Which budget printer should I go for??Can someone recommend one wholeheartedly?

londonman81

I need a new printer and have these considerations in mind:

1) Cost of replacement cartridges/toner. I know that in many cases the replacements cost a hefty amount and I want to avoid the 'cheap printer, expensive cartridges' trap.

2) Cost of printer - ideally i dont want to spend more than £100.

3) Type of printer - Here I'm not sure whether to go for an inkjet or laser printer. I would like the option of having colour so inkjet would be needed for that, but then I have to compromise on speed as they seem to be much slower. My main use would be to produce crisp B&W text pages very fast and this is where lasers excel afaik.

4) Specification - what sort of resolution do I need to produce a good text page? is 600dpi x 600 dpi any good? Which printer is fast in printing black & white text pages?

4) Reliability/User Friendliness. I have had printers in the past I had the cheap/free printer which came with the computer and broke down after a few months. I want to know which manufacturer produces the most reliable printers. I don't want software that plays up etc I've heard that Epsons are very fussy printers - can anyone verify this?

5) Space - shouldn't be too large as I don;t have much room to play with.


I don't care what the printer looks like as long as it prints well, fast and reliably. I hate faffing around with printers - I certainly DONT want one of those super-sensitive printers that complains every 2 secs when the paper is slightly out of line, etc I want it to give a low ink warning ONLY when there REALLY is little ink left.

Are the budget inkjets generally more reliable/better quality than the budget laser printers? Are they as fast etc?

Are certain designs of printer more reliable than other designs? I mean for exmaple are front loading printers more reliable than back loading etc??

From an inital browse through the various sites (Ebuyer etc), these printers have caught my eye - but I believe a wholehearted recommendation/review from someone would be very useful as there doesn't seem to be much info on printers on this and other sites:


Lexmark E232 Laser 22ppm - Usb2.0 600x600dpi Uk

Hp Laserjet 1020 14ppm 1200dpi 2mb Usb

Samsung ML-1520 A4 Mono Laser Printer 14ppm

Hewlett Packard Hp Deskjet 3845/en 18ppm A4

Hewlett Packard Hp Deskjet 5740/en 26ppm A4

HP Photosmart 7450 Thermal Inkjet Printer

Canon IP3000 Colour Bubble Jet Printer

Epson Stylus Photo R200 5760 X 1440 Dpi A4 Usb - though I've heard that Epson printers are very unreliable - is this true?


The Lexmark laser in particular caught my eye - can anyoen vouch for it or Lexamrks in general?


One of the most useful bits of info would be which type, spec or brand of printers to positively avoid! This can be as much help as knowing which ones are good - then i can avoid any nasties!

As usual with computer peripherals there doesn't seem to be a way to test run these printers in advance of buying - so it's pure guesswork for now :-(

Any guidance much appreciated!

Thanks

L

Jonni2bad

Well there's certainly a lot of info in your post, and I'm not sure that I can be so thorough in my response, but here it is...

I purchased a Canon Pixma 1500 a couple of months ago (£40.80 delivered but who knows what they are now..) and I have been more than impressed with the overall quality and speed of printing.

It takes 2 cartridges, obviously black and colour, but this does not really detract from quality when producing colour photos. I would say it takes on average 70 seconds to produce a 6 x 4 on best quality.

I've printed only short quantities of black only text pages, but when on draft I've found the results to be clear, crisp and fast.

Compat cartridges are widely available, I chose Choice Stationery who do a black and colour package for £3 delivered - so you'll never break the bank buying those! You can get slightly cheaper still by buying in 3's and 4's etc, but you'll work out what's best for your own usage.

Size is approx 15 inches wide, and only 6 inches high and deep - quite compact. It does NOT, however, come with a paper outlet tray, so you would need to place in on some kind of desk space to catch the printed sheets.

As per typical Canon, the interface is very straightforward and easy to use. I've owned Canons for several years and have never had a problem with quality or build etc.

Hope that helps a little.....

dan.mcl

Lexmark printers of all sorts are notoriously sore on and expensive for ink, Dell printers likewise as they are rebadged lexmarks with an EXTRA security measure to prevent you using anything but dell cartridges without taking a tool to your printer

I have a few HP printers at home, a Photosmart 7960 (about £120 to buy and puts out better photos than jessops or snappy snaps) and a PSC1215 (£25 display model multifunction print scan copier thing) I also look after a few of their laser printers at my job, i am absolutely delighted with them, the official cartridges can be expensive to replace but the refill kits are excellent, a friend of mine works in medical imaging and he swears by them for his PSC1215 (shares some of the same carts as my Photosmart). The thing to remember about the HP carts is that you are replacing the print head at the same time, if the worst comes to the worst and you buy a dodgy refill kit then all you have to do is replace the cartridges with new HP ones and they will be good as new!

You can also buy toner refill kits online but I cant find the link, apparently they are also pretty good, but if you screw up when filling them you could be covered in hard to remove toner.

I like my HP, i have also had epson but have found the print quality of text and photos to be lacking compared to similarly priced HP models, HP printers are renowned for their black text quality being almost indistinguishable from a laser printer.

londonman81

Jonni2bad wrote:

Well there's certainly a lot of info in your post, and I'm not sure that I can be so thorough in my response, but here it is...

I purchased a Canon Pixma 1500 a couple of months ago (£40.80 delivered but who knows what they are now..) and I have been more than impressed with the overall quality and speed of printing.

It takes 2 cartridges, obviously black and colour, but this does not really detract from quality when producing colour photos. I would say it takes on average 70 seconds to produce a 6 x 4 on best quality.

I've printed only short quantities of black only text pages, but when on draft I've found the results to be clear, crisp and fast.

Compat cartridges are widely available, I chose Choice Stationery who do a black and colour package for £3 delivered - so you'll never break the bank buying those! You can get slightly cheaper still by buying in 3's and 4's etc, but you'll work out what's best for your own usage.

Size is approx 15 inches wide, and only 6 inches high and deep - quite compact. It does NOT, however, come with a paper outlet tray, so you would need to place in on some kind of desk space to catch the printed sheets.

As per typical Canon, the interface is very straightforward and easy to use. I've owned Canons for several years and have never had a problem with quality or build etc.

Hope that helps a little.....

Wow - I thought no one would reply to my question and not only does someone reply but they suggest exactly what I did in the meantime!

On Monday I ordered the Canon IP3000 from Novatech for £72 all in, as I need a printer urgently. I also ordered extra cartridges from Choice Stationary who were doing a VAT free day on Bank Holiday Monday only! I got 3 or sets of extra cartridges for only £13! The IP3000 takes separate black, cyan, magenta and yellow carts which means its a bit more expensive to refill as I need to buy 4 carts but Choice makes it much easier to swallow - and I suppose I only replace colours that have actually run out!


Anyway - The only bummer is that they don't supply the USB printer cable needed to connect to the computer!! And it ONLY takes USB - not parallel!
I really hate this thing about manufacturers not supplying the cable! I went back into town an hour ago to get one bu the shops were shut!

Why the hell can't they at least remind you that the printer doesn't come with cable?! Surely it's in the interest of the retailers as they can sell an extra product at the same time!!

Anyway, depsite it sitting on my desk ready to go, I have to wait until Saturday when I can get to the shops before I can even get it running!

It had better be worth it!

Thanks anyway

L


P.S I was torn between the Canon and HP - and it's not as if there is any way to test them out in advance when ordering over the net - so I just went for the one with most good reviews on the net!

Malestrom

I have the Canon Pixma IP2000 and am very happy with it. Cheap to run, trouble-free and brilliant results time and time again, just like you would expect from a printer. Now if only my old Epson had been as good, I would have bought one of those, but it was nothing but a PITA from the day I got it. Even having it swapped out for brand new replacements twice in the first twelve months didn't cure all the problems. You'll be very happy with your purchase.

shrek101

I use my Epson R300 every day, okay not a great deal of printing everyday but its been very reliable since I got it last August and the cheapest printer to run compared with two other Epsons I have.

Its greta for photos, cd/dvd printing, kids home work, letters etc

gibby

canon are the cheapest to run - by miles for inkjet

for laser hp / canon are great

lasers are much cheaper to run and refill long term - even color ones

http://www.alternativesouls.com/phpbb/viewforum.php?f=13


has some great links


G

shrek101

I got 14 ink (10 colour,4 black) cartridges for the sum of £8.99 the other week, now thats cheap for a R300, thats 64p each.

N9eav

Jonni2bad wrote:

Compat cartridges are widely available, I chose Choice Stationery who do a black and colour package for £3 delivered - so you'll never break the bank buying those! You can get slightly cheaper still by buying in 3's and 4's etc, but you'll work out what's best for your own usage.

....

£3 for both delivered? Sound too good to be true. I am considerign a new printer as My HPC1205 is too dear for cartridges. £28 for both color and black. A new Canon 1p 1500 can be bought for £37

londonman81

N9eav wrote:

£3 for both delivered? Sound too good to be true. I am considerign a new printer as My HPC1205 is too dear for cartridges. £28 for both color and black. A new Canon 1p 1500 can be bought for £37

I finally got the Canon IP3000 and i'm very happy with it so far - its not a fussy printer and it churns out page after page reliable, quietly and to a good print standard.

I also bought extra cartridges from Choice Stationary and they are very good for price, service and speed of delivery.

I don't know if the IP1500 is as good as the IP3000 but I certainly think it's worth spending an extra £40 or so to get a mid-range printer which will last rather than the cheapest printer which , in my experience, tend to go wrong very quickly.

Good luck!
L

The_Biff

Very pleased with my Canon IP1500 -cheap to buy & run. Canon usually do very well in the Which? magazine tests in total scores & cost per copy.