Printers?

[Dougal 165]

Hello folks, could do some advice regarding printers please?

 

Although I don't do a massive amount of printing, I seem to get through an excessive number of actual printers over a few years. I only use it for home printing - nothing heavy duty. I do use double sided for printing my addon aircraft manuals.

 

I've had 4 printers in the last 8 or 9 years. My latest, an HP Officejet Pro 8000. NOT a cheap device by any means. I'm guessing the reason for this is possibly using, or trying to use non-OEM ink. I think the price of genuine ink is one of the few legal methods of robbery! However, it seems it maybe possible I've shot myself in the foot doing that.

 

Questions:-

 

1) Is it reasonable to expect to get away with using either after market cartridges, or refilling with non OEM ink?

 

2) If yes to above, are any specific manufacturers or models better for using such inks etc?

 

I'd be grateful for any info or recommendations for my next printer.

[Krister 51]

Just a different view on it - have you considered getting a tablet instead (or also) for your flightsim needs? I used to print thousands and thousands of pages, especially manuals in A5 format, for my add-ons and Airport charts. After getting my iPad the few pages I print I do it at work. With the manuals on my iPad in PDF-format I have them readily availably wherever I am and have a few minutes over. They are searchable and can be marked up. For charts I use wonderful apps like FSKneeboard 2 or Circle to land where I have the latest charts immediately available. I also export my Topcat sheets or the flightplan sheet from Vroute to the iPad. I agree there is a special feeling to holding a paper though... Since you might be a PPL holder, the iPad works great in an real airplane too! And why doesn't "carriage return" work for me!?

[ryanbatc 12,812]

After getting my iPad the few pages I print I do it at work. With the manuals on my iPad in PDF-format

 

Not to hijack this post but what app are you using? I've got my iPhone and the default pdf reader doesn't seem to have a search function.

[Krister 51]

Goodreader! There are also other very nice pdf-readers like iAnnotate which is stronger on the markup side. But If I could have only five apps installed on my iPad, Goodreader would be one of them!

[meshman 109]

I gave up ink jet printers a long time ago, as the cost of per page printing is rather high. Instead I've gone to personal laser printers. I consider them disposable commodities, in that if I start to have a problem I find a new, inexpensive one to replace it.

 

I can survive without printing in color and if I so wanted, can get a duplex model and also have wi-fi capabilities. Going from $.10+ per page down to $.02 per page adds up over time. I also would point out that I have the printer plugged into it's own wall outlet, as when they power on and print it can draw a little extra juice. But seeing 20 pages per minute spit out of the thing is worth any of it's other drawbacks. Toner (OEM) can be pricey and I have tried third party toner cartridges, but have reverted back to OEM mainly for piece of mind.

 

I had a little Samsung laser that worked just great. Then one day I attacked it with some compressed air to clean out some dust and something went haywire with it. Off to Newegg I went and got a replacement. But that Samsung was well worth the $49.99 I paid for it during one of Newegg's sales.

[ryanbatc 12,812]

Goodreader! There are also other very nice pdf-readers like iAnnotate which is stronger on the markup side. But If I could have only five apps installed on my iPad, Goodreader would be one of them!

 

Oh-oh. The $4.99 price tag goes against my "Max I pay is 99 cents for iphone apps." Is it reallllllllly good?

[Krister 51]

 

 

Oh-oh. The $4.99 price tag goes against my "Max I pay is 99 cents for iphone apps." Is it reallllllllly good?

LOL yeah, absolutely worth it. It's funny though with these apps and their prices. I can buy a flightsim add-on at 25 € just to try it out and I may never use it again and ir doesn't bother me the slightest. But if an app costs more than 20 € you expect something corresponding to Microsoft Office with Adobe Master suite thrown in for good measure!

[ryanbatc 12,812]

I suppose if I had an iPad I'd think more about that pdf reader.... but I usually pull up my ATC and pilot pubs on my iphone, and it's only a few times a week.

 

Ok, no more hijacking from me oops!

[Dougal 165]

Having recently re aquired a long lost daughter from 27 years ago, and so several new grand children, there's also a need for photo printing;-) Without spending a small fortune, I think that puts a laser printer beyond my reach.

[ryanbatc 12,812]

In the past we've owned HP. I liked the low cost but we use OEM ink and over time the ink heads became clogged. I can't prove that's what happened to yours but that's what happened to mine.

 

At the moment I've got a Canon MG5220. It's a year or 2 old now but works fine. It hogs ink from what I can tell. Even if you print in grayscale they say some color ink comes out unless you go deep into the advanced settings and disable that (which I finally did). It almost feels like it eats ink even when the printer is idle. We don't print a lot (some color photos, but mostly documents), yet the ink levels keep dropping lol. It's supposed to do wireless printing but I could never get that to work. It seems if my PC is off, and my wife wants to print from her laptop, it just won't work. I'm not a networking guru but canon says it should work in correspondence I had with them. I spent maybe 150 on it?

 

I went to Newegg and selected inkjet printers (MFC)... sorted by best rating... if you're interested. It seems Brother makes a good product. I know they make sewing machines as well. My wife had a hand me down that lasted a long time... doesn't mean their printers are good though lol

http://www.newegg.co...ne&Order=RATING

 

I'd also check out Amazon reviews and other tech sites. Canon's usually get high ratings as well. The one I have has over 5000+ reivews @ Amazon (4/5 stars)

[Krister 51]

I have an Epson Stylus Photo PX730WD that I bought mainly for printing the odd photo and some scanning. It also supports Airprint and Google cloud print which I find quite handy. Overall a very good printer but I just purchased it so I don't know about the running costs.

 

I don't have experience of color lasers in any higher price range than 5-6000 EUR but they really aren't suited for photo printing. My low cost HP2600n looks outright bad also with premium paper sheets.

[n4gix 4,947]

I had a little Samsung laser that worked just great. Then one day I attacked it with some compressed air to clean out some dust and something went haywire with it. Off to Newegg I went and got a replacement. But that Samsung was well worth the $49.99 I paid for it during one of Newegg's sales.

Your Samsung is likely the same (or similar) to the one I bought for $89 from Tiger Direct a year or so ago. The toner replacement package is ~$149, but so far I've not come close to exhausting the toner that came with it.

 

I never could get the WiFi connection to remain reliable, so finally resorted to using a Cat5 cable plugged into my network hub. I can print anything from any device on my network, including my Android tablet and laptop computer.

 

I don't print many picture, but the few I have printed (on photo quality paper) have been excellent!

[meshman 109]

Your Samsung is likely the same (or similar) to the one I bought for $89 from Tiger Direct a year or so ago. The toner replacement package is ~$149, but so far I've not come close to exhausting the toner that came with it.

 

I purchased the Samsung a long time ago, four or five years? Maybe more? But it served it's purpose nicely, until the canned air fouled it up... Then I got a refurbished Brother for $50, IIRC. Don't have a need for wi-fi, nor really duplex as printer paper is cheap at Wally World or Staples, etc. But it is nice to get a fairly fast PPM and realize it's not costing and arm and a leg to do it.

 

Dougal mentions having the need to print some photos and I would suggest that with the $$$ saved by using a personal laser, as in $.02 per page vs. $.10 - $.20 per page, the savings would allow for a dedicated photo printer to be used for those important printouts where quality matters. Or if there are not that many pictures to print out in high quality, I'd think about using an on-line service that does the printing and mails them to you.

[cmeeks 8]

I'm on the fence on this one recently. In the past I've been a strong supporter of owning a black/white laser printer at home and leaving the photo printing to a professional camera shop. Now that my wife and I are both out of school and much less reliant on the printer for printing reams at a time, I really wouldn't mind having a do-it-all multi-function color laser.

 

With that said, I can't speak highly enough of Samsung. Partially because HP ticked me off with their refusal to provide W7 drivers for their ubiquitous 1012 series laser printers, but more so because my wife and I had an ML-1851ND through grad school and it has been and continues to be completely flawless!

 

At the end of the day, take your best photos to a professional to be printed. I mean a real professional - not Walgreens or CVS. You will be thrilled with the quality!

[PieEater 10]

Hello folks, could do some advice regarding printers please?

 

Although I don't do a massive amount of printing, I seem to get through an excessive number of actual printers over a few years. I only use it for home printing - nothing heavy duty. I do use double sided for printing my addon aircraft manuals.

 

I've had 4 printers in the last 8 or 9 years. My latest, an HP Officejet Pro 8000. NOT a cheap device by any means. I'm guessing the reason for this is possibly using, or trying to use non-OEM ink. I think the price of genuine ink is one of the few legal methods of robbery! However, it seems it maybe possible I've shot myself in the foot doing that.

 

Questions:-

 

1) Is it reasonable to expect to get away with using either after market cartridges, or refilling with non OEM ink?

 

2) If yes to above, are any specific manufacturers or models better for using such inks etc?

 

I'd be grateful for any info or recommendations for my next printer.

 

From my research into this subject, there are 2 main types of inkjet printer;

 

1) Those that have the print heads inbuilt into the printer e.g. Canon, Epson Kodak, because of the extra hardware these printers are more expensive to buy initially. Though because the replacement ink cartridges are are just ink tanks they are generally much cheaper. However if you dont use the printer regularly and a printhead becomes clogged it may be an expensive fix.

 

2) Those that have the print heads inbuilt into the cartridges - HP, Dell, Lexmark. These printers are cheaper to buy initially as they do not have the printheads inbuilt instead the cartridges have integral printheads and so are more expensive to replace. If a printhead becomes blocked then replacing the cartridge will generally resolve this.

 

If you want to use 3rd party inks then I would suggest looking at the printers that dont have fixed printheads (HP etc) because if you run into any problems a new cartridge should resolve the issue.

 

Personally I have a canon printer (MG6150) which does everything I need it to. I do use genuine inks and proper photo paper (ilford) on the basis that sometimes quality is worth paying that bit extra for, plus I've written off a printer (Cannon) through using cheap replacement ink.