Spill the beans... on cheap printing

alfielibby · 27 June 2012 at 8:41AM

mayling03 wrote: »

I use old letters/scrap paper that I take home to work to print off irrelevant stuff. I hardly need to buy anypaper, as most of the stuff I print out I don't need anyway.

So why do you print it?

koru · 27 June 2012 at 8:50AM

Counter-intuitively, it could be cheaper to buy a more expensive printer. The cheapest printers usually have the most expensive toner/ink cartridges. If you print a fair amount, you will soon claw back an extra £50 or £100 spent on buying the printer.

Spending a bit more should bring duplex printers into your budget. That way, you halve the amount of paper you use. At between 0.5p and 1p per sheet of ordinary laser paper, this mounts up.

The cheapest printers also break down more often.

Look at how long things like drums last. Buying a new drum can cost more than a new printer, but several manufacturers make drums that will last years.

cheerful · 27 June 2012 at 9:31AM

Draft or economy mode can save a lot of ink. Often the difference from "normal quality" is hardly, if at all, noticeable.

If you need to print an email or web page don't just click the "Print" button as this will usually give you loads of unwanted extraneous stuff. Highlight the information you need and copy it to a word processing document then print that.

PM1 · 27 June 2012 at 9:38AM

Best price paper I have found recently is Tesco Value. And I ordered it with my grocery order so I didn't have to go and get it.

Wilkinsons used to have good value, but their price has gone up recently

crazycaro · 27 June 2012 at 9:48AM

i have been using a colour laser samsung clp for several years, refilling via refill toners at a fraction of the cost of toner cartridges. however, it has recently packed up i think it needs a new imaging unit and the cost of this is half as much again as a new up to date version (can't figure this out).

since i use mainly black on draft, with the occasional colour print job, i have decided to go for a mono laser this time. i have gone for the brother HL1230, after researching the costs of cartridge refills online. i am considereing getting an additional inkjet for any colour printing, not sure yet which one i will get.

best advice i can give is do some research on the cost of cartridges, refills availability (inkjet can be a bit messy) how many print you can get on average from a cartridge etc. try to get a printer with seperate colour cartridges if at all possible since it is a waste of money to replace a cartridge because the yellow has run out but the other colours are still OK. The cost of the printer seems irrelevent these days. it seems nearly as cheap to buy a new one when the cartridges need replacing not really environmentally friendly htough.

:j

Bellshillbaker · 27 June 2012 at 10:19AM

Visited Staples in Dundee recently to buy printer ink for my HP printer. Saw an XL size black ink cartridge, which had 30% more ink in it. After a few other selections I paid for my items. The price quoted chilled my blood. £89 for a few items. On checking I discovered that the cost hike was caused by the 30% more ink HP cartridge costing almost three times the price of an ordinary sized one. Needless to say I returned the item. £46 for a 30% more black ink cartridge as compared to £17 for an ordinary one. How can that be justified. We are held to ransom each time we buy ink these days, particularly with HP as they sell you ink which goes out of date very quickly and the printer anoys you each time past the date to carry out more functions to get the ink to print by continually responding to messages about the ink being out of date. The cartridges seem to be smaller and smaller yet more costly every time you go shopping. Avoid the XL trap as HP or Staples either cannot add properly or they rely on sleepy shoppers not noticing.

koru · 27 June 2012 at 11:56AM

I aim to pay no more than £2.50 for a ream of white copier paper to use in my laser printer. I often have to hunt on google to find something this cheap. Buying in bulk (eg, 10 reams) helps. For me, that's more than a year's supply.

yangptangkipperbang · 27 June 2012 at 12:00PM

Refill your own cartridges...........................

mishelly · 27 June 2012 at 12:12PM

Another vote here for continuous ink system (ciss). It works out that for the same amount of ink I would get from a cartridge (HP cartridge) I now pay 10p for. It used to cost me £45 for four new cartridges that didnt last very long.

I also get Tesco value / Wilkinsons paper depending on which I am going to first.

anniecave · 27 June 2012 at 12:32PM

PM1 wrote: »

At home I use CutePdf to print things like on-line bills to a file. It is much easier to find past bills that way, and does not fill a filing cabinet.

Agreed that printing to a pdf file is really useful. If purchasing something, you might want a copy of a receipt, or when applying for something, there is several pages of terms and conditions. Printing to a pdf file means its saved and I can just read it on my computer if I need to.

I have a laptop instead of a desktop, so I just connect up my printer only if I actually need to print something. Not very often. I can't remember the last time I bought print cartridges.

Spill the beans... on cheap printing

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