Looking for a new printer...

[GWarner]

I've had HP printers from all the way back to 1997 when I bought my first printer, an HP-855c. What a fine printer that was, in the six years I owned it, it never gave me a single problem, it just worked and worked well. But eventually age got to the rubber rollers and they could no longer grip paper like they used to. Eventually it got to the point that the rollers wond just spin and not pick up any paper, so I had to replace the printer.

My next printer was an HP Business Inkjet 1100d. I should have known something was up because the first two I brought home were defective or damaged. But the third one worked and it turned out to be almost as good as the 855c it replaced. But then came 64 bit Windows and then Windows Vista. While the printer models all around the 1100d were getting support for the new operating systems, the 1100d was abandonded and all of its owners were told that they have to buy new printers because there would be no 64 bit or Vista support for the 1100d.

I should have known better by now but replaced the perfectly working 1100d with yet another HP printer, the OfficeJet Pro 8000 and want a dismal failure it turned out to be. Yeah, it prints fast and its print quality was very nice but all too often you had to wait several minutes for it to finish "playing with itself" before it would start printing your document. And then today it broke after two years of very light use. (maybe twenty pages per month) It just stopped feeding paper, it just sat there making a clicking noise.

So now I'm in the market for a new printer and this time I'll take the hint and avoid HP and their products. Each new one that I've bought has not been as good a product as the one it replaced. Time to move on.

So.... Does anyone have any printer recomendations? I don't need anything fancy like photo printing nor anything designed for heavy workloads. I just want something that's well built, does a fair job, and is reasonably priced.

Time was HP generally meant quality products, now it seems that HP means junk...

[ts-soft]

I have used Epson, HP and Canon. The best comes from Canon. At moment i use a multifunction printer MP640.

Greetings - Thomas

[GWarner]

The best comes from Canon.

I have one of their cameras and am totally happy with it.

At moment i use a multifunction printer MP640.

I case it matters, I'm looking for a printer with no other functions.

[PureLust]

Because I also have a very low printing output at home, all my inkjet printers (lots of Canons (I loved Canon Printers in the past) and 3 HP-Multifunction Printers) in the past died after a few month or years, after I just had printed about 50-100 Pages.

So, around 3.5 years ago - after I switched from inkjets to a cheap Samsung Color-Laser and I'm still very happy with it.
These days the price for such a printer was around 270€ and I still have the first Toner in it and if I switch it on from time to time it prints fine.
No more fear that it has parched and the printhead has died.
Sure - if you want to print fotos, you can't compare the printouts with the ones from an inkjet - but for my purpose it's more than enough.

So, I never regret the change from an inkjet to a color-Laserprinter.


But if you want to stay with inkjets and are looking for a really robust and reliable Printer, I could recommend the one I've actually tested in my company.
If you are not scared to spend arround $370 for your new Printer, I could strongly recommend the Business-Printer B-310N from Epson.

I've already replaced 5 of our Laser-Printers with the B-310N (or B-510DN) to test if they are as good as expected.
Because of the great reliability, it's speed and cost-efficiency (and the good Business-Service from Epson) I will replace all other Printers with this one as well.
Further because of it's cheap consumable material (e.g. Ink) the B-310N saves us a lot of Money (we have quite a huge amount of printouts).

As you said - you don't have a high printing output, so you won't have such big cost saving as we will have.
But - nevertheless - if you are looking for an strongly reliable inkjet-Printer (with up to 5 Years of Warranty), and you don't get feared by it's price (which may be quite high for a 'normal consumer', but which is very low for a professional business-printer ), I could recommend the B-310N (or even the B-510DN with Duplex-Unit).

Greetz from Germany,
PL.

[GWarner]

So, around 3.5 years ago - after I switched from inkjets to a cheap Samsung Color-Laser and I'm still very happy with it.

Yeah, I have also considered lazer printers. Although the toner cartridges may cost significantly more than ink cartrihdes, I figure they will last a good long time. And that brings up another reason to quit using HP printers. HP puts a chip in each ink cartridge and when the date in the chip is reached printing stops and will not continue until after the cartridge is replaced. The "expired" cartridge could easily be full of perfectly good ink and yet you are forced to throw it away in order to resume printing. HP says it's to protect the print but I think it's just a gimmick to sell more ink cartridges.

Of course it wouldn't surprise me if other manufacturers were doing the same thing with their cartidges too and for the same reason...

[DarkDragon]

Well, laser printers are very dangerous and you may end up disabled. I don't know if a few hundered dollars are enough for you to make you sick.

[skywalk]

For personal use, color printing is not cost effective. You are "renting" the printer between cartridge refills. And low use is a killer to the mechanics. When I need color, I take a USB stick to a nearby Print Shop and get better photos than I could ever reproduce.

Instead I use a networked Brother(HL-5250DN, paid ~$200) laser printer I keep in the basement to limit exposure to toner outgassing.
It prints duplex and wakes on LAN for my rare printing needs.
LOL, I can't remember changing the toner cartridge and it's been over 4 years of mostly text printing.
Only thing I buy are reams of paper.

[GWarner]

Well, laser printers are very dangerous and you may end up disabled. I don't know if a few hundered dollars are enough for you to make you sick.

I have no idea what you are talking about. In my past life as a computer tech, I've repared many lazer printers and other than the obvious dangers of exposed electrical connections, the only other danger from the laser printer is the laser itself and allowing its light to enter your eye.

Anyway, I decided to check consumers union, an independant product testing organiization supported by membership dues that accepts no advertising or donations from companies. This gives them the freedome to trash a product if it deservec it.

Currently they list the Dell 1250c for $150 USD as the best color laser. And ironically list HP OfficeJet Pro 8000 as the best color inkjet, strangely this is the same printer that I hand just gotten rid of. Go figure!

When I need color, I take a USB stick to a nearby Print Shop and get better photos than I could ever reproduce.

I do the same thing too, for photos you jut can't the quality or cost per photo of a photo printing center.

[ts-soft]

the dust from toner is not more dangerous as smoking 100 cigarettes at day

[skywalk]

This very thorough link concludes minimal health risks from normal to light exposure of laser printer emissions.
Though it doesn't hurt to keep it tucked away.
http://www.technikwissen.de/gest/get_ar ... d%5D=30024

[skywalk]

the dust from toner is not more dangerous as smoking 100 cigarettes at day

LOL, does anybody know someone still alive who smokes 100 cigarettes a day?

[DarkDragon]

Well, laser printers are very dangerous and you may end up disabled. I don't know if a few hundered dollars are enough for you to make you sick.

I have no idea what you are talking about. In my past life as a computer tech, I've repared many lazer printers and other than the obvious dangers of exposed electrical connections, the only other danger from the laser printer is the laser itself and allowing its light to enter your eye.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=151HHgcV ... re=related
http://www.time.com/time/health/article ... 02,00.html

I've even seen a documentation where some people couldn't do anything else than just staying in their bed and the problems all started when they began using a laser printer.