Slightly OT: Printe/scanner recomendations

[Jethro]

I was "lucky" enough to get a Lexmark S405 last year, just before my office closed and I went to working from home. At the time I was well chuffed as it was wireless, and had a document feeder.

Anyway, a year later, and I've had it to the back teeth with the POS. Can anyone suggest a suitable replacement ... cost not really an issue.

I tend to print infrequently, but when I do it's longer documents.

The worst trait is for the colour inks to just stop working, even though they are full. My only suggestion is that something gums up with underuse ? But it can be incredibly annoying when you're printing a presentation which relies on colours, and have to turn up at a meeting and sneak a look at someone elses (fnarr fnarr)

Ideally wireless with ADF too. Also no need for a ****ing fax feature.

[dom]

... cost not really an issue.

Buy a laser printer.

[Malcolm]

Look at the Canon range. I have an MP160 which has black and colour ink tanks. The ?Mp540 uses separate colour tanks. My experience of both, one at home and the other at work is good.

Malcolm

[Andy Dingley]

Best fix for that is a cheap B&W laser printer. A HP is still the best and cheapest long term, even the small "personal" scale stuff. Colour lasers though are a PITA unless they're big money.

For colour, Canon seem to be the best for not clogging when unused. The Pixma 4850 is nice as a high-quality photo printer on shiny paper (I bought it to run a photo booth at an event) . It's give-away pricing as a printer and ink is no more insane than usual - although the 4500 is cheaper (same price, bigger tanks) if you can find an old eBay one. Mine is now running a =A360 "milkbottle" ink feed system that looks like a right lashup (and makes the printer non-portable) but works well and makes ink a trivially low cost. It works far better than dodgy refills.

I'm no fan of combined printers / scanners.

[harryagain]

I have the same problem. The answer is to run a test paper once a week to keep the cartridge jets from drying up.

I have HP, the jets are on the cartridge. With Epson (for example) they aren't and are harder to get at. If they do block and can't be unbocked by the normal printer programmes I take mine out and anoint the business end with washing up liquid and scrub lightly with a soft toothbrush & wash off. I then shake hard downwards until ink appears. Repeat as neccessary. They have to be dried of course beforeputting back in.

Kill or cure.

On many printers, the jets are parked on a bit of felty stuff when at rest which keeps them humid. The problem arises when it dries out. This can be stopped by putting a drop of water on the felt with an eye dropper once a week.

There are special cleaning cartridges too that unblock jets. Some chemical in them, dunno what it is.

[polygonum]

The "traditional" from early days of blocked inkjet nozzles was the USA window cleaner Windex.

were that the critical ingredient was a spot of ammonia.

I *think* the UK product Sprint - might be commercial only - also works. But memory plays tricks.

[Adrian C]

Windolene _clear_ workes fine, not the pink one!

Has ammonia as the active ingrediant.

[tony sayer]

DO NOT buy the Canon MG6150 series we had one of these at the beginning of this year and we've already paid more for ink refills than what the poxy thing cost in the first place:(

OK it does work well but the scam is piddly small ink pots which don't last 5 mins and thus far are not re-fillable. I know I grumble about the HP K8600 ( we need A3 capability from time to time) which has more paper jam's and unless the very best paper picks up several sheets at once then spreads the print over each one of them so you can't re use 'em but at lest its economical with re-fillable carts..

But be very wary re this ink refill cost....

[MuddyMike]

I run an all in one Epson BX300F on cheap cartridges from a stall on the market and have never had a problem. It prints, scans, copies and faxes.

Mike

[Jules Richardson]

Agreed. Unless you really *need* colour frequently, just farm out colour work to your nearest repro/copy place, and keep a B+W at home for the bulk of the work.

Our HP one is arse. Not particularly any good at any one task - which I suppose is true of most modern combined-function gadgets :-)

cheers

Jules

[robgraham]

HP got it right some years back with the Continuous Ink System. I've never quite worked out how it works, but I've got an elderly (now) HP

3210 which works excellently and reliably with a lot of whirring, wheezing and grunting on occasions. I believe the ink gets pumped back into the tanks so never dries on the jets, but the internal mechanics are so extensive I doubt HP could have made money on them.

Rob

[OG]

I've just replaced my Canon MP160 as I got fed up with paying over £40 a pop for a pair of replacement cartridges every few months. Yes you can refil them once, but they don't seem to last long.

I've bought a Samsung CLP325W (as the initials suggest it's a Colour Laser Printer with wireless). With it being a laser printer you wouldn't use it for your photos, but it should be good for presentations.

Replacement toner is about £35-40 for each colour, but should be good for a thousand pages rather than only a hundred.

[Mark]

All I can say is that I am pleased with my low-cost HP colour laser printer. Unless you're printing lots of photos I could avoid inkjets completely.

+1

[Andrew Gabriel]

I bought my parents an HP C6180 printer/scanner/fax several years ago, and it's excellent for printing, including photo quality. It's on the internet, so rest of the family can directly print pictures of the grandchildren, etc on it remotely, and that was one of the main reasons I chose that printer. It is let down by poor scanner software - it's OK for one sheet, but it can't scan multiple sheets without running out of memory, which is stupid given the scanner has auto sheet feeder, and the hardware seems to be well built. Never tried the fax part.

I also bought a B/W laser printer HP laserjet 1022n, and that's worked well too.

My reservation now would be that many people have warned me that I bought these products just before HP's product range took a significant nose- dive in quality, so this isn't any guarantee of what you might buy today.

[AlanD]

Not in my experience. I've been running a HP colour laser at home for ~5 years, no problems. Unlike the inkjets before it, no problems with intermittent use, just works when I need it to.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Do you *really* need colour that often? If not a 40 quid B&W laser is the answer for infrequent use.