printer recommendations

J

jeepster485

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It's great how bad things always come together for some reason....

Almost four months ago I purchased an HP 3420 printer since my Epson sucked ink and always was clogged when I tried to print. When I was trying to print a bank statement off my account since I was charged twice for the same thing, I noticed it was taking too much paper so I cancelled to re-print. Well the printer didn't like this and made a loud clunk and then the printer sounded like it was eating itself. I pulled a little plastic chunk out of it and the heads bounce back and forth freely now...I don't think this is natural. I highly doubt HP will honor anything since this printer supposedly has a 90 day warranty and it broke 23 days out of that warranty. But I will try to bargain with them. Some experience for my first HP printer I guess. Since it looks like I'm gonna have to get a new printer before college, I was wondering if anyone could recommend a good printer that isn't expensive, doesn't go through an ink tank every 2 days, doesn't clog if it's not used for a week, and doesn't break after owning it for 23 days outside of its warranty. Thanks.
 
Do you need color? If not, a cheap laser printer may be a good way to go, and the above Brother may fit your bill!
 
I tell you, avoid Epson. My old 740i is soooooo stupid that it will not print an image in black if the color cartridge is out of ink. The black cartridge is fine and I set up the doc to be black, but it simply will not print. In addition, there is no error message - just a job that continually fails until you change the color cartridge. This is so stupid, I have to wonder, is it on purpose? Are printer cartridges the only way Epson can make money and if so, is this a clever way to get me to always keep a spare black and color cartridge on hand? This borders on a conspiracy theory and the more simple explanation is that they still simply can't write a dinky little app like a printer driver. It is not rocket science.
 
I bought the Brother HL-5070N for about $450 delivered; it's cheaper now at pagecomputers.com.

The HL-5070N is network ready (10/100-Base-T on board), prints incredibly fast, and can be upgraded with more RAM if you need it. I haven't needed it (yet, but will probably do so in the next few months).

It's recognized as a "plain old LaserWriter" but you may certainly install the Brother drivers for whatever "special" features the LW software doesn't support. Use LaserWriter8 for OS9 and leave it as a "generic" printer; it works fine.

You can also buy add'l years of warranty directly from Brother for <$75 for year two and about $100 for year three. That's a good way of making your printing costs a budgetary line item. Toner costs are also not too expensive.

BTW - This -is- a PostScript3-compatible unit.

Barry
 
I have never had a problem with my Epson. Beautiful print outs.

On the other hand my HP tends to decide what document it will print. I can not print any PC document that has been converted to Mac. It prints one page then stalls. I end up taking it to my Epson and all is fine.

By the way, most printers will not print a thing if one of the cartridges is empty. It's like walking with only one shoe on.
 
Originally posted by Cheryl
I have never had a problem with my Epson. Beautiful print outs.
Click to expand...
Ditto for our HP Deskjet 935C. Even though it's an HP.

Read the magazines, like Mac Addict and Macworld, and see what they recommend.
 
Hmm, maybe I should go look for one. I could really use a printer in my room, especially when school starts. Although I think I'd be printing a lot more text documents than pictures, meaning I'd prefer a laser printer over a photo printer.
 
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