<p>My old HP T45 died today - it was a great all in one copier, printer, fax, scanner. I work from home so it will be used for some business related copying and printing, very little faxing and some picture printing. I’m looking for a good value - as in, the best I can get for not a lot of money. Any suggestions?</p>
<p>there are several new HP models that are great…I’d suggest a road trip to your local Staples, Best Buy, Circuit City, or Office Max, and check them out. Then go online and you’ll probably be able to get it cheaper!</p>
<p>D got an HP 4280 free with her macbook last summer. Didn’t have room to take it to school, so it stayed here with us. Does a good job printing photos but sucks up the ink at a rate I can’t believe. Has had very light printing duty (that computer is also connected to a black and white laserjet for normal printing. This week is suddenly decided to print my Christmas letters minus half the photos and with every other paragraph in bold (perhaps printed twice instead of the photos?) Unplugged, uninstalled all software, reinstalled. Same problem. Haven’t had time to sit around for hours waiting for HP support, especially considering the original cost, but geez…</p>
<p>I dont like all in ones- suck the ink- slow- etc my epson was so slow and I didn’t like the ink so well either.
I would prefer a laser printer for text and a inkjet for color
tht said I just bought a canon ip4500 that has excellent color and speed.</p>
<p>I agree. Do some comparing (screw the stores, go for amazon or newegg or something online like that, they’ll have MUCH better deals, especially after christmas) and compare lasers and inkjets. I agree with emarald, in that laser is the way to go for black and white. I would try to get a copier/scanner with the laser, and then buy a cheaper inkjet for color (laser colors are a tad expensive still). You’ll spend a tad more, but overall, you’ll save the hassle of inkjet cartridges and laser printing is much more convienent (if you’re business printing, you’re probably highlighting/writing on, and it doesn’t bleed/run)</p>
<p>If you don’t do much color printing, I would get a laser-monochrome (black only) and a photo printer.</p>
<p>I print so few things that matter any more - I email everything. Now and then, I print things out to see how they look before I email them to a client. Speed is not an issue. I should probably just use the freebie Epson that came with my computer for color stuff and get a laser for black and white and get a separate photo printer. I like making my decision before going to the stores - hate shopping around for these things.</p>
<p>I hate the idea of an all in one. I got a HP printer (new in the box) at a yard sale for $15 for when the time comes I need a new one. I also have picked up a scanner for $2 for when the one I have now ($5) dies. I hate that the bulb isn’t a consumer replaceable part. Printing pictures at home is an expensive proposition. I can get then done locally for .15 and sometimes the online sites have good deals. makes no financial sense to print pictures at home.</p>
<p>No suggestions as to brand, but I say go cheap if you don’t do a lot of printing. And get cartridges that you can refill yourself. the ink is the money maker for the manufactures.</p>
<p>We love our all-in-ones. We replaced a relatively new HP with Canons though, because it’s almost impossible to refill the HP ink cartridges and very easy to refill Canon’s. We buy ink refill kits at Costco and also online - saves us hundreds of dollars a year. I highly recommend the Canon MP600; easy to use, easy to refill and did very well in consumer testings.</p>
<p>I prefer to go to the techy review websites, like this one: [Canon</a> Pixma MP830 Multifunction Device reviews - CNET Reviews](<a href=“CNET: Product reviews, advice, how-tos and the latest news”>CNET: Product reviews, advice, how-tos and the latest news)
And then looking for the best deals on-line and in stores. Best buy had printers on-sale and some had free shipping or you can order on-line and pick up in the store. Alot of the newer all-in-ones have power saver modes and individual ink replacements so you just replace the color you need.</p>
<p>I love HPs. We have 4-year-old 7550 that keeps on going and I use that for high-quality prints. Bought an all-in-one HP 5750 from Costco and use it for fax, scan, printing. Cheap–$100? can’t recall. Prints nicely, not fast but fast enough. I think HPs are really pretty darn good with ink usage.</p>
<p>sewbusy - I was researching the Canon MX700 last night as one that looked like it would suit my needs - probably the newer model of yours. I loved my old HP, but the reviews on sites like CNET are not good - the editor reviews are better than the customer reviews it seems. I had no idea that printers were so cheap these days. I thought I was looking at refurbished prices when I first looked at the websites. I realize all electronic equipment has gotten cheaper over the years, but I didn’t know there were entry level printers for less than $100.</p>
<p>All in one machines do a poor job compared with dedicated units. If you want to print photos you need a dedicated printer. The speed will be slow and the ink too expensive for routine printing. You can get a fairly decent photo printer for about $100. For general printing, I highly recommend a laser printer. These are well under $100. They last forever, have low printing costs and print very fast. We also have a separate Fax/phone answering machine.</p>
<p>You’re right edad - that is what my decision has to be - do I sacrifice quality for space considerations and the convenience of buying one and being done with it. I know the minute I go with the all in one inkjet, I’ll have a project come up that I’d love to have the laser for. I wish I didn’t need the fax, but I do still have to fax things fairly regularly for my business.</p>
<p>Dragonmom, are you using the 4280 with a PC? I’ve been supporting some of those and I’ve seen a problem with them printing out like half a page then spitting the rest out…sounds sort of similar to your problem. Go to start > control panel > printers and faxes and set the 4280 as the default printer. It’s not exactly the same problem I’ve been seeing but it’s worth a try, I suppose…</p>
<p>I got a all-in-one with my laptop through school, but I hate it. 99% of the time I print in black and white (notes, Powerpoint slides, whatever) so it wasn’t practical to have something sucking up ink cartridges like that. I bought a HP laserjet for $55 and it’s fantastic.</p>
<p>I purchased the Canon MP530 this summer at Staples using an on-line coupon during a sale. It was highly rated by several sources. It cost about $135., and includes fax, copy, print & scan. So far, I’ve been happy with the quality of nearly everything, but it does have a few quirks as well. </p>
<p>Positives:</p>
<p>Basically, I like the multi-function machine for the occasional need. It is primarily used as a printer. If you have a specific need, you may want a faster or better machine for that particular need. I sometimes wish I splurged and bought the next higher unit (830?) which also scans slides and negatives, but I will probably buy a separate unit for those if and when I decide to digitize our old photos.</p>
<p>The first time I changed the black ink was in Dec. (about 4 months use) which seemed a longer duration than our former HP multi-function machine. However, we are also one less person in our household. I like the separate cartridges. You only replace the ink you need, rather than throwing away a half-full multi-color cartridge. </p>
<p>Photos are slow, but good quality. I send the majority to a local photo store at $.15 a copy. I only do an occasional photo at home, but the convenience is nice when needed. </p>
<p>Negatives:</p>
<p>It is a very large (and heavy) machine that may not work if space is an issue. </p>
<p>I cannot figure out how to coordinate the fax with our answering service line. It will occasionally (but not consistantly) send the fax tone after I’ve picked up another phone in the house. </p>
<p>You cannot refill the cartridges at the local Walgreens. I haven’t tried to refill myself yet.</p>
<p>I purchased a Samsung SCX-4200 multi-function (scanner, printer, copier) on-line for about $140, mainly because the per-copy cost is so low. I liked it so much that I bought one for my wife, and also one for each of my two kids who are at college right now. The only annoying aspect of this printer is that the hardware / software tells you that you are low or out of toner sooner than you actually are. This does not disallow you from printing though, so you only need to ignore the generated messages until you can see that the copies are actually getting low on toner. If you look at the cost of replacement toner cartridges and the number of copies you can obtain, this is an extremely cost-effective printer. I probably print about 1500 pages per month, and I have had this printer for about 1 1/2 years with zero problems, and my kids have also had excellent performance.</p>
<p>By the way, I also work from home, and the times when I need to send or receive faxes I use [url=<a href=“http://www.greenfax.com%5DGreenFax.com”>http://www.greenfax.com]GreenFax.com</a> - Internet Faxing / Virtual Fax<a href=“there%20are%20other%20similar%20competitors”>/url</a>, which allows me to e-mail a Microsoft Word or PDF file to them and have it faxed to any phone number at a very cheap rate (usually about $0.07 per page) and also converts received faxes (I have my own assigned fax phone number in my area code) into PDF files that are e-mailed to me.</p>
<p>When my HP DeskJet 932C leaked like someone stabbed it in the heart, I went on ebay and got another (because I had a fortune in brand new ink cartridges in the desk drawer).</p>
<p>Has anyone any experience with the new Kodak printers whose ink cartridges are so cheap?</p>
<p>Interesting info about the fax service. I am usually dealing with resumes and transcripts so I have to be extra careful about confidentiality. Not that I have any reasons to distrust the services, but it is something to consider.</p>