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Quality, Affordable Printer


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Quality, Affordable Printer
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Stallion
 
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: Milwaukee
 
2006-02-14, 21:02

I am looking into a quality, basic printed that has some photo capabilities. I am looking in the sub-100 dollar price range, as I just need something cheap for school that will last a few years.
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Brad
Selfish Heathen
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
 
2006-02-14, 21:33

We got a Canon PIXMA iP 1600 two months ago for about US$60 on a whim because it would have cost as much to buy replacement ink for the old printer we had.

It's actually turned out to be a great printer. The ink is relatively cheap, it will actually print until the ink runs dry (some like Epson refuse to print at all once ink gets low), and the quality is pretty good. My only complaint is that it's a little loud when loading the paper.

edit: We also used it to print a couple of 4x6 photos recently on glossy paper and it did a good job.

The general mantra for printer advice these days seems to be: Canon Canon Canon! Anything Canon!

The quality of this board depends on the quality of the posts. The only way to guarantee thoughtful, informative discussion is to write thoughtful, informative posts. AppleNova is not a real-time chat forum. You have time to compose messages and edit them before and after posting.
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atomicbartbeans
reticulating your mom
 
Join Date: Jan 2005
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2006-02-14, 21:45

I'll echo Brad's sentiment: buy Canon.

My parents have a cheap model from Best Buy and it rawks. 4 years old and still going strong... very ink-efficient (low cost per page) as well.

OTOH, the Epson piece of crap that came with my iBook has been a huge disappointment. The magenta head hasn't worked since July, and it quits printing when any cartridge gets low. Then I found out that (due to a stupid encrypted memory chip) to refill the cartridges, you need to buy a special (read: expensive) "chip resetting tool" to get around Epson's ink DRM.

Okay, maybe not DRM, but it's the same greedy business model.

You ask me for a hamburger.
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chucker
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: near Bremen, Germany
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2006-02-14, 22:00

Yes. Canon PIXMA, while I don't much care for the design (I preferred the pre-PIXMA designs from Canon), is pure excellence. Fast. Cheap. Easily replaceable. The only major vendor that got out and said "we're not doing the 'put a chip in the ink to lock out third parties' crap others are doing". It's also a bit of a "woah" effect to connect a Canon PowerShot digital camera to a Canon PIXMA printer and then have a surprisingly flexible print interface for your photos.
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Ichiban_jay
Member
 
Join Date: Apr 2005
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2006-02-14, 22:04

I prefer the new brother's. Our Canon Pixma ip3000 has died... well this is the 4th time. Got warranty serviced 3 times and just yesterday the print head died again... At least it prints black and white....

Gonna bring it to Compusa and use my TAP on it, since they don't have IP3000's anymore maybe I'll get a new IP4200. Here's hoping!

Of course, my track record for tech stuff has never been that great...
Powerbook - replaced once, repaired 4 times
iPod- Replaced 7+ times for a single iPod
The list goes on...
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Ebby
Subdued and Medicated
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Over Yander
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2006-02-14, 22:45

Quote:
Originally Posted by atomicbartbeans
OTOH, the Epson piece of crap that came with my iBook has been a huge disappointment. The magenta head hasn't worked since July, and it quits printing when any cartridge gets low. Then I found out that (due to a stupid encrypted memory chip) to refill the cartridges, you need to buy a special (read: expensive) "chip resetting tool" to get around Epson's ink DRM.
I've never had those problems with my epsons (2200 - $650 and R200 - $50). I can run the ink dry like I did last night.

Think4ink has all kinds of cheaper solutions and can sell ink for 1/2 the price. There are also continuos ink systems that have permanent resettable chips if you print a lot like I do. I'm waiting for my color cartridges to dry up before using the CIS I bought at Macworld.

^^ One more quality post from the desk of Ebby. ^^
SSBA | SmockBogger | SporkNET
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PKIDelirium
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2005
 
2006-02-14, 22:52

Quote:
Originally Posted by atomicbartbeans
I'll echo Brad's sentiment: buy Canon.

My parents have a cheap model from Best Buy and it rawks. 4 years old and still going strong... very ink-efficient (low cost per page) as well.

OTOH, the Epson piece of crap that came with my iBook has been a huge disappointment. The magenta head hasn't worked since July, and it quits printing when any cartridge gets low. Then I found out that (due to a stupid encrypted memory chip) to refill the cartridges, you need to buy a special (read: expensive) "chip resetting tool" to get around Epson's ink DRM.

Okay, maybe not DRM, but it's the same greedy business model.
What model Epson was that?

I got an Epson Stylus CX4600 with my iBook in March 05. it died a couple months ago. I called Epson and they shipped me a new 4800, no problems with it.
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BenP
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
 
2006-02-14, 23:22

Canon, Canon, Canon. I've never had an Epson printer but HP sucks ass. My Canon i850 is the best printer I've ever had.
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torifile
Less than Stellar Member
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Durham, NC
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2006-02-14, 23:54

I dunno. My HP photosmart 8450 is nice. I got it for $99. It prints very decent quality pics and has Bonjour and networking support, so I just plugged it into my ABS and I had instant wireless printing (well, from my Macs. The windows computer required about 15 steps to get configured). I haven't had to buy ink for it yet, so it may not be all that cost-effective in the long run, but it works very well now.

If it's not red and showing substantial musculature, you're wearing it wrong.
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Dorian Gray
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
 
2006-02-15, 00:37

I have a Canon i250 that was dirt cheap to purchase (40 quid?), and uses ink cartridges that last a surprisingly long time and cost very little to replace. The printer worked by simply plugging it into my Mac with a USB cable, and it has sat on my desk looking pretty as a picture ever since. The print quality is great for general use, though I wouldn't use it to print a CV of course.

You can't go wrong with cheap Canon printers.
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patrickatm08
Member
 
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: College Station, TX
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2006-02-15, 07:19

Ounce for ounce, printer ink is more expensive than gold. Don't know if that helps, but I did get to type it on my new Apple keyboard I got for Valentine's Day, so I did...

I also have a Canon i250 and think it's nice. For a large amount (over 5 pages) or for a lot of color printing, I usually take my stuff to the campus computing center and print it out there on their dime (well, my dime that they've already taken...). Also, it fell about 6 feet from the top shelf in my closet and still works just fine.

White Macbook 2.0, 1gb RAM, 60gb HDD
1gb Shuffle, 4gb 2gen silver Mini
Shure e4 headphones
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