Good inkjet printer? (Oxymoron I know)

[RadiclDreamer]

My wifes HP printer just died and we're in the market for a new one, being a corporate IT guy I've always been partial to HP but their consumer grade product reviews are horrible so I am second guessing that. What is a good model these days that does pretty decent quality photo printing with wireless? I'd rather not break the bank but $150 isnt out of the question either if its a good product with cheap (comparatively) ink.

 

[RadiclDreamer]

Bump?

 

[DaveSimmons]

I have a Canon Pixma from a few years back with the 3 separate color tanks + black. I think it was the $100-130 model not a cheaper one.

The quality was good and I was impressed by how the ink tanks did not dry out. I used it for some xmas cards and custom DVD sleeves one December and the next December I was able to print more xmas cards with the same ink tanks.

I normally use my 5+ year old Brother laser for printing and the Canon is boxed up in a closet so I can't check the model.

 

[Pardus]

HP printers suck, get a Brother.

 

[nwo]

HP printers suck, get a Brother.

I like my HP OfficeJet Pro 8600+. It's got all the basic features I like. Print/scan/copy/fax and most importantly double sided printing. Wireless is super easy to setup without ever having to connect it to a PC. Scans to network PCs or memory card/USB. The only thing that bugs me is faxing more than 1 page at a time (especially if they are double sided) is a difficult challenge. It has a bunch of other features I don't use like converting scanned documents into word, eFAX, etc... The ink seems to last forever (at least 3k pages of mostly black and white office forms, with some color for logo) and I get them super cheap ~$10-15 each from printpal.

 

[JackMDS]

The old Cannon PIXMA (like the 4000) were excellent color printers.

The prices if the few that left around is outrages.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listi...&condition=all

Unfortunately these days Canon interest is more focused on developing "Tricks" to force you to buy more Ink rather than on quality of printing.

 

[razel]

Another vote for the Brother. Try to get their small office inkjets. They're reliable and solid with wireless networking and ones we own do not do any trickery with ink. They even follow common networking/scanning standards that our old 2010 model can be printed on and scanned from using iPad/Android devices!

I also like the Canon PIXMAs, but only the more recent 2013 models. I recently got the 5420. It's dog slow if you don't print often since it does it's stretches and warms up, but it always does print. I print probably 50-100 pages a year and I still am using the ink that it came with.

Avoid the entry level Epsons... I had the Artisan 430-something from 2012. Terrible print quality. I even warranteed it. Totally unacceptable print quality. Quality is as if you can never align the print heads. I loved the screen interface though, too bad they forgot that it was suppose to be a printer.

 

[JackMDS]

Brothers are scary.

Some of them very good in color printing and general use.

Some are Just good for general use, and some Models are really scary in their functionality.

I.e., instead of just "throwing out" Brand names it will be nice if people will vouch for specific models.

 

[PliotronX]

True story, my coworker was working on networking hardware at an office when somebody walked in and exclaimed "the black brothers not working!" A good laugh was had by all.

Anyway, I love Brother printers, more specifically laser. It is catnip to me. Can't help with inkjet other than tell you HP makes great hardware but their drivers can be crap. The cheaper HP's will jam on you. If you can at all, I'd suggest staying away from ink. It's a tossup whether the ABS plastic in a 3D printer is cheaper than ink.

 

[FrankSchwab]

Had an HP Officejet 6500 for about three years; worked great, especially once I put in a continuous ink system (external tanks) from cisinks.com. Eventually the printhead gave up (after roughly 15000 sheets of paper), and I decided it was time to buy something new. What surprised me is how seldom we had any printhead clogs - previous inkjets seemed to have problems like that once a month or so.

Got a Canon MX922 back in December, and it's worked fine for us so far. Replaced the starter cartridges with a refillable set from CISInks (notice a trend here?), and still no problems. I think I prefer the external tank system, though; these seem to be lasting about a month, which implies a lot of refilling.

 

[nickbits]

Owning hp, epson and canon, canon is overall the best IMHO. Reliable unit, good quality, decent features and ink carts are easy to get cheap compatible carts.

I have an mx882 right now and it is the best home printer I've used.

 

[Pardus]

Brothers are scary.

Some of them very good in color printing and general use.

Some are Just good for general use, and some Models are really scary in their functionality.

I.e., instead of just "throwing out" Brand names it will be nice if people will vouch for specific models.

Have the Brother MFC-J470DW, got it for $50 @ staples. Does color/b&w copies, scans, multi-page faxes and prints. Also prints duplex and goes to sleep mode after 5 mins of no-activity. It does use chip ink, but i found a seller on ebay who has generic inks, all 4-replacement for $20 and they work perfectly fine. No issues with it at all.

 

[nageov3t]

I own a Brother MFC-J825DW and I've been pretty happy with it.

I do photo printing semi-regularly (because, lbr, digital picture frames are kinda tacky) and I've been perfectly satisfied with the results. ink replacements have been fairly cheap, since it seems to work with third-party ink without a hiccup.

 

[Doppel]

I will never buy an inkjet again. After years and years of awful relationships I bought a $140 brother laserjet monochrome last year and my life is forever changed. I can't do photos, but I do them cheaper (and never worrying about ink or crap) at walmart the infrequent times I need them.

 

[RadiclDreamer]

I ended up getting the MFCJ870DW Wireless from Brother, will let you guys know how it panes out. As for getting a laser, yeah im well aware how much cheaper and more reliable they are but alas, my wife loves to print photos. I never print anything so all I care about is the reliability and cost per copy.