Recommend a printer for very infrequent use

[rockfan4]

I've had it with the wife's inkjet printer. We rarely print, she will print our recipes every so often, I print once a year, tax forms. Guess what time of year it is?

I dragged out old reliable. A HP 4000 I bought used from the local tech college. It has a sticker on it that a maintenance kit was installed in 2005 at 186,000, and it is flashing again that it needs another kit, along with the toner being just about empty. It took me way too long to find the right driver for it, HP's site is acting up, like it always is, and I couldn't find a page with a PCL5 universal print driver. Ended up downloading it from a shady site, I've probably compromised my laptop.

Looking for a printer that can sit and sit and sit, collect dust, and then print at a moment's notice. WiFi would be ideal, so I don't have to drag it up from the basement to plug it into the router like the old 4000. Blazing 10mb connection. Just above the 10bt connection is a coax connection. Coax!

Thinking of picking up another used HP off CL or FBM. Tell me why I'm wrong.

[JackDidley]

Brother laser jet. Cartridges never dry out. I have had mine 5 years + no problems. Less than $100, I think.

[Gogar]

Spend $100 on a canon or a hp or something at the box store and move forward. Yes printers are just the vehicle for cartridge sales but it's not worth your life to try and win the ink game.

If you buy a beater off of CL you're most likely gonna have to buy cartridge for it and you're gonna be at $100 anyway and a whole day of your life chasing down the printer and chasing down the right cartridge and then you will be the owner an unknown used printer, with one day less to live.

[jyl]

I buy Brother lasers. Well made, no nonsense. I’d get a multifunction because copy/scan is useful.

Probably avoid an inkjet if it won’t be used for months.

[Bill Douglas]

Yep, Brother laser vote from me too.

[JavaBrewer]

Copy documents to a thumb drive or upload to your personal cloud. Drive to local Office max or equivalent and print on their equipment. Once a year…easy

[rfuerst911sc]

We bought a Brother black and white laser printer over a year ago . Rock solid and easy to use .

[stevej37]

I have an older Epson, but their new tank printers come with large bottles of ink.

https://epson.com/ecotank-ink-tank-printers

If you are using Chrome....there is no driver needed when using wifi

[GG Allin]

Originally Posted by Gogar

Spend $100 on a canon or a hp or something at the box store and move forward. Yes printers are just the vehicle for cartridge sales but it's not worth your life to try and win the ink game.........

......but buying a laser jet over an ink jet is an easy win.

[masraum]

Based on recommendations here about 2 years ago, we got a black/white brother multi-function laser printer. I bought it "renewed" on Amazon for $120. It's still going just fine. We use it a handful of times per year. This is what we have, Brother Printer RHLL2395DW Monochrome Printer with Scanner and Copier. I'm guessing this specific model may no longer be available, but who knows.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by GG Allin

......but buying a laser jet over an ink jet is an easy win.

Absolutely. Unless you need to print photos that look like photos, I would avoid inkjet. We switched to color laser probably 15 years ago, and then after some time (everyone out of school and no longer needing to print homework with color) we switched from color laser to black/white laser.

[911 Rod]

Take it to a copy n print shop

[CurtEgerer]

In the good old days (before the China flu) HP sold inkjet printers for $29 at Walmart. I bought many of them over a 15 year period of time. Great color print quality and when the cartridges ran out? Toss it in the trash and buy another. That all came to an end a couple of years ago

So I bought the cheapest Canon I could find at around $70. That lasted all of about 2 months before requiring head cleaning before every use and then had connection problems and eventually just quit printing In the trash it went. Bought an Epson for around the same money on the promise that it has 3 individual color cartridges so you can just buy the one color that runs out. That printer was an absolute piece of crap from day 1. Horrible print quality and was good for maybe 25 prints before needing all 4 new cartridges. Was not compatible with 3rd party refill cartridges. Worst printer ever. In the trash it went.

So now we're 1 month into our new $49 HP 2700 series, very similar to the old $29 specials. Happy days are here again. So far.

If you just need black & white, probably tough to beat a laser.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by CurtEgerer

In the good old days (before the China flu) HP sold inkjet printers for $29 at Walmart. I bought many of them over a 15 year period of time. Great color print quality and when the cartridges ran out? Toss it in the trash and buy another. That all came to an end a couple of years ago

So I bought the cheapest Canon I could find at around $70. That lasted all of about 2 months before requiring head cleaning before every use and then had connection problems and eventually just quit printing In the trash it went. Bought an Epson for around the same money on the promise that it has 3 individual color cartridges so you can just buy the one color that runs out. That printer was an absolute piece of crap from day 1. Horrible print quality and was good for maybe 25 prints before needing all 4 new cartridges. Was not compatible with 3rd party refill cartridges. Worst printer ever. In the trash it went.

So now we're 1 month into our new $49 HP 2700 series, very similar to the old $29 specials. Happy days are here again. So far.

If you just need black & white, probably tough to beat a laser.

We used HP exclusively for a long time. I think my first printer way back was an Epson ink jet, but then went to HP. We mostly bought large small business color laser printers on clearance or refurbished. They always lasted many, many years and thousands of pages (probably tens of thousands). We don't print as much any more, hence the cheap brother black/white laser printer.

[porsche930dude]

Our hp started printing bad. I pulled out a Hp C2005A from 1993 it prints great! We got it cleaning out my bosses attic when he moved to florida. It hasnt been ran in 15 years atleast.

[rfuerst911sc]

Our Brother laser printer works with Windows laptop and our Chrome Android phones just fine .

[GH85Carrera]

I had a HP Laser Jet 4 for over a decade. Apple kept changing and locking down AirPrint function, and they finally got it to the point that if the printer does not come from the factory with AirPrint, you can't print anything from your phone or iPad. Apple makes a royalty for the printer, and they gets their pound of flesh.

I use a Win 11 computer system. I have a Brother color laser printer and copier. It sits for weeks at a time and then is needed for a print. My wife is happy (happy wife = happy life) becasue she can download a knitting pattern for a new knitting project, and print it right from her iPad to knit whatever she is making next.

It is handy to on rare occasions make a copy of something, or scan it to a PDF.

100% get yourself a LASER printer. Forget the inkjet, and a laser printer can last decades with no issues. Right now I have Brother HL-L3290CDW but I do have a small business and print something once or twice per week.

[Zeke]

Cheap Canon used almost daily. Ink is expensive, but I can get almost a ream of paper out of them.

[Paul T]

I have an HP3755 that I think was around $60. All I really use it for is to print a few checks each month. If I printed more, I'd get a laser...

[stevej37]

Originally Posted by Zeke

Cheap Canon used almost daily. Ink is expensive, but I can get almost a ream of paper out of them.

That is the same as mine...think I paid $49 for it. Print quality is excellent.
I just wish I would have waited to get one of their Tank Printers. When this one gives out, I will.