All you need, is a $50 scanner
a $5-$10 modem
and whatever PRINTER you would like.
todays $50 scanners (usb) are more than enough, and if they break, they are disposable.
If your scanner element in your $300 all-in-one breaks, you're SOL.

 

[Laforge]

Surprisingly my dell photo printer is working at 100% and has not failed me yet. One of the first dell products that i have owned that has not crapped on me. Decent quality printer if you ask me, but others may think likewise.

That printer is made by lexmark, unfortunately.

Lexmark has such a vested interest in the business model of "printers for cost, ink for a fortune" that whenever any company tries to make generic cartridges for their printers, they sue them. Lexmark has even taken to putting "hardware authentication" technology into their printers so that you CAN'T buy a generic cartridge (doesn't stop someone from injecting ink.. but I think they're working on that, too..)

 

[burningrave101]

You don't NEED a copier if you have a scanner and a printer.
You don't need a FAX machine if you have a scanner and a FAX MODEM

All you need, is a $50 scanner
a $5-$10 modem
and whatever PRINTER you would like.
todays $50 scanners (usb) are more than enough, and if they break, they are disposable.
If your scanner element in your $300 all-in-one breaks, you're SOL.

You can get a good All-in-One for around $150. I got my Canon MP390 for only $110 and i could of gotten it for $60 if i would of caught the $50 MIR rebate that showed up for it the next week at Staples.

http://consumer.usa.canon.com/ir/controller?act=ModelDetailAct&fcategoryid=123&modelid=9722

The Epson RX500 was going for around $70 or less AR at Staples and its a $200+ All-in-One. Its based off the Epson Photo Stylus series printers that print very good quality photo's.

The scanners and copiers that are equiped on these All-in-Ones are as good as any scanner or copier you'll get for $50.

If you care anything about desktop space an All-in-One would take up less room then a printer AND a scanner.

 

[=lks= ka druma]

I work in commercial photography. Use epsons from 2200 to r800. Just bought a r200 for 99.00 for my home. It blows the socks off of my now defunct 1270(399.00). It costs a 4th less, uses less ink is 1/2 as loud and 3 times as fast. I love it.

Downsides. It is only usb 1.1 ( only this model). I figure it can only print on 8.5x11 paper so a 8.5x11 jpg @ 300dpi is aprox. 18-30 mb's , i can wait the 2 to 3 secs to spool.

The R800 is printing @ 1.5 picolitres. Its tech should be replacing the 2200's. At least thats what i heard thru the grapevine.

LKS

 

[DeeFrag]

Thanks all for the suggestions. Didn't want this to turn into a flame thread so please keep it clean, everyone has their opinions.

I am leaning towards the laser option because even if I purchased a photo inkjet, I was planning on picking up a b/w laser in the future for b/w document printing. I may not print much now but that might change in the future. I also don't need a fax machine since I have no active phone line, cell phone only. Even when I had an active phone line for ADSL before cable was available in my neighborhood, I never had a phone hooked up to it, just my computer. (Never had to deal with telemarketers that way )

So instead of spending $200 on a inkjet now and another $200 to $300 later for a b/w laser later, I would rather get a color laser for mid $300s, and save on the cost per page.

I agree that people who do not print much and with a tight budget, inkjets are probably the way to go, and if they are in the market for a scanner and fax as well, an all in one isn't a bad idea. But since all I need is a printer and price isn't really an issue to an extent, color lasers are quite an attractive buy.

Hell, I saw the Logitech MX1000 for $9 off so I ordered it to replace my dual optical mouse and since I was ordering stuff I also ordered a Samsung 910T monitor for some dual head lovin'. And a while ago I didn't like how my xbox looked on my 24" tv so I bought a Sony Wega 36" HDTV. LOL It's only money, I can always make more later.

 

[=lks= ka druma]

I bought a b+w laser last semester for my wife. She has a crap load of writing to do... Anyhow i bought an Hp laserjet 1012, best 149$. It does what we want it to do, text. They are normally 199, but it goes on sale pretty regularly. I highly recommend it, or at least looking at it.



LKS

 

[Buckus]

LOL It's only money, I can always make more later.

That's what I tell my wife, but she doesn't buy it. Then I go spend the money anyways