Are there still inkjet printers that don't try to screw you on ink somehow?

My reliable printer of 20 years has died, and I'm dreading looking for a replacement. It was a Canon, and I was always satisfied with it. But I got a Canon for my parents a few years ago and it freaking sucks. A random ink will run out every 2-3 months, despite not even being used for printing more than a few pages a week. Like it evaporates ink or something.

I heard HP is even worse, they try to sign you up for a subscription and refuse to work with aftermarket ink, if they work at all. I also heard that the USB port on them is fake, and it needs to connect to wifi to work, for spying and OTA, I guess?!

So are there any good alternatives?

I need a multifunction printer with scanner and the ability to print duplex without having to manually flip the paper. And I don't want laser, because it sucks for photos.

I have to disagree regarding HP. I have had a HP Envy 6055E for 4 yrs now. I pay monthly for ink refills based on pages printed per month. Three yrs ago I was still working and printed 15-30 pages per week. I think it was $6 per month. Every 3 to 4 months I'd get ink sent to me. Never ever ran out. When it starts running low they automatically send more in the mail. No returns needed. It just seemed like the ink lasted forever compared to the Epson I had before. Now I'm on the lowest tear ($2 monthly) and occasionally go over the amount allowed. additional 2 bucks covers me. Had I remained on the $6 plan they would have sent me a new printer by now, also a part of the program at that teer level. I can actually upgrade to that plan today and they will send a new printer. I literally went just over a year needing black ink and still don't need color that's over a year old. I've never seen anything like it in 30 years of dealing with printers.

Well, i doubt it has a "fake" USB port...

Also, inkjets are known to stop working if not used regular, so several months, ink prob dried out on the nozzle..

high % isopropyl or everclear can clean the nozzles out, I did that with my Canon mp620 a few times over before it failed entirely.

I decided to get the Epson EcoTank Photo ET-8500, the no-cartridge design convinced me to give it a shot. A lot of the other EcoTanks didn't seem as nice, this one was one of the few that competed with the venerable mp620. I've been happy! Ink will eventually cost me about $20-50 depending on source. I think I got this printer on a deal looking at the prices nowadays, maybe wait till black Friday if you don't want to spend $600.

The et-8550 is a larger format if you want 13x19 or something like that. Both can do some pretty cool stuff - take the back off and you can print longer media or thicker cardstocks, cd/dvds, etc. They both use 6 inks for better photo printing.

MrGuvernment said:

Well, i doubt it has a "fake" USB port...

Also, inkjets are known to stop working if not used regular, so several months, ink prob dried out on the nozzle..

Click to expand...

Yep. I have a color inkjet - same reason the OP wanted one. Lasers suck at photos. Also have a B&W laser. The inkjet is an expensive pain in the ass. Gums up if you don't use it, ink costs too much, etc. The laser is using a 12+yo toner cartridge and can sit for a year, then fire up at tax time and work perfectly. Guess what happened to the inkjet? I didn't use the inkjet for a while and now it won't print at all. Probably all gummed up. So probably a full set of cartridges and maybe a print head if I can't figure out how to clean it properly.

Years ago I had a workgroup size color laser. Samsung CLP-550N I think. I bought it in maybe 2005? I kinda wore it out in law school. Most of my printing was black and white and I ran through several B&W toners. Black toner was rated at 7000 pages & color at 5000. They got pretty close to that, at least 6000/4000. Toner cartridges were ~$110 back when I had it. The printer was fine, but I ran 10s of thousands of pages through it and it needed a new drum, transfer belt, and all the toners were low. I ran the numbers and decided it would be cheaper to just get a new printer than get it back up to fully working. It still worked, the worn out drum & transfer belt just caused a little ghosting on color prints. But by that point I was done with school and didn't really need it anymore, so it just sat until I moved, then got tossed.

I'd consider two printers unless you mostly print photos. Dedicated photo printer + a laser for everything else. If you want the all-in-one printer/scanner/fax thing get a laser version. That's assuming you'll use the inkjet enough to keep if from gumming up. If you need photo printing but won't use it enough to avoid gumming up without including your other printing you're kinda stuck with inkjet. Or maybe laser plus some sort of non-inkjet photo printer. I think there is/was such a thing.

Next time I buy a printer I'm getting a color laser all-in-one and I'll think about a photo printer if I can get one that doesn't gum up. As much as I print photos I think I'm better off just sending them out to some online service that prints them on a pro grade printer and mails me the prints. And yeah, buying that inkjet AIO so I could print photos was a mistake. It's a lovely printer. Wide carriage, automatic duplexer, scanner, can do 13x19, etc... I just don't really use it and when I do I'm more likely to scan something.

This is why the good lord baby Jesus invented Walgreens. Buy a laser. The actual 2 photos a year you print that matter will cost 50 cents at Walgreens and look twice as good as your crappy desktop inkjet.

As we all ran to lasers, even laser manufacturers (especially you HP) are making the "ink jet" mistakes. Hard to find a good (especially color) laser printer that doesn't force you into extremely high priced toner and requisite name brand only maintenance parts. And they wonder why their sales are down? Could it be due to the attack on the consumer?

owcraftsman said:

I have to disagree regarding HP. I have had a HP Envy 6055E for 4 yrs now. I pay monthly for ink refills based on pages printed per month. Three yrs ago I was still working and printed 15-30 pages per week. I think it was $6 per month. Every 3 to 4 months I'd get ink sent to me. Never ever ran out. When it starts running low they automatically send more in the mail. No returns needed. It just seemed like the ink lasted forever compared to the Epson I had before. Now I'm on the lowest tear ($2 monthly) and occasionally go over the amount allowed. additional 2 bucks covers me. Had I remained on the $6 plan they would have sent me a new printer by now, also a part of the program at that teer level. I can actually upgrade to that plan today and they will send a new printer. I literally went just over a year needing black ink and still don't need color that's over a year old. I've never seen anything like it in 30 years of dealing with printers.

Click to expand...

cjcox said:

And they wonder why their sales are down?

Click to expand...

The paperless office is happening. Or the paperless home office anyway. Approximately zero of my regular friends have printers at home. Very few have a desktop and some of them don't have laptops either.

The frankly alarming number of people who do their taxes on their smartphones don't print them. Yeah yeah, I did my first tax return by phone too... But somewhere, maybe, I have the paper form I filled out to use with teletax; touchtone phone required.