Do you have a printer???

"I had one but it’s not working out of nowhere." That's usually the thing with printers. Just so they can get more money out of you

I haven’t had a need to print anything for years.

Buy a laser printer. Buy a new, extended use toner cartridge. Don’t just use the one that comes with the printer. You’ll forget you ever had printer problems, and the expense isn’t much more than an inkjet and the multitudes of replacement cartridges they require. Even if you buy a color laser printer, it’s worth the initial cost.

This belongs on the underwhelmed-pumpkin spice limited edition thread.

I've had the same one for years - printer/copier/scanner. HP ENVY 5530.

Yes I have a printer/scanner I primarily use for work when I work from home. Also gets use as I volunteer for a local civic association. Its a canon model that's a few years old. Ink is ridiculously expensive but I avoid color printing, just black ink mostly. I like the convenience. I have a friend who borrows it occasionally but she uses a staples store for printing as well.

Got a small laser when I started working from home during the pandemic.

Still working from home. I have printed less than 50 pages in that 2.5 years.

Yes. I'm not a savage.

Plus I return to Amazon all the time and need to print the return labels at least once a week.

[quote] If not, how do you print when needed?

Public library or the UPS Store.

R8 this is exactly why I want to buy a new printer. I needed to print a return label and the printer wasn’t working. I went to the doorman and asked if he could print it and he said to get something printed I need to email it to the office and he will print it and leave it with the doorman for me to get. Really fucking excessive. I did it though.

And you can scan your Amazon return labels when you do returns at UPS stores.

R9 yes! I forgot I can print at the UPS store. I live around the corner from one too

If you have access to a printer from work, use that. (Just don't do what my idiot supervisor did in the past - printed out her DUI from the Division of Motor Vehicles and left in the printer tray so everyone could take a look at it. Also did the same with her husbands medical records when he was applying for rehab).

Otherwise, libraries (including college libraries if you have one near you) and UPS stores are rather affordable.

I have a small-ish HP laser (B&W) printer. It is reliable. Yes, the toner cartridges are expensive. Mine are about $80 each. Depending on how much you use it, it should last for a long time.

I bought a Brother b/w laser printer because it was a pain to get dressed (!) and go to the public library or UPS. The toner cartridge lasts forever, doesn’t get gummed up if you don’t use it for months. If I need a color photocopy, I do get dressed and go to UPS.

I didn’t and used to print at work. Once COVID happened I got one of those combination printer/scanner/fax machines for my home.

A printer/scanner is great because having a scanner is useful for digitizing old photos and the like, even if you don't print much. Pretty sure all modern printers are scanners too.

Buy Epson inkjet ecotank printer with separate 6-color ink tanks. Very economical and efficient. And they don't print tracking dots on your documents either, so you can print and send hate mails to whomever you want.

I was on the HP Ink Club or whatever they call it. They tier their pricing (i.e., 10 pages per month is 99 cents or 700 copies per month is whatever it is). They send you new ink cartridges before you run out of ink. I found myself printing MAYBE five pages every two months so I stopped throwing money out the window and canceled. I was PISSED knowing I was paying for (I think it was) 20 copies per month, but only printed 2-5 pages (at most) a month. Those motherfuckers, as soon as you cancel the membership, stop your ink cartridges from printing. I did the math and could have bought 3 black and 3 color ink cartridges from the store for what I was throwing away with my subscription. HP is a shitty company.

Do you live near a Kohl’s store? You can take any Amazon returns there and you literally just hand it to them. Doesn’t need to be wrapped or in a package, and no labels need to be printed.

Another vote for laser printers here! Unless you need other functions just keep it simple, with light use the toner lasts so long and you can take it out and jiggle the toner around a little to get more life out of it. Get a refurbished cartridge when you finally run out for a little cheaper, you won't know the difference. If you've only had inkjets and such you will enjoy the quality of the product too, it's just that much more polished looking than even a good inkjet good produce. I still don't use it much but I found some uses I enjoyed that I wouldn't have played around with because inkjet cartridges are so overpriced and run out so fast. The cost-per-copy with a laser is significantly less, and it looks practically printed.

I still use a Brother WP-760D daisy wheel word processor from 1985.

You can just take a photo of the document. Everyone today owns a phone with great cameras.

I envy R5.

I do have an all in one printer which has come in handy since working from home. I only buy brother printers, they seem to do well for me. If you DO print at work and it's non-work related make sure you change the file name of the item being printed to something work related sounding before printing. Where i used to work we had a big fancy printer and it would show the print job names (of the files).

I also got a laser printer. If you don’t print all the time, most of the expensive inkjet ink is wasted. Another advantage—instant printing. No 15-minute head-cleaning dance.

Get a cheap laser printer - the #1 black and white laser printer on Amazon. It's probably a Brother. Then make sure to buy generic black toner for it, after you use up the cartridge that comes with it. Shouldn't be more than $15 per new cartridge. Make sure it's rated highly by at least 5000 people.

I raise my own squid so I can afford the printer.

Get this OP. I'll put a link to cheap toner next.

I haven’t owned a printer since college, almost 20 years ago. Even back then cartridges (color and black) cost more than $30 each.

also, I get my cartridges from the linked. I've had maybe 1 out of every 15 be a plunker.

Here's the toner for the printer at R29. Cheap AF.

The same toner at R32, but a 2-pack, with like 10,000 review.

I have a wireless laser printer. It comes in more handy than I thought that it would. HP laser printer/scanner and copier. I use the scanner a lot. I also just got a new desktop, a HP ENVY. Great name.

I also envy R34.

this is the one I have, I have to have duplexing and wireless. I don't use the fax but I do scan quite a bit too (although I have a small epson double sided scanner too that I use sometimes)

Am I supposed to believe every DLer uses the same fucking brand of printer? Please.

Library 0.10 a page in black print and 0.20 for color.

Don't be so cheap I have this, the Cannon TS3522 All-in-one printer. Good clear copies, ink is reasonable and it's $49 at Walmart

No, OP — even living in the land of unforgiving bureaucracy and endless paperwork (Germany), I really only need to print something a handful of times per year. I'll just go to the copy shop.

I actually am shocked by how many people don’t have a printer. Most people see no reason in owning one

R41, I’m R2. I do everything digitally now. I don’t remember the last time I had to print something myself. It may have been years ago when I printed some documents to renew a driver’s license. Now even that is fine oblige.

[quote] Now even that is fine oblige.

Online not oblige.

R43 OP here. I do everything online also.

I only use mine to print off recipes. It's a pain in the ass to follow a recipe from my phone, especially if I'm handling raw chicken.

I thought Eldergays just hand wrote everything with a quill pen.

I'm embarrassed to say this, but I'm a printer-holic. (And a computer-holic.) I have at least SEVEN printers. The one I use most often is a color laser all-in-one. The rest are all inkjets, including one portable and one large format (up to 13 x 17.) I also have four desktop computers (two miniature) and a number of laptops. Mostly Windows, but three Chromebooks and one Mac. And probably six to eight tablets.

And I'm retired and live alone.

When I have to return something I just tape my phone with the return address to the package and off it goes 🙄

R47, that’s rather sad.

[quote] It's a pain in the ass…especially if I'm handling raw chicken.

I know the feeling.

R18 another vote for the Epson Ecotank, they are a great printer, good output, easy to use and extremely economical to run. Didnt know about the additional hate mail functionality, and I have no use for it, but its a bonus, will keep that in mind

I had to get one a couple of years ago during the time of tech good shortages. It works, but not well.

I have one I print shit for my mom

I had an Hp for about 10 yrs but bought a new computer (my last one was 12 yrs old) & the printer wasn’t compatible. I hate my printer anyway, it takes like 4 mins to warm up, then jams whenever I print anything. Ink cartridges would last for 10-20 pgs & conk out. I’d replace with Hp cartridges, sometimes the printer would say they weren’t true Hp cartridges & wouldn’t print. If they did actually work, the printer would have to align them every time I turned it on. Then when I’d put the test page on the scanner glass, it wouldn’t read the results. When I’d go to finally print, jammed again.

I just bought an Epson printer from Costco that uses liquid ink & not cartridges, but I haven’t opened it yet.

R53, is your mom Erna?

I currently have a Brother monochrome laser (MFC-L2730DW) and an Epson Ecotank (ET-7750). The laser printer has worked fairly well but I vaguely remember having some issues with other Brother laser printers at work (mostly with the cheap plastic parts which just broke, although tbf we printed like 5000+ pages a year). Still, if you buy the larger ink cartridge the printing is fairly cheap although I've already had to replace the drum unit and I've only bought and changed one ink cartridge. The printing itself is easy and reliable with duplex printing and wifi. Mobile printing works well on my Android phone as well.

I love love love the Ecotank. The printer came with two sets of ink bottles and I still haven't used all of it, and I've printed TONS of A4 and A3 full page pics. My mother has Alzheimer's and I've printed her dozens of large versions of photographs from her youth and adult years. Ecotank and other bottle ink printers are just great for that. The image quality is awesome but just like with all inkjets text crispness loses to laser printing. BTW, I've used Canon's glossy and matte papers which are much cheaper than Epson's own, and they work perfectly well.

Now the minuses. The printer heads get clogged rather easily. That's not a huge problem since the cleaning procedure is easy but the cleaning does use the inks, and although that doesn't really matter since the inks just last and last and last, they get collected in a maintenance box that gets filled fast. I've already replaced the maintenance box (á €10) like 5 times and I've learnt to have a few spare boxes always around. Another problem is that printing on DVDs just doesn't work. I don't know if it's just my unit but the disc just doesn't seem to have enough space inside the printer and there are black ink splotches on the disc in the end. Thankfully I rarely burn on DVDs anymore but still, it's annoying in a €600+ product.

I've also heard that Epson has set a predetermined used-by date for the Ecotank printers and they'll just automatically stop working at some point. I'm already ready to explode if that ever happens.

Before Ecotank I had a Canon inkjet that used traditional cartridges. It's amazing how little you can print with those, and it gets bloody expensive and fast. I did change to much cheaper non-brand inks at some point but apparently they ended up destroying the printer heads which was why I decided to always use real ink from now on, hence the Ecotank.

I didn't know inkjets are still popular. I mean the cost per page is pretty high compared to color laser, and is it waterproof? Doesn't the ink run it the print is exposed to water?

I have a seven year old Brother that I dropped on a cement floor and it's still working beautifully. Brother's have a reputation for sturdiness. I always buy off brand toner for it from Amazon.

I also have an three year old HP printer that works just fine, but I don't think it'd withstand a drop on the floor. I also use off brand toner for it without any problems.

If I had to buy another printer tomorrow, I'd buy a Brother, no question.

Inkjet vs. laser

*if the print is exposed

I've had a Canon Pixma MX860 printer/scanner for years and years. I think it's the longest-lived printer I've ever had, and that's probably down to the fact that I hardly use it. Still I can't imagine not having a printer. Whenever it dies I plan to replace it with a laser printer.

I walk to FedEx Office whenever I need to print something which is only a few times a year, mostly forms that require a real signature. If there wasn't a fully staffed Amazon pickup/return hub nearby I would need to print more often.

[quote]I didn't know inkjets are still popular. I mean the cost per page is pretty high compared to color laser, and is it waterproof? Doesn't the ink run it the print is exposed to water?

The last time I extensively used a color laser printer was 5 years ago at my previous work place. It was either a Canon or HP but the printing was extremely expensive and the image quality was way worse than even the cheapest inkjets I've used. And yes, inkjet colors are not waterproof but at least on the ink tank printers the cost per page is super low.

I have a pretty old printer — HP Envy 4500. It’s worked ok through several different operating systems, but it jams for no reason I can see, and even though I maybe print a total of 25 pages a year it runs out of ink SO FAST. And not necessarily in accordance with which cartridge I use most often. And of course it will not use refilled cartridges.

R63 thank you. Everyone here is praising laserjets but we have huge top quality laser printers at work and the color never looks that good. It looks better on inkjet

R65, that reminds me that two years ago I actually worked a short stint in a printing house that had a massive Canon laser color printing system I used a few times (it was probably from their imagePRESS line of digital presses). You couldn't get truly photorealistic print out of that either although I'm sure that with the right settings and the right media you get fairly close. However even the cheapest inkjets pretty much print photorealistic images out of the box which is what really matters for most consumers. Laser printing is awesome for text and some vector graphics which is why I always have one at home, and preferably a monochrome one. Quite frankly the color laser I used in my earlier work 5 years ago actually produced black text that looked worse than similar text from cheap monochrome laser printers. I'm sure they must be better now but still I'm 100% sure they won't beat an Ecotank in the printing costs and image print quality.