Have set out my learning from experience in the tricky business of home printing.
If you only need black and white then ignore this and follow JohnD’s advice “OKI Printer” and buy a laser (probably a Samsung or OKI depending on pocket depth, but I’m no expert here).
For me only I would do same. The family insist on colour capability. They don’t care that the printer manufacturers and the rest must be making a lot of dosh out of cartridges.
I started with a Lexmark. Never again. The cartridges cost the earth and the ink’s gone before you switch the printer on. It still remains in the house surprisingly in the capacity of scanner only.
Next I looked for the cheapest cartridge that was readily available (thinking buy new whenever needed). I did not have time to do research as printers always fail when you need them. The Epson (R240) is as bad as the Lexmark. The cartridges are cheep but don’t contain hardly enough ink. Also the head priming/cleaning utility drinks it like there’s no tomorrow.
Then made it 3 disasters in a row. Thought refilling was the answer. After much time and effort I now have the complete refilling kit (thick newspaper opened at centre page, latex gloves, syringes, stopper plugs, cleaning fluid, ink, paper towels, drill bits, chip re setter, instruction sheet) mostly from www.jrinkjet.com. I got good additional tips from (http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/inkjet_cleaning.html). I was very sceptical about using the folded kitchen paper magic carpet trick to clean the printer heads (major drawback of the low cost cartridge printer ie no head on the cartridge and no access to clean the inbuilt head) but it worked a treat (I used my bought cleaning fluid not the sainsbury cleaner only because I had the bought stuff in stock).
The verdict is still out on refilling as I am looking at the derivative of continuous ink flow systems (www.proprint.co.uk) as a sensible wayforward (the inbuilt printer head is still a major concern as you can’t see it to assess it’s condition).
Next went to my trusted local cartridge shop to get his recommendation. Any HP that uses cartridges 337/343 and 350/351. What sold it for me is that HP also have an extra large capacity cartridge for each which is the same cost to refill as the standard.
Pockets are empty at the mo but I think when the time comes it’s going to be HP just like the sauce (the weight of the Epson lawsuits in the US weighs too heavy against it).
If you only need black and white then ignore this and follow JohnD’s advice “OKI Printer” and buy a laser (probably a Samsung or OKI depending on pocket depth, but I’m no expert here).
For me only I would do same. The family insist on colour capability. They don’t care that the printer manufacturers and the rest must be making a lot of dosh out of cartridges.
I started with a Lexmark. Never again. The cartridges cost the earth and the ink’s gone before you switch the printer on. It still remains in the house surprisingly in the capacity of scanner only.
Next I looked for the cheapest cartridge that was readily available (thinking buy new whenever needed). I did not have time to do research as printers always fail when you need them. The Epson (R240) is as bad as the Lexmark. The cartridges are cheep but don’t contain hardly enough ink. Also the head priming/cleaning utility drinks it like there’s no tomorrow.
Then made it 3 disasters in a row. Thought refilling was the answer. After much time and effort I now have the complete refilling kit (thick newspaper opened at centre page, latex gloves, syringes, stopper plugs, cleaning fluid, ink, paper towels, drill bits, chip re setter, instruction sheet) mostly from www.jrinkjet.com. I got good additional tips from (http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/inkjet_cleaning.html). I was very sceptical about using the folded kitchen paper magic carpet trick to clean the printer heads (major drawback of the low cost cartridge printer ie no head on the cartridge and no access to clean the inbuilt head) but it worked a treat (I used my bought cleaning fluid not the sainsbury cleaner only because I had the bought stuff in stock).
The verdict is still out on refilling as I am looking at the derivative of continuous ink flow systems (www.proprint.co.uk) as a sensible wayforward (the inbuilt printer head is still a major concern as you can’t see it to assess it’s condition).
Next went to my trusted local cartridge shop to get his recommendation. Any HP that uses cartridges 337/343 and 350/351. What sold it for me is that HP also have an extra large capacity cartridge for each which is the same cost to refill as the standard.
Pockets are empty at the mo but I think when the time comes it’s going to be HP just like the sauce (the weight of the Epson lawsuits in the US weighs too heavy against it).
