Pulled eFingers:

Stacey —

I've used a personal laser printer for years. I replace the toner cartridge maybe once per year. Unless you are in dire need of color, laser is the way to go. Mine is a bit old, but it is a Brother.

hitch Hicker —

I was fed up with ink jet printers as well and got a B&W laser 2 years ago. I do not print much at home, maybe 30 pages a week, but so far I did not need to change the toner.
Laser colors are not good for picture quality prints. Mine is a Minolta and very quite. I paid $80 for it at Fry's when it was on sale. But later found why it was so chip. When I tried to connect it to my home network, I had to buy a print server for it, this particular brand requires a special print server that costs $100, while hp or canon could use any $10 print server. The toner for minolta is about $30, that is not bad.
I guess you might want to narrow your search down to a couple of brands, and then check for their material costs.

I actually had the 450C by citizen at the same time, the color was optional and required buying a special color ribbon and an electro/ mechanical arm. The ribbon had 4 main colors on it and the arm actually had to lift it up and down to generate different colors. It was a piece of art and I think it could become antique if I had kept it till now.

hitch Hicker —

Sorry, 30 pages a month is right.

Eric —

Yeah, that's the exact same printer I had! I could get it to print all black, all red, all blue, or all green. But never more than one color on a page. After some months, I gave up and just assumed that's what their marketing department meant by color printer.

Were you able to have it print in real color? If so, I wish I had known you back then. You could have saved me hours and hours of head banging.

Thanks for the info about the laser printer. I hadn't even considered the need for a print server.

Hich Hicker —

I'm guessing your small piece of hardware that moved the ribbon up and down was brocken. Mine worked fine and I could print in color.

New printers have an ethernet port, so you just need a switch to add them to your network. Mine doesn't have the port so I needed a print server.

steve —

If you don't need to print in color, then laser is the way to go. Modern ink jet printers are capable of printing very good photographs. The problem is that the paper and ink is so expensive that it's actually cheaper to print them at Walgreens. It is a nice convenience when you need it, though.

I've never seen a printer/scanner without a fax.

Couldn't find a laser printer on newegg with 802.11. Doesn't your router/AP have 10/100 ports?

PS, tried calling you tonight on my calling card. I'm in DC and forgot my cell phone charger. DOH!

Eric —

Yeah, my router has available jacks, but my home office (aka book shelf) has no more available space.

I have two missed calls from a Maryland area code, wondered who it was. I guess that was you! I was out jogging at the time. I think USB should be the power distribution mechanism, or at least the form factor, for all new mobile gadgets. Some newer cell phones are this way and it's very convenient.

anonymous —

I love my laser printer that I have at home, the toner runs about $100 per year, and I consider it a cheap price to pay for the convenience of only having to change the cartrige out once per year and not having to risk ruining my wardrobe with those nasty little ink cartriges from other typical printers that ooze everywhere. We have HP printers at work with those same said little bitty ink cartriges and I despise them. I also advise you don't be cheap with a printer, as soon as you commit to a less espensive model you will find a nice application for the expanded capabilities and it will be too late for you to change your mind.

Mom —

I still have that Citizen printer of yours in the back of the guest room closet. I will put it in the mail to you tonight, glad to hear that you still need it. :-)

Lori —

I have a samsung ML-2510 laser printer. It only prints in black. I have had it since early this year and is already on a second cartridge but then i have to print lot because of my notary work. The printer itself was only $50 on sale from Best Buy. Genuine toner cartridges cost around $80 each and is suppose to last 3000 pages. I did not keep count. Compatible generic toner cartidges go for under $40 I think. I'm looking into getting that for my non-notary printing purposes. It has been working wonderfully for me and is very fast and quiet. I have it directly connected to my laptop and my laptop is part of our wireless home network so as long as my laptop is on, any computer in our home network can print to my printer.

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