Multifunction printer recommendations?

I am about to throw my HP Photosmart C6350 into the trash. I have absolutely had it with throwing money at it left and right in ink cartridges. I seldom print, but when I do, it's usually just a few 4x6's (I'm talking about less than 10 at a pop). For most non-photo jobs, I have a LaserJet 1300.

Anyway, the last straw came when I went to print about 10 photos on 4x6 (genuine HP paper). Once again, the printer told me I was out of color ink. So, I swapped in a brand new set of color cartridges (all four). Printed my photos and noticed that the black ink tanks were empty.

I went out to Target and picked up a photo black and a print black and popped it in expecting the printer to happily tell me that I had a full complement of tanks. Guess what? Now, the indicator is telling me that magenta is next to empty and cyan and yellow are about a quarter full! This is after *10* photos!

So, I'm done buying ink cartridges. Each time I've bought ink, I've bought it in a "kit" directly from HP with supposedly enough paper and ink for 150 photos. I've never gotten a fraction of that yield. I have more 4x6 paper than I could ever use as a result.

I've owned Canon, HP, Lexmark and Epson printers. I was probably most satisfied with the Canon's ink utilization. I love the dedicated 4x6 tray on the HP and would like the next printer to have one of those. Built in networking is also a must (wireless would be preferable, but not a must).

Does anyone have any recommendations?

You say multifunction - and I would recommend Canon in that category - but if, as you say, it's "usually just a few 4x6's (I'm talking about less than 10 at a pop)", have you considered one of these Epson releases PictureMate Charm photo printer: Digital Photography Review.

In two decades of using printers with a Mac, I've found Epson inkjet machines to provide the best colour reproduction, but they are very thirsty beasts.

Looking at the Epson article date, it's a bit over a year old. The reason I mention it is because I've seen one in action, using a card and/or a cable from a Canon camera, and I am mightily impressed. Ink consumption? Don't know.

cwa,

I'll be interested to see what recommendations you get. There seem to be so many models out there...hard to know what's a "good or best" one.

- Nick

hughvane said:

You say multifunction - and I would recommend Canon in that category - but if, as you say, it's "usually just a few 4x6's (I'm talking about less than 10 at a pop)", have you considered one of these Epson releases PictureMate Charm photo printer: Digital Photography Review.

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I like having the multifunction for occasional scanning and color documents, not that I do those very often, but it's handy to have when you need it.

In two decades of using printers with a Mac, I've found Epson inkjet machines to provide the best colour reproduction, but they are very thirsty beasts.

Looking at the Epson article date, it's a bit over a year old. The reason I mention it is because I've seen one in action, using a card and/or a cable from a Canon camera, and I am mightily impressed. Ink consumption? Don't know.

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Thanks for the input, hughvane. I'm definitely looking at the Canons as they've always done a good job for me. The problem is that none of them seem to have a dedicated 4x6 tray - and I know with my last one (MP500), it had issues picking the right tray when sending it jobs. This was confusing for my wife and lead to a lot of 4x6's being printed on 8.5x11 legal paper

pigoo3 said:

cwa,

I'll be interested to see what recommendations you get. There seem to be so many models out there...hard to know what's a "good or best" one.

- Nick

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There has to be a million of them. And they change revisions constantly.

Does anyone have any input on Kodak's lineup? The low cartridge cost has me intrigued, but I just wonder how they holdup overall and if the color reproduction is decent.

This may help a little. 2010 Reliability and Service Survey: Printers - PCWorld I still use an HP C6380 but I buy the XL cartridges.

From experience, the Canon MP560 has served me very well so far.
The printer seems to be efficient with using ink, both on documents and photos.

My 2 cents.

Cheers ... McBie

I love the new printer I just got, the HP Envy 100. It's small, quiet, and has ePrint so I can print from my iPad and iPhone easily. Doesn't have the dedicated tray for photo paper, but I'd definitely recommending looking at it for someone who doesn't print a lot (that's why I got it also).

Amazon.com: HP Envy 100 e-All-in-One D410a Printer (CN517A#B1H): Electronics

There are also larger versions in the ePrint line that do have dedicated trays, etc.

i have the monochrome version of the Samsung Multifuntion and i love it. on that note, i'd suggest the Samsung Color Multifunction Laser Printer (CLX-3175FW)

I use the kodak 5300 printer. Kodak has absolutely the cheapest ink any where ($10 for black and $15 for color) and it will print tons of photos. Kodaks do have some banding issues when printing 8x10 photos that have alot of black in them. That problem is easily corrected by running the cleaning cycle after 10-20 8x10. 4x6 is a snap and the kodak has a dedicated tray.

ljbad4life said:

I use the kodak 5300 printer. Kodak has absolutely the cheapest ink any where ($10 for black and $15 for color) and it will print tons of photos. Kodaks do have some banding issues when printing 8x10 photos that have alot of black in them. That problem is easily corrected by running the cleaning cycle after 10-20 8x10. 4x6 is a snap and the kodak has a dedicated tray.

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IMHO opinion Kodak's printers are crap and I used two different ones over the last 3 years. Yes the ink is cheap, and yes they're decent when they work, but the print head is garbage. I've had to have Kodak replace 5 or 6 print heads in the time I had the printers.

At first I thought it was just the model I had, then I bought a newer one of a different model and it did the same thing. Come to find out, it's a pretty big issue with their printers all over the net...one which they seem to be oblivious too (or at least pretend to be when you call them).

Also, their Mac drivers leave something to be desired for sure.

schweb said:

IMHO opinion Kodak's printers are crap and I used two different ones over the last 3 years. Yes the ink is cheap, and yes they're decent when they work, but the print head is garbage. I've had to have Kodak replace 5 or 6 print heads in the time I had the printers.

At first I thought it was just the model I had, then I bought a newer one of a different model and it did the same thing. Come to find out, it's a pretty big issue with their printers all over the net...one which they seem to be oblivious too (or at least pretend to be when you call them).

Also, their Mac drivers leave something to be desired for sure.

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Glad you mentioned that. For a minute it was sounding like the Kodak was a perfect fit.

cwa107 said:

Glad you mentioned that. For a minute it was sounding like the Kodak was a perfect fit.

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Yeah, I honestly think the issue is that their printheads die if you don't use them very often.

I, like the situation you described, didn't print often so it was almost like the printhead would dry out and then stop printing correctly. It was such a PITA.

I finally had it when I went to print my boarding passes for the flight before Thanksgiving and it was dead again. I tossed it and bought the HP.

Within the last hour I've seen the same Kodak printer commercial twice...and Kodaks BIG message in the commercial is "low cost ink"...but they really don't talk about quality, reliability, or performance (printing speed).

Maybe it's just me...but to me (in order of importance) when I'm looking for a printer I want:

#1 High Quality
#2 Reliability
#3 Decent print speed (pages/min)
#4 Low cost ink cartridge replacement
#5 Good paper capacity

If I'm not in a hurry...I could probably flip #3 & #4...but high quality would be my first priority. So I'm thinking if Kodak wants to "push" the fact that they have low cost ink...they should still make sure customers know that their printers also have high quality & reliability (unless they don't have high quality & reliability)!

- Nick

Well the quality of the Kodak printouts always seemed ok to me when it was working. But reliability was certainly not good.

Oh and they were loud too which may or may not be a concern.

Pigoo, I have also seen that Kodak commercial maybe 30x in the last week. Thanks to Schweb for his comments on Kodak's as I knew he had owned a Kodak before.

I was on a budget and did not need a Multi, so for my Color printing got a Canon from New Egg for $49. Can't remember the model at the moment but the Ink cost is quite low and I have printed 10 4x6's and still have a lot more Ink left. The quality is great and it was just plug it in to my C2D Mini with 10.6 and there it was with full support.

I know CWA is looking for a Multi, but if Canon's Multi's are like this, I would be very impressed. I use an HP Laserjet 1022 and Brother 2041 Lasers for my B&W printing and just wanted a good but low cost color printer for my occasional printing of pics. The Canon has not let me down yet.

One of the + for Canon is that they work effectively with generic ink cartridges (no, not refills). Canon brand ink tanks are expensive by comparison. I don't know if alternative brand ink tanks are available in the US, but it could be worth investigating.

I don't know if alternative brand ink tanks are available in the US, but it could be worth investigating.

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They are (at least for the MP 620). I buy them direct from net suppliers and they come in two varieties: With the Canon chip and without. The MP series of printers use 5 tanks so the savings are substantial. About 40%.

chscag said:

They are (at least for the MP 620). I buy them direct from net suppliers and they come in two varieties: With the Canon chip and without. The MP series of printers use 5 tanks so the savings are substantial. About 40%.

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That's good to know since I have an MP 990. Six tanks put a real crimp in the budget. I have two questions about the cartridges you are getting:
1. Do you notice much difference between the chipped vs. non--chipped cartridges?
2. How good (accurate) is the color compared to Canon brand ink? I am printing more in color recently including some photos.

I will be interested to see what CWA ends up with. I don't have a lot of experience with Multi printers. Some people hate them. They are quite handy though sometimes.

Thanks everyone for all the info on Canon Ink. That will help me when it's time to refill my Canon.