If you’re OK with smaller prints then I’d recommend a small dye-sublimation printer like a Canon Selphy.
The quality is not as good as the very best inkjets but it’s good enough if you’re not exhibiting your photos.
The reliability though is amazing. I have an old Selphy printer from the 90s that still works perfectly from certain cameras. There’s nothing to dry out or spill.
It just works.
I have replaced it but only because the USB implementation seems too old to be recognised by many modern devices.
The Selphy I replaced it with I expect to run and run.
For everything else I use a Brother colour laser.
Canon, Epson or HP inkjets are a fool’s purchase. I’ve been that fool before, never again.
I had the opposite experience. My Canon ES1 Selphy died after not much use. Paper stopped feeding, sounded like grinding plastic gears.
Tried the recommended things to fix but couldn't fix. I liked the quality of the prints even if they were a bit pricey per print.
Upright design of ES1 didn't help, since the paper must do a 90 degree turn like it's performing a stunt! Just to reach the output tray. All in a creaking plastic box. I respect Canon cameras but not my old Selphy ES1. Sorry!
Got an Epson photo eco-tank and it's good. No stress about running out of ink. Nozzles haven't clogged and I like the quality, it is well made printer the Epson ecotank, at least the model I have.
Previous Epson printers - hated the cost of ink and clogged nozzles.
I wonder how much paper I need to go through to get myself an Epson end of life message! I doubt I will print/waste that much paper. Funny how some are concerned about the e-waste implications of printing a truck load of A4.
No need to apologise, it's useful to hear about another anecdata point (vs my own. :D )
I've only used the CP range of Selphy printers. These are flat, horizontal designs where the paper travels out one side and back again. They sound much simpler mechanically than a vertical machine.
I think I pay about £0.20 to £0.40 a photo (paper + ink) where as my local supermarket prints for about £0.07 each, so there are cheaper options but I'd bet still cheaper than buying and running a high end Epson inkjet.
I buy bulk paper+ink packs and print pretty rarely. Since it never goes off (I've used 20 year old stock before) it just sits in the box until the family comes round.
I'm glad you're getting good service from your inkjet but I'd never buy another one.
What I really hated about my Epson and Canon inkjets is the driver software. It's overly big and very rent seeky. It tries desperately to sell you stuff like ink, paper or photo storage, none of which is competitive price wise. On the Mac I needed third party software to remove it completely.
The experience soured me on both brands, (old Selphy printers excluded).
Recently bought an older Laserjet off CL. HL-4040CN.
The autofeed tray was broken, but the manual feed tray still worked.
A steal at $100 and cheaper, easier and more reliable even in the short run than trying to unclog the 2 inkjets my wife and I both brought to the marriage.
What do you mean 'a thing'? They're hugely popular in offices and increasingly in residential environments as people (very) slowly pick up on the offensive economics of feeding a bubblejet.
I picked up a Brother (L3510CDW) colour laser + scanner a few years ago. It was slightly more expensive than a bubblejet, but consumables and maintenance will mean TCO is way lower. Brother seem to have some of the better support for GNU/Linux & CUPS these days - this thing Just Worked (over the network, too) on Debian with I think one package from the standard repos.
Also, the printer from your childhood was limited to black and whatever colour paper you fed into it, not black and white.
I meant ‘are they being produced anymore’, ‘would you still recommend them’, etc.
>> Also, the printer from your childhood was limited to black and whatever colour paper you fed into it, not black and white.
I wouldn’t have known - it’s not exactly like I was the person purchasing the toner, and I was simply told by my Dad that it printed in black and white only.
At that age, I was just grateful to be able to print my Winnie-the-Pooh fan fiction. :P
Laser printers have been the most versatile B&W printing tech more or less since they were invented, and the best-looking for most of their existence.
For photo prints, you are far better off just paying per page for commercial products, though color lasers are pretty good for simple things like colored charts. A really good color printer costs a lot; it's far cheaper to rent the use of one when you need it.
I used an HP LaserJet 4+, upgraded to 4M+ by adding a PostScript board, and adding memory to get it into the 30-something MB range. That was 12 ppm printing speed. I replaced it with a much-lighter Brother HL-2140 (22 ppm) when I had owned it for about 10 years, during which I replaced the toner once. The Brother is now almost 10 years old, still working just fine, though I have replaced the toner twice.
I could replace it, but why? It still does what I bought it to do.
Fair enough. I'd looked at your profile and assumed you'd have come across plenty of laser printers at large orgs like LEGO & Universal Music. I guess the swathe of energetic replies to your first question have now convinced you, in any case.
It's a bit of a trope, people calling monochrome printers black & white -- they don't print the white areas, of course. Some light-yellow paper would have been appropriate for the fanfic. : )
IMO if you print only occasionally at home, laser printers are the way to go. No more frantically realizing that all my print heads are gummed up 2 days before taxes are due.
Laser printers are really bad in terms of energy use if you don't turn them off (the toner is kept warm at all times) and interior air pollution, two problems inkjet printers avoid entirely.
Yes, don't expect photo quality from them, but if you want some documents, or tickets or what ever in paper form they are perfect. And you don't need to care about drying up ink.
They're the best thing. They print at screaming high speed, with none of the problems of inkjets. Every inkjet printer I've ever owned has ultimately made me want to throw it in a wood chipper. I got a Brother HL-L2300D a couple years ago and have been thoroughly impressed, no wood chipper impulses so far.
I've had zero cases where I needed to print color. If I want to print photos I just order them at Shutterfly and pick them up in less than an hour at the Walgreens around the corner.
Yes. They can be purchased new with color or B&W. Old HPs from 20+ years ago are still running fine as well. Modern color lasers have the same problem as inkjets with tracking dots printed on every page so there is utility in keeping a B&W laser around.
I just bought a new Kyocera ECOSYS P2235dw laser printer. Still black and white, but I haven't had a paperjam yet, unlike my HP5600, which has a ceremonial paper jam every time it wakes from a deep sleep, or my old HP 1606n, which occasionally just couldn't print a particular PS or PDF. Didn't need Windows to get the Kyocera on my network, and they provided a .ppd that works with CUPS. Hasn't automatically upgraded itself over the network either.
Don't underestimate impact dot-matrix printers as well. They still have the lowest cost per page if you don't mind the rather sub-par quality and are printing a lot.
If you need a printer for documents, get something that runs on powder toner, like a color LED.
If you want to print photos, send out for it; it will be cheaper anyway.