Author Topic: Inkjet Printers  (Read 13956 times)

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Offline grouchobyte

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #25 on: June 02, 2017, 04:10:42 am »
All inkjet printers are garbage. I only use monochrome laserjets. Screw color. One for letter size (hp 2035n)and another for 11x17 schematics and other drawings I need to read (hp 5200).

If you need color then consider anything but an inkjet. They are  a waste of money and the marketing wanks that hatched the idea should be exiled to a deserted island.

I recently discarded an  epson workforce tabloid printer just like this. It felt great. :-+ :-+

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« Last Edit: June 02, 2017, 04:12:30 am by grouchobyte »
 

Offline tooki

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #26 on: June 02, 2017, 04:27:56 am »
Who ever invented the inkjet and thought it was a perfect thing for casual users who rarely print things should be shot.
I don't think anyone who knows anything about printers thinks they're perfect for casual use. Naïve consumers who don't know any better choose the cheaper printer over the more expensive one, not realizing the downsides. (With laser traditionally being more expensive to buy, though that's changing now.)

As a giant printer nerd, I've been recommending for ages that sporadic users choose laser. 

Not to play down your problems with your inkjet printers guys, just chiming in to share my experiences on the opposite. I've been using Canon PiXMA inkjet photo printers for some 13 years now and never had a single clogged nozzle. They often sit unused for months/half a year on end and then print just fine when needed, after they finish their (admittedly long) maintenance routines.
Same here. I got my first Canon-branded* inkjet in 2003 after my Epson became irrecoverably clogged, as most Epsons of the era did. The Canons have never given me trouble. (Of course, I never buy entry-level; maybe those suck, but I say "caveat emptor" if you think buying a $79 printer is a good idea.)

*My first two printers were an Apple StyleWriter and Color StyleWriter Pro, which used the print engines from the Canon BJ-10e and BJC-600e, respectively. (I may be off by a letter on the "e" suffixes.) These printers were also tanks that handled any kind of abuse. I took old cartridges (they contained the print head) for the original StyleWriter and refilled them with all sorts of inks, from "proper" inkjet refills, to the cheapest fountain pen ink, and it reliably printed with them all. (I didn't dare try that with the Color StyleWriter Pro or any of my newer Canons, since they use separate individual ink tanks with a quasi-permanent printhead which I wouldn't want to contaminate.)

All inkjet printers are garbage. I only use monochrome laserjets. Screw color. One for letter size (hp 2035n)and another for 11x17 schematics and other drawings I need to read (hp 5200).

If you need color then consider anything but an inkjet. They are  a waste of money and the marketing wanks that hatched the idea should be exiled to a deserted island.
If you need high-quality color, inkjet is the winner, end of story. No color laser can match the print quality of a color inkjet.
 
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Offline Electro Detective

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #27 on: June 02, 2017, 06:53:56 am »
This post is rockin   :-+

I thought I was alone in having SERIAL bad luck with inkjet printers and Fing cartridges  |O clapping out wayyy before their use by date  :--

Next purchase favourite here appears to be a Mono laser printer,

hopefully plonk it down, fill er up, install drivers, test, 

and walk away   :phew:  :clap:

and if necessary buy an  -assume one good use only- colour inkjet printer


I'm def going to get into some Youtube inkjet printer demolition videos later,

and feel The Force flowing through them   :popcorn:



 

Offline steve30

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #28 on: June 02, 2017, 08:56:29 am »
I've never really had much trouble with inkjet printers. I find as long as you clean the dust and other crap out of them, they are fine. I've also found genuine canon ink to be better than generic.

My Canon ip4000 is 12 years old now and still works very well, although I normally use my LaserJet 4M Plus for anything non-colour.

I've been pondering getting my old Epson Stylus Photo 750 going again just for the fun of it. The motors in those sound like they are trying to play tunes :).
 

Offline rollatorwieltje

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #29 on: June 02, 2017, 09:08:14 am »
I bought a cheap Samsung color laser printer several years ago. It was cheaper than a full set of Epson inkjet cartridges. It even has ethernet and wifi. So far it's great, not a single paper jam or shitty prints. Granted, it's not the fastest (in color), but I couldn't care less, I don't print that much anyway. When I incidentally need to print something, the damn thing should just work.
 

Online tautech

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #30 on: June 02, 2017, 09:29:43 am »
I've been through a few ink jets and have a couple of lasers now, an old workhorse HP 6MP and an Oki C5200 colour that does shit hot photo quality.

Recently when we changed the office PC to Win 8.1 an oooold HP scanner was no longer supported so it had to go.  :-BROKE

Tucked away was a Canon Pixma that we had bought our daughter many moons ago and it had done so little work so I thought it might be useful for scanning and copying. Of course the head would likely be dried out and it was.  :( New cartridges and numerous cleaning cycles couldn't coax it into life.  :rant:

With nothing to lose I ripped the head out of it and gave it a good wash and clean. A little success but nowhere near what it should print like.
Spurred on by some small success I left the print side of the head on wet paper towels for a few hours in some misguided attempt to dissolve all the dried out ink in the jets. Result was much better but still not real good so it got the same treatment again, this time overnight.

Easy fix really once you know how.   ;) ;D
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Offline wraper

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #31 on: June 02, 2017, 09:58:33 am »
For me inkjet is nearly free to use. I bought canon pixma ip2200 in 2005 for about $50 + 4x 100ml bottles of good quality ink (lifetime supply) for like $15-20. Lasted me for about 9 years, bought black cartridge for about $18 once as it electrically died after many years. The downside was that it had cartridges with built in printhead, therefore less life and more pita to fill them. Right now Canon still sells printers with exactly the same cartridges, with one added ripoff, though. It has 2x less ink in usual cartridges, and my usual cartridges became "high capacity ones", and my high capacity cartridges are no longer supported by new models  :--.
In the end when color cartridge died 3 years ago, I just bought a more expensive Pixma ip7250 which has a standalone printhead + 5x 100ml bottles of decent ink for around $25-30. I think filled them around 5 times so far. No issues as for now.
Using laser printers won't be any cheaper for me, especially if using original consumables. They also come with crappy reduced capacity cartridges, so soon you will pay 60%+ of your cheap laser printer price.
« Last Edit: June 02, 2017, 10:05:23 am by wraper »
 
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Online jpanhalt

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #32 on: June 02, 2017, 10:44:44 am »
For me inkjet is nearly free to use. I bought canon pixma ip2200 in 2005 for about $50 + 4x 100ml bottles of good quality ink (lifetime supply) for like $15-20. Lasted me for about 9 years, bought black cartridge for about $18 once as it electrically died after many years. The downside was that it had cartridges with built in printhead, therefore less life and more pita to fill them. Right now Canon still sells printers with exactly the same cartridges, with one added ripoff, though. It has 2x less ink in usual cartridges, and my usual cartridges became "high capacity ones", and my high capacity cartridges are no longer supported by new models  :--.
In the end when color cartridge died 3 years ago, I just bought a more expensive Pixma ip7250 which has a standalone printhead + 5x 100ml bottles of decent ink for around $25-30. I think filled them around 5 times so far. No issues as for now.
Using laser printers won't be any cheaper for me, especially if using original consumables. They also come with crappy reduced capacity cartridges, so soon you will pay 60%+ of your cheap laser printer price.

If you think Canon's PIXMA is a ripoff, then buy a different brand.   Free printing is not a human right.
 
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Offline wraper

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #33 on: June 02, 2017, 11:09:00 am »
If you think Canon's PIXMA is a ripoff, then buy a different brand.   Free printing is not a human right.
:palm:, really? I just said they kept the same cartridges but halved their capacity (3ml per color  :-DD). You can see where the things are going. If that is not a ripoff, then I don't know how I should call it. "normal capacity" became nearly unusable, and those cartridges are a total waste of built in printheads as would last 20+ times of ink capacity in those cartridges.  I any case, this is a reason why I skipped those models right away and gone to higher price range.
 

Offline P90

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #34 on: June 02, 2017, 12:26:38 pm »
If you think Canon's PIXMA is a ripoff, then buy a different brand.   Free printing is not a human right.
:palm:, really? I just said they kept the same cartridges but halved their capacity (3ml per color  :-DD). You can see where the things are going. If that is not a ripoff, then I don't know how I should call it. "normal capacity" became nearly unusable, and those cartridges are a total waste of built in printheads as would last 20+ times of ink capacity in those cartridges.  I any case, this is a reason why I skipped those models right away and gone to higher price range.

That's a big time ripoff... all these inkjet printers and their "starter" cartridges are a ripoff. Everytime it cleans the head, it wastes half the ink... :(
 

Offline wraper

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #35 on: June 02, 2017, 12:34:31 pm »
If you think Canon's PIXMA is a ripoff, then buy a different brand.   Free printing is not a human right.
:palm:, really? I just said they kept the same cartridges but halved their capacity (3ml per color  :-DD). You can see where the things are going. If that is not a ripoff, then I don't know how I should call it. "normal capacity" became nearly unusable, and those cartridges are a total waste of built in printheads as would last 20+ times of ink capacity in those cartridges.  I any case, this is a reason why I skipped those models right away and gone to higher price range.

That's a big time ripoff... all these inkjet printers and their "starter" cartridges are a ripoff. Everytime it cleans the head, it wastes half the ink... :(
The point is, those are not just starter cartridges, like in laser printers. Those are "normal" capacity cartridges you buy in the store.
 

Offline P90

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #36 on: June 02, 2017, 12:36:42 pm »
If you think Canon's PIXMA is a ripoff, then buy a different brand.   Free printing is not a human right.
:palm:, really? I just said they kept the same cartridges but halved their capacity (3ml per color  :-DD). You can see where the things are going. If that is not a ripoff, then I don't know how I should call it. "normal capacity" became nearly unusable, and those cartridges are a total waste of built in printheads as would last 20+ times of ink capacity in those cartridges.  I any case, this is a reason why I skipped those models right away and gone to higher price range.

That's a big time ripoff... all these inkjet printers and their "starter" cartridges are a ripoff. Everytime it cleans the head, it wastes half the ink... :(
The point is, those are not just starter cartridges, like in laser printers. Those are "normal" capacity cartridges you buy in the store.

in that case let me rephrase that... it's a fvcking rip-off!
 

Offline jonovid

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #37 on: June 02, 2017, 01:01:33 pm »
If you think Canon's PIXMA is a ripoff, then buy a different brand.   Free printing is not a human right.
:palm:, really? I just said they kept the same cartridges but halved their capacity (3ml per color  :-DD). You can see where the things are going. If that is not a ripoff, then I don't know how I should call it. "normal capacity" became nearly unusable, and those cartridges are a total waste of built in printheads as would last 20+ times of ink capacity in those cartridges.  I any case, this is a reason why I skipped those models right away and gone to higher price range.

That's a big time ripoff... all these inkjet printers and their "starter" cartridges are a ripoff. Everytime it cleans the head, it wastes half the ink... :(
The point is, those are not just starter cartridges, like in laser printers. Those are "normal" capacity cartridges you buy in the store.

in that case let me rephrase that... it's a fvcking rip-off!

my local officeworks has printers.  :-+ so why bother with the cost of owning one.
we all know the business model, cheap inkjet printers, sold at cost. expensive cartridges, all this running on firmware that has hiddan spyware. >:D
I have a inkjet printer just for the flatbed scanner in the lid of it. I have given up on printers a long time ago!
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Offline macboy

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #38 on: June 02, 2017, 02:17:58 pm »
I still have a TWENTY year old Epson Photo EX. This prints up to nearly 12" wide with six ink colours, which is why I have kept it. I fired it up a few weeks ago to do a print job. This was the first time it was even plugged in, in about 7 or 8 years. No joke. I installed a "new" (>10 year old, but unused) ink tank and performed two or three cleaning cycles and boom... working like a champ. I did a test print to flush some more ink through the system, then I was off and printing.  Epson piezo print heads FTW.
 

Offline DmitryL

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #39 on: June 02, 2017, 07:21:07 pm »
All inkjet printers are garbage. I only use monochrome laserjets. Screw color. One for letter size (hp 2035n)and another for 11x17 schematics and other drawings I need to read (hp 5200).
If you need color then consider anything but an inkjet. They are  a waste of money and the marketing wanks that hatched the idea should be exiled to a deserted island.
I recently discarded an  epson workforce tabloid printer just like this. It felt great. :-+ :-+

Come on :) There are some more or less good working inkjet printers... I can recommend these guys as an example (among many others):
http://digital.markandy.com/
A bit expensive though :)




 

Offline tooki

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #40 on: June 02, 2017, 07:51:05 pm »
If you think Canon's PIXMA is a ripoff, then buy a different brand.   Free printing is not a human right.
:palm:, really? I just said they kept the same cartridges but halved their capacity (3ml per color  :-DD). You can see where the things are going. If that is not a ripoff, then I don't know how I should call it. "normal capacity" became nearly unusable, and those cartridges are a total waste of built in printheads as would last 20+ times of ink capacity in those cartridges.  I any case, this is a reason why I skipped those models right away and gone to higher price range.
Well, again, if you spend $50 on a printer, you're gonna be paying through the nose (and other select body parts) for the ink. It's almost universally smarter to spend 2-3x as much up front on the printer, in exchange for much lower running costs.
 

Offline wraper

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #41 on: June 02, 2017, 08:00:23 pm »
If you think Canon's PIXMA is a ripoff, then buy a different brand.   Free printing is not a human right.
:palm:, really? I just said they kept the same cartridges but halved their capacity (3ml per color  :-DD). You can see where the things are going. If that is not a ripoff, then I don't know how I should call it. "normal capacity" became nearly unusable, and those cartridges are a total waste of built in printheads as would last 20+ times of ink capacity in those cartridges.  I any case, this is a reason why I skipped those models right away and gone to higher price range.
Well, again, if you spend $50 on a printer, you're gonna be paying through the nose (and other select body parts) for the ink. It's almost universally smarter to spend 2-3x as much up front on the printer, in exchange for much lower running costs.
The issue is, a few years earlier they sold printers for a little bit less money and same cartridges but 2x more of capacity (still supported by new models). The most ridiculous part was that they dropped support for true high capacity cartridges for no technical reason.
 

Offline grouchobyte

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #42 on: June 02, 2017, 08:58:06 pm »
All inkjet printers are garbage. I only use monochrome laserjets. Screw color. One for letter size (hp 2035n)and another for 11x17 schematics and other drawings I need to read (hp 5200).
If you need color then consider anything but an inkjet. They are  a waste of money and the marketing wanks that hatched the idea should be exiled to a deserted island.
I recently discarded an  epson workforce tabloid printer just like this. It felt great. :-+ :-+

Come on :) There are some more or less good working inkjet printers... I can recommend these guys as an example (among many others):
http://digital.markandy.com/
A bit expensive though :)

I need 11x17 or tabloid format because I print B size schematics, mostly for making red-line edits when debugging a circuit. There is nothing available that is reasonably priced between inkjet crap ( and I mean CRAP) like EPSON or a full blown color laser  at $2000 USD. Even a new monochrome Laserjet from HP is the size of a small car, weights 80 lbs and cost $1.8K USD. I hear that architects are flocking to the market in search of used/refurbished monochrome laser printers like the HP5200 because there is really slim pickings on the tabloid printer market unless you prefer screwing with ink or paying through the nose for a really high end plotter.

Ya, I know for letter size there are some decent inkjets on the market. I will NEVER consider one again for 11x17 printing, NEVER! :palm:


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« Last Edit: June 02, 2017, 09:00:05 pm by grouchobyte »
 

Offline janoc

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #43 on: June 02, 2017, 09:00:45 pm »
I haven't had an inkjet printer in 20 years...
Laser all-in-one is the way to go.

For you :P Go ahead and print a gallery-quality photo on a gallery-quality paper on your laser printer ;)

If I need gallery-quality photos on a gallery-quality paper I will go to a professional printing service and not screw around with a crappy inkjet and overpriced paper. The results will be much better.
 
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Offline tooki

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #44 on: June 02, 2017, 09:04:11 pm »
If you think Canon's PIXMA is a ripoff, then buy a different brand.   Free printing is not a human right.
:palm:, really? I just said they kept the same cartridges but halved their capacity (3ml per color  :-DD). You can see where the things are going. If that is not a ripoff, then I don't know how I should call it. "normal capacity" became nearly unusable, and those cartridges are a total waste of built in printheads as would last 20+ times of ink capacity in those cartridges.  I any case, this is a reason why I skipped those models right away and gone to higher price range.
Well, again, if you spend $50 on a printer, you're gonna be paying through the nose (and other select body parts) for the ink. It's almost universally smarter to spend 2-3x as much up front on the printer, in exchange for much lower running costs.
The issue is, a few years earlier they sold printers for a little bit less money and same cartridges but 2x more of capacity (still supported by new models). The most ridiculous part was that they dropped support for true high capacity cartridges for no technical reason.
I assume you're referring to the PG-30/40/50 series and the color equivalents? Yeah, it's a bit strange. (That change coincided with moving to region-coded cartridges, i.e. the PG-40 and -50 are worldwide, but USA has the PG-30 while Europe and Oceania have the PG-37. Ever since then, new cartridge series have been released as e.g. PG-2xx for USA and PG-5xx for elsewhere.)

What's really strange, though, is that the page yield on the PG cartridges — which Canon has obviously gone to great lengths to not advertise — are odd. For example, some places list the PG-30 as having 220 pages yield and the PG-40 having 195, despite the latter being larger. (30/37: 11ml, 40: 16ml, 50: 22ml).
 

Offline tooki

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #45 on: June 02, 2017, 09:09:59 pm »
I haven't had an inkjet printer in 20 years...
Laser all-in-one is the way to go.

For you :P Go ahead and print a gallery-quality photo on a gallery-quality paper on your laser printer ;)

If I need gallery-quality photos on a gallery-quality paper I will go to a professional printing service and not screw around with a crappy inkjet and overpriced paper. The results will be much better.
And what do you think they will print it on? If it's larger than an 8x10", they're gonna do a giclée print — the art community's snobby and inadvertently perverted term for, you guessed it, an inkjet print.

Yes, for smaller prints you can get it printed on actual silver halide photo paper. But it's not really better than inkjet in terms of print quality. And an inkjet print using archival pigment inks should be more lightfast than a silver halide print, since the color dyes in silver halide paper are not as stable as pigments.

For smaller sizes there's also dye sublimation, though you really only find it at those instant-gratification photo print kiosks at stores anymore.
 

Offline imidis

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #46 on: June 02, 2017, 09:18:08 pm »
Not necessarily. Production laser printers do a pretty damn good job. Either way a professional print service will be able to do it cheaper and better regardless of method.
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Online helius

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #47 on: June 02, 2017, 09:33:27 pm »
I look at a lot of photographs in galleries, and I've noticed that the pseudorandom dot pattern on inkjet-printed work is almost always visible. It is not visible on lightjet/lambda prints.
 

Offline wraper

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #48 on: June 02, 2017, 09:52:50 pm »
I assume you're referring to the PG-30/40/50 series and the color equivalents? Yeah, it's a bit strange. (That change coincided with moving to region-coded cartridges, i.e. the PG-40 and -50 are worldwide, but USA has the PG-30 while Europe and Oceania have the PG-37. Ever since then, new cartridge series have been released as e.g. PG-2xx for USA and PG-5xx for elsewhere.)

What's really strange, though, is that the page yield on the PG cartridges — which Canon has obviously gone to great lengths to not advertise — are odd. For example, some places list the PG-30 as having 220 pages yield and the PG-40 having 195, despite the latter being larger. (30/37: 11ml, 40: 16ml, 50: 22ml).
Yes I mean them and CL-38(31), CL-41, CL-51
 

Offline james_s

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Re: Inkjet Printers
« Reply #49 on: June 02, 2017, 10:44:28 pm »
Photo print quality on color laser printers varies widely. My friend had a Minolta Magicolor laser that produced beautiful semigloss photos, almost as good as an inkjet on photo paper. The consumables were horrendously expensive for a laser though.
 


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