JerryM Posted July 22, 2006 Share Posted July 22, 2006 (edited) When I bought my Dell computer I got a Dell 922 all in one printer. It is a Lexmark I think. I do not like it, but it does OK for most things.I like to make greeting cards, and I do not believe my 922 makes as good color reproductions as it should. Accordingly, I am considering another printer. Today at Best Buy I looked at a HP 3210 printer. It seemed to have good specs, but I would appreciate any advice as to a good HP printer. I say HP because I have not seen another brand I like as well. I think the price of the 3210 is about as much as I desire to pay.I like the multiple color cartridges, but have not used a printer that had them.Any advice will be appreciated.Regards,Jerry Edited July 22, 2006 by JerryM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted July 22, 2006 Share Posted July 22, 2006 I have had several HP printers with the multiple printer cartridges. I loved it. They were more cost effective in the long run but I stepped up to something that is even more cost effective in the long run - a color laser printer. While mine cost about $400 when I bought it, they are much cheaper even now. Take a look here: http://www.compusa.com/products/product_in...0_Laser_PrinterIt is only about $80 more than what you picked out but it is heads above the best inkjet. I can not see going back to an inkjet at this point in time. I'm like you with HP.. My first printer was an okidata printwheel back in the early 80's but every printer since then has been an HP except one and I ditched it because it had too many problems (it was even a color laser too). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeber Posted July 22, 2006 Share Posted July 22, 2006 <Full disclosure> I work recycling printer consumables.Consumables, the cartridges, are the one item most people don't consider when buying a printer. Inkjets come in two general varieties; ones with the print heads mounted on the cartridge (HP, Lexmark, newer Canons) and those that use ink tanks (Epson, older Canons, Brothers). There are good and bad to both. With printhead cartridges, you replace the print head every time you change a cartridge. There are also more parts, primarly the electronic strip and the head itself, to go wrong. Ink tanks are cheaper and usually carry more ink. But reusing a common print head, hard mounted in the printer, means the whole printer itself may last a shorter time.Ink itself can be problematic. Batches may differ in color tone, and so prints with one cartridge of cyan may look quite different from those printed with another cyan cartridge (yellow and black are pretty consistant, cyan and magenta can differ greatly, especially if you switch from OEMs [Original Equipment Manufacturer...like HP or Epson] to compatibles). Ink can leak and improperly stored cartridges (see my work site at cwsandiego.com for tips on keeping them properly) can dry out and become unusable.Toner printers are much more reliable, but the consumables can cost 10 times more. Of course, they can last 10 times longer. I use a monochrome laser printer at home (Samsung ML-2010) which I love. Obviously, I refill my own cartridges, so my consumable cost is zero, not counting paper @ $4 a ream. Again, the color quality can change slightly from one batch of toner to another. <Here's my soft-sales pitch> To keep costs down with either ink or toner, find a refiller/remanufacturer you can trust and recycle your cartridges. I'm not talking about home refill kits. Those are horrible. Let a pro do it for you, you'll still save money over buying OEMs each time.Just don't buy an HP 3500 series laser printer. The cartridges are frustratingly complex and can only be recycled once before you have to buy another OEM anyway. We use an HP 2550 color laser at work and I love the output. If I could afford one, that would probably be my choice. Print a few test pages before you buy. Be sure you like the color, no matter if it's inkjet or laser.(Worth considering: the 3210 uses HP 02 cartridges which have a very small [about 6 grams] ink capacity. If you do a lot of printing, you're going to be going through these at quite a clip. Also, all-in-ones concern me in that if one part fails, say the scanner quits working, you have to lose the use of your printer just to get the scanner repaired. More functions=more parts=more points of potential failure. I'm more confident with single function machines.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted July 22, 2006 Share Posted July 22, 2006 Mine is an HP 2550 as well and I absolutely love it. I have replaced half of my cartridges now once and have replacements ready for the other two. I will probably send the cartridges off at some point but have a while to decide. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeber Posted July 22, 2006 Share Posted July 22, 2006 Teacher, if you hold the green button down for a few seconds, it will print an internally stored test page. The image on the test print is how I want my front room to look. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted July 22, 2006 Share Posted July 22, 2006 Hmm, let me go run grab one out of the trash can..... On second thought, do you wan thte shole page or just the test image? Have you considered prism markers and doing it yourself? Don't ask how I know prism markers do great designs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scot Posted July 23, 2006 Share Posted July 23, 2006 I'm a laser guy. Going a long way back. But I like ink-jet for the infrequent color I need to print. I would like to get a color laser at some point, but every time I check them out the print quality and consumables prices disappoint me. I'm just writing to say that I've found HP inkjets to be unreliable and the most expensive to maintain from the consumables perspective.Last time I faced this decision, I bought a Canon Pixma i400r (might have the model name wrong, but it's the 400 that has built-in ethernet and wireless). Let me just tell you that I adore this printer. Deep love. It's been a joy from the start. It works great. In fact it so much, I bought the 520 for my wife, which has a bit better photo printing.I expect to get a color laser next time around. My current laser is an HP LaserJet 5MP that I bought in early 1995. It doesn't owe me anything!-- Scot Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted July 23, 2006 Share Posted July 23, 2006 I gave up my HPiiip about four years ago. I donated it to a charity because it just kept going nad going and going. My daughter loves the Canon Pixma i400. It was a freebie with some purchase (I think it was a camera). She is using it at college and really loves it. I have had a love-hate-hate relationship with Canon because the were always so ink intensive. I gave away the one my hubbie purchased. Scot When you are ready to go laser look at the HP 2550 or a similar current model. I replaced two cartridges after 4000 pages but it ships with the half size cartridges instead of full size ones. We will see how long the others last. I still have aboug 40% of my first black cartridge and a similst amount of magenta left. Will see how they hold out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerryM Posted July 23, 2006 Author Share Posted July 23, 2006 WOW! Thanks for all the good information and advice. I had not considered a color laser printer. I am not in a hurry so I need to consider that option. I appreciate all the help.Regards,Jerry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cluttermagnet Posted July 23, 2006 Share Posted July 23, 2006 (edited) I just bought an HP 3747 USB color inkjet printer for 24.99, new. Even includes the tiny 21 and 22 starter cartridges. Uses 27 and 28 after that. I had to supply the USB cable. Got it from gearxs.com. I also saw it at that price other places on the net. My friends at the refiller company I use tell me that is a pretty good deal. Anyway, if I get even 1-3 years use out of it, I got way more than my money's worth. I know nothing about what sort of quality to expect. I print infrequently, and 'OK' quality is fine for me. My past experience with HP printers has been that the color rendition was pretty good. FWIW, I have gotten probably 5-6-7 years use out of my HP 932C inkjet printer now. With occasional use, it just seems to go on forever. I'll soon have the 3747 installed on one of my boxes- if anyone is interested in a status report on this 25 dollar printer, let me know and I'll post results later. I'm going to stick with the cheapies. I did pay 199 bucks for my 932C 'way back when', however. They were all too soon down to 149 and dropping...As you all no doubt know, manufacturer profits are mainly in the replacement cartridges, less so on the printers themselves. And using a professional ink cartridge refiller is a very good idea, as Jeber mentioned. You can save substantial amounts of cash using refills if you print a lot. :thumbsup:Say, Jeber-Can my 'low yield' 27 and 28 cartridges be refilled to 'high yield' levels or not? Edited July 23, 2006 by Cluttermagnet Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeber Posted July 23, 2006 Share Posted July 23, 2006 Can my 'low yield' 27 and 28 cartridges be refilled to 'high yield' levels or not?Nope, sorry. HP designs the interior of the cartridge so that only a set volume of ink can be used. For those cartridges, it's about 10 grams. HP, and a few others, are starting to provide low yield cartridges as the standard ones for their new printers. It seems we aren't buying OEM cartridges fast enough to please them, so they're reducing ink levels in order to force the consumer to buy cartridges more often. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cluttermagnet Posted July 23, 2006 Share Posted July 23, 2006 Nope, sorry. HP designs the interior of the cartridge so that only a set volume of ink can be used. For those cartridges, it's about 10 grams. HP, and a few others, are starting to provide low yield cartridges as the standard ones for their new printers. It seems we aren't buying OEM cartridges fast enough to please them, so they're reducing ink levels in order to force the consumer to buy cartridges more often.Thanks, Jeber. I'm not too surprised. Well, HP cartridges have always been way too expensive, so I turned to pro refillers a while back. Have been completely happy with the results. They say they use the correct ink as designed for whichever printer model, not just some generic ink. I think the capacities of my 45 and 78 cartridges for the 932C are copious- something like 38 grams (?) seems to stick in my mind for those. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeber Posted July 23, 2006 Share Posted July 23, 2006 Yup, the 78/45 or 78/15 combo was the last really large ink supply cartridges from HP. The older Lexmarks also had big ink tanks (#80, #50...).The biggest difference between what we do and what you get with a home refill kit is the quality of the ink. We have an R&D department that backward manufactures our inks from the original, avoiding violating their patents, of course. The generic inks in those kits isn't specific enough for you to know what the quality is. (That, and we allow you to avoid the mess that home kits usually create-from what I hear from our customers.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cluttermagnet Posted August 11, 2006 Share Posted August 11, 2006 I finally got my HP 3747 printer hooked up and working. Stupid thing made me upgrade IE5 to IE6 in 98SE, otherwise pretty uneventful setup and alignment. (Actually, I could have upgraded to a slightly later IE5, but what the heck...) Prints great. If it lasts a year or more, at 25 bucks it's a great buy. That includes ink cartridges, BTW. Shipping was free; I had to come up with a USB cable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted August 11, 2006 Share Posted August 11, 2006 And the USB cable could have cost as much as the printer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cluttermagnet Posted August 11, 2006 Share Posted August 11, 2006 (edited) And the USB cable could have cost as much as the printer. Naw- I've found 10 footer USB cables on sale for 5 bucks and under, new. Once I picked up a couple of Belkin 10ft A-A USB's for 3 bucks a pop, on sale at Walmart, of all places. Watch the clearance displays in stores. The companies who sell you bargain gear such as what I just bought will also throw in a cable for 4-5 bucks more. Anyone who frequents electronic swap meets can come across entire boxes of used cables in good shape. I picked up a whole box of printer and RS-232 cables at a church rummage sale two years ago, for a buck, if I remember right. It had a couple dozen cables, some new. Ditto for IEC power connector cables, the type that power most monitors, computers, and other such stuff. I was given an entire box of them, a couple dozen or so. A good price for IEC's, new surplus, is a buck apiece. Anyone who pays full price for cables is- er, uh- in a big hurry. Or buying them for their company, etc. Anyway, my cable cost was zero for the USB.Clutter cannot resist a bargain. That is why Clutter is known as Clutter. It's all neatly boxed and stacked on shelves in my warehouse- er, basement. Edited August 11, 2006 by Cluttermagnet Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teacher Posted August 11, 2006 Share Posted August 11, 2006 Ahh, the collector. That's why it was phrased "could have" since I have seen them priced that high. There is nothing quite like the supply closet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeber Posted August 12, 2006 Share Posted August 12, 2006 PC Club is another good source for reasonably priced cables. I think the last 6' USB printer cable I bought there was around $6.Never go to places like WorstPurchase for peripherals. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cluttermagnet Posted August 12, 2006 Share Posted August 12, 2006 (edited) PC Club is another good source for reasonably priced cables. I think the last 6' USB printer cable I bought there was around $6.Never go to places like WorstPurchase for peripherals.Worthy of a bookmark. Thanks, jeber.I was wrong, BTW- my Belkin cables were 10ft A-B (8.39 for D-Link at PC Club). I see that 10ft A-A cables are a lot more pricey (15.99 for Belkin).Some of the prices on that site are outrageous, however- so you need to know market prices. Would you believe a generic floppy 3-head ribbon cable for 9.99? Ouch! You can get one (or two or three) of these for a dollar at any weekend swap meet, NOS (new old stock).Yep, WorstPurchase is about as high as you can get on items like cables. Edited August 12, 2006 by Cluttermagnet Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
onederer Posted September 24, 2006 Share Posted September 24, 2006 I have an HP 3210. It is a network printer/scanner/copier (no fax) model. It prints fine, and I have no problems with that. My greatest peeve about this printer (and some others) is the poor paper handling capability. I get bent out of shape when I have to stay there and baby-sit the machine to make sure that it will pick up only a single sheet of paper, at-a-time, or pick up any sheet for that matter! I decided to make this network printer "wireless". So I plugged it into a Linksys wireless access point. It works fine that way, and cheaper than buying the "wireless" printer version. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerryM Posted September 24, 2006 Author Share Posted September 24, 2006 I have an HP 3210. It is a network printer/scanner/copier (no fax) model. It prints fine, and I have no problems with that. My greatest peeve about this printer (and some others) is the poor paper handling capability. I get bent out of shape when I have to stay there and baby-sit the machine to make sure that it will pick up only a single sheet of paper, at-a-time, or pick up any sheet for that matter! I decided to make this network printer "wireless". So I plugged it into a Linksys wireless access point. It works fine that way, and cheaper than buying the "wireless" printer version.Thanks, I also do not want a fax. It might be nice to have the wireless capability, but not for the extra money.Regards,Jerry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cluttermagnet Posted October 25, 2006 Share Posted October 25, 2006 HP ink at $8,000.00 per gallon? Yikes! I found this article just today. It's a bit old, but not at all dated. Kind of puts the whole gasoline price flap in perspective, eh? What with smaller bottled waters costing more per gallon than gas, etc. Ahhh, the all suffering consumer! I hear that snake oil brought a pretty high price in its day (see historical writeups of the old "medicine shows")US: HP finds formula to turn ink to goldBTW my little $25.00 HP 3747 continues to work, and it prints just fine. Printer connoisseurs will no doubt sniff at the paltry output of this little inkjet box. A laserjet it's not, but it gets the job done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zlim Posted October 26, 2006 Share Posted October 26, 2006 HP ink at $8,000.00 per gallon Well they have to get the money to pay the detectives that do the identity theft thing on its board members. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.