[Janisum]

Currently I have a cheap HP-deskjet F4280 and it will print ok but I just don't feel the quality is good and the ink is so expensive!!! I'm wanting to buy a printer for general everyday printing of documents and some pictures. Since I will be doing alot of printing I need one that doesn't have such costly ink cartridges. I am not familiar with the different types of printers as I've always just had a inkjet all-in-one. I want to spend under $100. or alittle over if I can get by with that. Any ideas? Thanks kindly in advance...

[coastie65]

Hi. I have been using an HP PhotoSmart AIO C5180 since about May of '07 and it had done well for me. The print quality is good and I use it to print addresses on envelopes. I did thast at Christmas with some cards with Gift cards and printed the To: From: stuff on them in fancy fonts. The receivers of those things were impressed and wanted to know how I did it.

[LincolnSpector]

Janisum, on 29 December 2011 - 08:45 AM, said:

Currently I have a cheap HP-deskjet F4280 and it will print ok but I just don't feel the quality is good and the ink is so expensive!!! I'm wanting to buy a printer for general everyday printing of documents and some pictures. Since I will be doing alot of printing I need one that doesn't have such costly ink cartridges. I am not familiar with the different types of printers as I've always just had a inkjet all-in-one. I want to spend under $100. or alittle over if I can get by with that. Any ideas? Thanks kindly in advance...

If there's an inkjet printer without costly cartridges, I haven't found it. And it certainly wouldn't sell for under $100. Manufacturers sell inkjet printers at a loss because the profits for selling ink are so huge.

Here's what I do, although the initial expense is considerably higher than $100:

I have two printers--a b&w laser and a color inkjet. Although lasers are initially more expensive, they're much cheaper by the page, because the toner cartridges can last for years. We use the laser for everything that doesn't require color--the vast majority of what we print. We only use the inkjet when necessary. In the long run, that saves us money.

Lincoln

[compnovo]

We're doing the same thing at home that Lincoln is describing. Last year I bought a used HP Laserjet 1320tn, a two-tray printer that can be networked to all our PCs in the house. My wife and I use it almost exclusively and I buy reconditioned cartridges from Amazon vendors (haven't had any problems). If she needs something in color or we need to copy/scan/fax then we use the Canon MX330 multi-function printer attached to her PC via USB. If you stay with an inkjet I highly recommend the Canon MFPs. The ink isn't cheap but they do a terrific job for the price.

This post has been edited by compnovo: 29 December 2011 - 09:37 AM

[LiveBrianD]

LincolnSpector, on 29 December 2011 - 09:10 AM, said:

I have two printers--a b&w laser and a color inkjet. Although lasers are initially more expensive, they're much cheaper by the page, because the toner cartridges can last for years. We use the laser for everything that doesn't require color--the vast majority of what we print. We only use the inkjet when necessary. In the long run, that saves us money.

What I've found is that lasers are cheaper if you print a lot and text quality is better, but they suck at images. I have a color laser duplex (Brother) and images aren't very good. Inkjets print images well, but the text is a bit blurry, and the ink is expensive. What I did before is I had a b/w canon laser and an epson inkjet for photos. Eventually, we had to replace the canon (from ~2002) because they didn't release any 64-bit drivers, so we bought a Brother color duplex laser. (btw, the epson, from 2000 or so, works without me manually loading a driver on everything from W2K to Win7 64-bit) Nowadays, my family doesn't really print photos at home (but my mom prints some things in color for work at times), and we use things like the CVS photo printing service for that (we don't print often though).

This post has been edited by LiveBrianD: 29 December 2011 - 12:08 PM

[coastie65]

I do run my own Pics at times, and that can get a bit pricey as far as the ink goes ( the color cartridges are $9.95 apiece for the std ones; a little more for the extended ones ). Black ink is just downright pricey period at $19.95 per cartridge.

[mjd420nova]

I like the laserjet units for just black or grey scale prints. Cheapest price per page. Sizes vary but have become pretty small and can handle some huge jobs with ease. I still have an old LJ series two that uses an ASCII interface to an IBM AT running my home security system. It gets turned on once a week for a printout (7 to 8 pages) of a fault codes. It has been doing that for 25 years. Only used two toner cartridges. Toner carts will be the biggest consumable costs.

[WinfieldZenith]

It is important to choose a right printer that has good quality prints. I think you should buy a personal laser printer for fast, quality text and graphics.

[axe40]

WinfieldZenith, on 27 February 2012 - 06:14 AM, said:

It is important to choose a right printer that has good quality prints. I think you should buy a personal laser printer for fast, quality text and graphics.

I got a similar HP 4200 printer that i bought it for $90.One thing i don't like about the printer is that the ink gets finish quicker than i thought and that makes me to be very uncomfortable.