My HP multifunction thing is about 2 years old and has printed about 400 pages in its life, its been through three sets of carts at about 70 quid a time, about halfway through any original HP cart it starts moaning that they are fakes, insists on doing an alignment before every print job, keeps dropping its network connection and is now in pieces on the drive after I showed it who’s boss..

Despite being convinced that home printers are a massive folly, for various reasons I need need one.
I would like wireless networkabilty but no longer care about scanner as I just use my phone to “scan” docs.
Any recommendations?

What are you printing?

Had a Hp deskjet thing, worked well, then all of a sudden refused ink cartriges, squirted ink all over its insides, made horrible choking noises and died.

So off to staples, cannon and Hp on special offer, cheap, ink more expensive than printer, so left them in shop.

Returned home and connected old 14 year old deskjet that was out of ink and slow to computer, and its just printed 400 plus leaflets with no problem, despite the thing telling me it has no ink. Seems as if old technology works even when it tells you its not working.

contracts, the odd boarding pass, and email recipts that go in the tax return, so no need to be colour really..

Have a look in staples lorts of cheap ones there, and use refuilled ink cartriges.

to balance the field, I have better luck in my HP (newish ones that support airprint) than Epson

I think I might get a brother laserjet, the internet seems to think they are excellent…

In that case I’d recommend a B/W laser printer. Might cost a bit more up front but lower costs overall.

I’m happy with my Samsung.

donald, cheers, that chimes with what I’ve just been reading.

Always bemused by printers IME,you need driver disc to set them up,they get a moody on if the paper jams or the wind changes direction,don’t like it if the ink is even nearly about to run out (hey,just print that last item,and let me be the judge!),mess themselves,so printing looks like a black and white murder scene and if the paper tray is a micron out of line issue death treats….. . Did scientists not just land a pretty small craft on a meteor…. . Hang on it did take 10 years..,the printer was in a queue!!!! 🙂

a big old HP Laserjet

Those big old Laserjets were the last properly built printers. Even the huge corporate type Canons and HPs these days are made of cheese and rely on regular callouts to keep them operational – much to the annoyance of the end users.

Still funny

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSK1D3bZhRs[/video]

when the ink cost more than the printer itself on the grand scheme of things – made of cheese is understatement. 😡

The new Canon printers looks nice though

Yes get a b/w laser! Very liberating experience for me and well worth the few quid extra in reduced ongoing cost and excellent reliability.

I’ve always got on well with HP, you replace the print head along with the ink so in theory should last a bit longer.
And in defense of all ink jet printers, do you lot know how hard it is to fire a drop of a few picolitres so it lands within a few (1-2) microns of where it’s supposed too? And sell that for £30?

rich, I’m sure its hard, I think thats why they go wrong.
Installing B/W brother as we speak..

And in defense of all ink jet printers, do you lot know how hard it is to fire a drop of a few picolitres so it lands within a few (1-2) microns of where it’s supposed too? And sell that for £30?

So make them better and more expensive. It could work out to be better value. Unfortunately we have adopted a “make ’em from cheese, pile ’em high and flog ’em cheap” attitude to virtually everything.

Unfortunately we have adopted a “make ’em from cheese, pile ’em high and flog ’em cheap” attitude to virtually everything.

I’m not defending poor products, and like in the ‘worst bit of design’ thread from a few weeks ago, it’s often not the designer that got it wrong, it’s the marketing or sales, or us, the people who buy things, that has driven things in a particular direction.

my lodger once walking in on me (with her parents, who were visiting for the first time to see how she was getting on in uni) smashing a printer with an axe, shouting “ha ha ha mumble mumble mumble ha ha ha” like boris the blade from snatch.

not my best moment

I had a really nice Canon scanner/printer thing. It would never remember the wifi settings and you had to enter them with this scroll wheel every single time you printed over the network. Then, just before Christmas, it decided to go wrong and I took out all my frustrations on it.
*BOOT* “There, now you’ve got an ERROR!”
*BOOT* Side falls off.
Many boots later and the scanner glass is smashed, there are little cogwheels all over the carpet. So I powered it on and made it destroy it’s own insides. HA!
Only cost me £60 to replace with a Canon ip7250 and it was worth it.
So far the new one’s been great. (No scanner though – but they’re pretty redundant these days I reckon)

I’m using a brother MFC J 6720dw
Gives me A3 capability (separate trays for a3/a4)
Works well, even with compatible inks (had it over a year and probably printed 1500+ drawings at A3)
It scans at A3 too, and you can scan to / print from apple products easily
Not actually printed any photo stuff on it yet though

As above get a small B\W laser printer they are much the same just have a look in to how much the consumables cost and see what toner cartridge is shipped with the unit. As often they are fitted with start cartridges which fun out straight away.

Never felt the need for one. Just steal prints from work.

As clearly alot of people do in my office IT literacy isn’t to high though as its fairly common to find a0 prints for chocolate brownies and that type of thing.

The Brother printers I’ve always used have never caused me any bother. No problems with connectivity, good ink usage, no jams, easy to set up.

I’ve never had an inkjet I haven’t wanted to smash within a month. The last one I had, I slam dunked and it was sweet relief.

Buy a laser printer. The toner doesn’t work out that expensive per page, it’ll print fast and it won’t stop working if you leave it a month. I’ve had a cheap Dell 1130 (when Curries were selling them off for £30) and traded up to a Samsung M2020 with wifi; both have been dependable and easy.

If you shy away from laser printers thinking they’re more expensive, whatever the difference in price it’s well worth it in terms of how much less painful they are to own.

The brother has already beaten the hp hands down. Its been left overnight, and this morning found itself still connected to the network! What an incredible achievement.

Got a samsung laser printer. Toner lasts forever, seems reliable enough.

My current Epson was told in great detail what happened to the Dell, HP and Canon printers which preceded it.
Dell – Sent to the naughty step (loft) idefinitely then after 12 months solitary confinement, put to death at the council tip
HP – Replaced by a Canon multifunction ink jet surplus from work, briefly resurrected (for an hour) after the Canon guffed up, Took me AGES to install it on an old XP machine, because Canon havent released cant be arsed to write software to allow me to align the printheads on anything newer than an XP machine (despite updating drivers for Win 8), then deciding after fannying about for an hour not to recognise the cartridge which just needed aligning, before being hauled downstairs by the scruff of its USB cable to be hauled out of the back door and smashed to bits repeatedly.
Canon – See Dell above.

The Epson knows its place…..

After many, many printers from various companies I bought a Kodak. Mainly as the last Lexmark said I’d used all the ink I was ‘licenced’ to use from the cartridge – not that it was empty when I took it apart!

Had the Kodak 3 years now and it does everything needed, is left on standby all the time and sometimes not used for a week or so.

Only buy branded cartridges are they are reasonably priced.

And to put it into perspective, just ordered 2 cartridges for the Canon laser at work; £160 each…

I got a Canon MG5500 about 3 months ago from Currys in their (semi-permanent) sale after reading reviews and asking on here after going through similar experience with the HP one we had that I detested, the canon was good at first but has recently started to not feed paper unless you take out and re-load the tray virtually every time. Good quality print but I’m worried I’ll grow to hate it as much as the HP one if this carries on.