Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire My wife needs a new printer

I despise computer printers. The ink costs to much and every time I buy a new cartridge the printer $hits the bed and dies. I'm done with it. I refuse to spend one more minute dealing with a non functioning printer. I do not want or need a new printer. My wife thinks she needs one. I only have one rule. No Hewlet Packard. No HP nothing. It has to be reasonably cheap but dependable and the ink cartridges need to have lots of ink and not cost and arm and a leg. Most of all my wife has to be able to use it. Any suggestions from the fire ??

kwg

There is another printer group from Epson that uses a different kind of ink cartridge. I can't recall much about it but it touted extra low ink cost.

Went through this a while back. Apparently, home printers are sold at a fraction of what it costs to build them. The manufacturers recoup that loss by selling the half empty ink cartridges. You can buy a high dollar printer that takes bulk ink. Price wise it's a wash for the casual home user. I ended up not buying a printer.

I "print" a lot of things to pdf files instead of paper and save them electronically, I rarely use our printer anymore. If our printer takes a dump I'll probably just pick up a cheap one at Walmart. The other option would be put the electronic files on a USB stick and print a few sheets off at work.

kwg020: Before you pick one answer these questions?

1) Do you need color or just black and white?
2) Do you print more than a few hundred pages a month?
3) Do you need it to fax?
4) Do you need it to scan or copy?
5) If yes to 3 and/or 4 would it be multiple pages?
6) Do you need to print on both sides of the paper?
7) Do you need wireless access?

Let us know and you'll get better suggestions.

Thanks - tnscouter

It's true; there is a HUGE markup on ink. I have my ink cartridges refilled at Costco at a considerable savings.

I have a couple of printers; a Canon and a Hewlett Packard. Both print fine but I find the Hewlet Packard less finicky and it has worked fine for probably 4 or 5 years now; maybe more. The irritating thing about the Hewlett Packard printer is that occasionally it sends popup to my computer wanting me to buy ink or telling me I don't have original factory ink cartridges installed (duh, I knew that). On the up side, when I've ordered ink from Hewlett Packard, I can have it on my porch with "free" shipping the next day.

As far as being able to print a lot with very few cartridge changes, a laser printer is hard to beat if you only need to do black and white printing.

On more pitch for Costco. If you by stuff from them and it doesn't work out, they are very good about giving you a refund.

Yeah, I know you said no HP.

Mine is an HP Office Jet Pro 8610 with copier, fax, etc. Pretty large black ink tank. Prints decent pics as well on photo paper.

The big thing with ink jet printers, is they need to be exercised regularly. Print a test page or something about once a month. Otherwise the ink will dry in the print head and plug it up. When that happens, it is cheaper to replace the printer than to have it repaired.

My present printer has the print heads in the ink cartridges, if I remember correctly. If one print head fails, I do not have to purchase a new printer.

I agree Idaho shooter about using the printer more often. She will go weeks without using it and she's upset when it won't print. Squidge says he puts his on a thumb drive and prints it at work. I do something similar. My wife does like to print pictures of the grand kids but she doesn't do it very often. Mostly she will copy and print the kids school pictures.

Any suggestions are welcome.

kwg

We don't fax tnscouter and we don't multi page. We do scan and copy.. We just don't do a lot of it.
kwg

My advice:

Print pictures at Walmart or Walgreens’s or similar. Upload from her phone, go pick the prints up an hour later. They’re setup for printing pics. It’s easy on their apps. Multiple size options etc.

For printing documents at home......I’ve never been happy with a printer after the initial purchase time period. Always eventual failure.

Epson ET-2720.

Without a hard copy the data could disappear forever. Electronics break and need power. Sometimes the format changes. Printers never you just fill the ink in the tank in the printer.

Several brand name printer manufacturers market models with refillable ink tanks nowadays that represent a substantial savings in ink cost over cartridges but the printers themselves cost a fair bit more than typical big box store bargain printers. If you need/want a printer that prints on both sides look one that says "Duplex".

As to reliability and lifespan I've gone through 4 printers in 4 different brands so far, most averaging about 2 years of service. The first was a entry level HP printer/scanner/copier. It was the simplest to operate of all and lasted the longest at 3 years.The scanner went out on it but the printer still worked.

Using a Cannon 3 way now I bought on sale for $19 at Walmart a couple of months back. Its already more than paid for itself printing out coupons. Each ink cartridge though cost more than the printer did.

I was constantly buying ink for my wife's color printer, finally I bought a Epson ecotank printer thru Costco came with two bottles of ink in each color and 3 black, cost more up front but have not purchased ink in 18 months and have only used less than half of what came with it.. I figure I have saved $200 so far and will save double that long term, it more than made up for the higher purchase price already.

I've got a Brother's Ink Jet printer sitting here on the desk, that has to be at least going on 20 years old, if not OVER 20 yrs old...

buy an ink cartridge for it about every 4 or 5 years... and they are refills so they don't cost that much. to operate.

I’ll second a Brother. I have had a MFC-8860DN for 15 years and it is still going strong. It will copy, print or fax but it is a black and white printer, no color. It is a small laser printer.

I have a Brother All in One laser printer. It has been excellent!

Fixing to upgrade to a Brother color laser All in One.


I'm DONE with the inkjet cartridge scam. Forever.

I'm looking at the Epson Eco-Tank models, but I prefer laser printers.

I bought a laser all in one last November. My ink would dry up between print jobs. I have used it more than I thought. I understand the higher cost, but it does not dry up.

Myself & several I work with all have Brother 6545/6945 all in ones which have been reliable & easy to use for going on 3 years. These models are larger all in ones that handler ledger sized paper but there are equivalents that handle letter size as maximum and are cheaper to boot. Ink tank life is excellent as well.