Printer suitability?

If you do anything with images that need the geometry to be correct, you do, but for general document archiving, probably not. There are what are basic rostrum camera mechanisms for sitting a phone on to get fairly good geometry, but a reasonable scanner is cheaper.

One option would be to follow my example. I have an A3 colour laser an A4 mono laser and a portable inkjet.

All cameras suffer from pin cushion, barrel and simple focal length distortion. Scanners do not. If you really want to reproduce a flat object accurately you need a process camera that has a very restricted range of focal lengths over which none of these effects are significant.

A scanner is cheaper

I only have a small work area, so I'm hoping to settle for just one printer at a time.

I think I must be very lucky then or they are getting less worse. I have an Epson XP-355 and I think its not printed more than 20 or 30 pages in the 9 years I have had it. Its in my holiday home and was bought for printing boarding passes. I thought as I didn't visit for over a year during lock down it would be toast, but it was still working in March.

In my main house there is a Brother MFA that again gets very light use and again it seems fine.

I have had very bad experiences with Lexmark Lasers in the small office environment.

.. what I can't find these days is a printer that doesn't lose its warrenty when you cancel the ink subscription

Dave

Yes but a scanner with a sheet feeder is a totally different beast.....

Dave

This is a deep subject - and much will depend no the eventual workflow. If the actual volume printing is being done by a print shop etc, then what you choose may not matter much, since most will take print ready copy as a PDF.

Many printers these days seem to follow the Gillette model of pricing (loss leader hardware, expensive consumables, with many building DRM into their inks/toners to try ans restrict you to OEM consumables). For Lasers, Brother are one of the few holdouts that don't go too far out of their way to be obnoxious. (cf stories of Canon multi-function devices that will not even scan if they are low on ink).

If you do get one that is network connected, make sure it can't reach the internet. That way you only do a firmware upgrade if you want to do it, and should not suddenly find it now does less that what you paid for!

Generally inkjet is cheaper to buy, more expensive to run (although note a full set of toner carts can be several hundred quid on a colour laser even if they are significantly lower cost per page).

Inject has the edge on top end glossy photographic prints - but colour lasers are pretty good these days. Laser equal or better on "business colour" (graphs, charts, colour heading on plain paper etc)

If you want top end colour photo output / print ready proofing, you could look at "dye-sub" printers.

If you want volume inkjet, look at those that allow the use of continuous ink feed systems (external tanks of ink linked by tubes to the print head, rather than teeny cartridges with small volumes of ink inside). Often available for some Epson inkjets.

You may even find a budget mono laser is adequate - proof colour stuff on screen, layout etc in black and white on paper, and send PDF in colour to the printers.

What is the purpose of the 162pm? If it is just for proofing then surely any printer will do. The copies that are printed elsewhere should be printed from your file so the quality of your printer is irrelevant. (I haven't read all the replies to your message, in case anyone else has touched on these points.)

Our *community matters* publication *The Pump* is A5 format from folded A4 sheet. I guess you would need a printer with that facility.

I am very happy with my Epson ET-2650 although it did have *insufficient memory* issues run on W7. Couple of upgrades from Epson and the problem has not repeated on W11.

Flat scanner screen, density/size adjustable. Now on my second tank fill using compatible inks. (6 years plus)

Not in daily use but probably several times per week.

PC World have long gone (Currys ?) & I don't know of any equivalents.

Yes, but those one star reviews are often from idiots that don't read the manual or complaints about late delivery.

I'd say the decision tree should go something like this:

1. Do you really really need top quality photos and are prepared to pay substantially more per page for it?

- if no, go to 2

- if yes, go to 3

1. Go for a colour laser

- I can recommend Brother for reduced toner chipping shenanigans

- I have the HL-L8260CDW which is excellent and doesn't use toner chips. I use aftermarket toner at about £30 for a full set which is dirt cheap. I can't speak for colour rendition of them v OEM as for home printing I don't care.

- Yes Brother use different toners in different regions (TN-421, TN-431, TN-441 for mine in different regions) but buy from a reputable supplier and you'll be fine.

1. Do you want artist grade photos? - if yes, go for an inkjet with more than 4 inks (pigment inks are more lightfast than dye inks, important if it's going on the wall).

- The Canon imageProGRAF range is nice, the Pro-1000 range takes 80ml ink and there's a third party CISS system I have a Pro-300 which has 14ml carts and they're too small. I upgraded from an Epson XP-970 which really doesn't like third party ink.

- budget for expensive special paper (~50p per sheet)

- if you don't need artist grade photos, go for an Epson Ecotank inkjet

- you will likely still need to pay extra for good paper

1. If Q1 = yes and if budget is tight and you don't mind some faff, investigate a CISS system on a cartridge-based inkjet. Useful especially if you need something one of the EcoTank printers won't do.

Negative reviews can give some useful information but I wouldn't pay a huge amount of attention. Many of them are not actually problems with the product (often with the user or the supplier) - I only tend to skim them for things I might care about.

Theo

And duplex - strongly recommend the OP considers this if likely to print

That's a good point - I've not seen inkjets which will print double sided, although I assume they exist. You can of course turn the stack of paper over, but inkjet tends to make the paper a bit crinkly which might cause feeder problems. Feed problems (eg feeding two pages when you want one) can cause the sides to get out of sync, wasting the whole stack.

Theo

Epson Ecotank will do duplex

The last few we've had will do duplex, though it takes a while as it hangs the paper out for several seconds for the ink to dry before doing the other side.

This is our current one:

Nice summary.

1. If the need for quality is only occasional use a print shop / online photo print service when you need it.

Fundamentally when it comes to knocking out flyers a laser jet is find on bog standard paper. It will also proof color photos, but for pro glossy whatsit and colour perfect the printshops can do the flyers and the photo shops can do the prints

This is great advice, and I may need to come back to it soon. Meanwhile my neighbour has just thrown out a Brother inkjet, with scanner because the colour red is not printing. I just saw some convincing videos showing the use of syringes, used with isopropyl alcohol and Windex mixture to overcome the problem.