Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler OT - Printers

Yes, another OT... YAOT, just like YACC for you old programmers.

I'm looking for an all in one printer. Not sure what's the best computer review forum to research. Currently I have a Xerox 470CX (all in one) that eats $50 print cartridges for breakfast. It works fine, but my wife prints a lot for her business so I want to upgrade, instead of going to Staples every week.

Some requirements for a printer/fax/copier.
1) REASONABLY priced printer cartridges. (Reminds me of all get those d*&n toner cartridge emails, along w/ mortgage and viagra emails.) I want to have the option to possibly buy generic brand cartridges too. And no, I'm not willing to fill cartridges w/ syringes.
2) I can live w/ either laser or inkjet
3) Color is nice to have but not required.
4) Speed is not an issue, print quality is more imporant.
5) Wifi is nice but not required.

From a cost per page standpoint, laser is the best choice by far for printing.

I would look at the HP Laserjet all-in-one devices, but I am sure there are comparable devices from Xerox and Canon.....maybe even Samsung.

To step up to a laser color all-in-one would mean some type of a floorstanding model. Expensive, but worth it in the long run for business IMO.

A good resource is www.cnet.com.

Why do I know so much about this cr*p? I used to work for Xerox many moons ago....and currently work for www.peerless.com.

I'd only look at HP. Good quality, very ubiquitous, and that spells lower prices for toner. Don't touch Lexmark; proprietary toner!

I would probably look a little higher than the 1x00 series of Laserjets, but other than that, they're pretty good. You'll chop $2-400 off the price if you don't need networking.

I've been running an HP Officejet K60xi in my office/lab for the past 3+ years and highly recommend it. Mine is an all-in-one which is in extremely adverse (dust, dirt, vibration, hot, cold) conditions. It gets used heavily every day, prints beautifully in color, has great features for faxing and has never missed a beat. Cartridges are pretty reasonable especially recycled ones.

I also second the HP suggestion. I've owned numerous printers in the past and they all stunk...except the two HP's I've bought.

Never put much thought into this... but since it gives me a chance to agree with Spiff... I have an HP 2210 all-in-one deal, and it is a great unit. 18 months old, never a problem.

Now... when it melts down tomorrow...

I just bought a HP 7310 a couple weeks ago at Costco for $369. It's color/inkjet. USB and ethernet connections. It does everything I've asked so far quickly and proficiently. I am astounded by the capabilities and prices of these kinds of devices compared to just a few years ago - paper feed, dupliex printing, etc. No complaints yet on the HP - it is a very satisfying purchase so far.

I have a Canon I560-s that i got at costco for i think 70 or 80 bucks, print quality is top notch and ink isint too pricey. Not to mention seperate color tanks. Not an all in one but if you dont need all the scanning and copying junk id reccomend it. I have had HP before. i wouldnt buy one again. They put those color ink cartriges in an all in ove package on purpose. i know it! to sell more ink! Greedy!

Thanks for the replies fellas. I knew I could count on this forum for good referrals.

This'll get me started. I was leaning towards HP, just from a feature/quality standpoint. DEFINITELY want to stay away from proprietary cartridges.

Thanks for the Costco reminder too. The 7310 looks good, I can hook the ethernet to my wifi router. The Cat5 is closer to the wall jack (my house is wired for cat5 and cable TV!) and closer than to the computer.

Next printer I buy will be a laser. No way am I dealing with ink tanks any more.

When you can not get a color laser now for $500.....it is a no brainer.

And photos from laser are now very close to what you can get with an inkjet. You should see what we can produce in the office.

Got the 7310 from HP yesterday. Wow, that's a lot of s/w to install. Works, looks good. Looking forward to cartridges that are less than $49.

Now I have to figure out how to get the network configured so it'll run w/ my Norton Security on.

Hmm... it's on the network, then? You'll need to find out which ports it's using, and then open those up manually in Norton. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a printer port already pre-designated in Norton, but if there's special stuff for the scanning, etc, you'll have to do some digging to find out what that is.

yeah, i just have to figure out the IP assigned to the printer and then add that to the list in norton. Didn't feel like searching for it last nite at midnite. Actually, i now have to find my netgear password which i don't remember...

If the printer's on DHCP, then it's IP will likely change in the future, making security and config changes a regular pain. If at all possible, you should give it a static IP.

Does your netgear router allow you to reserve an IP range for static IP addresses? If not, you could just force the printer to use the last valid IP address in the range. Chances are it would never be assigned to one of your computers.