I am on the point of buying a cheap inkjet printer, as I'm not printing a lot. Although printing mainly black and white text, I don't want to shell out the triple for a laserprinter.

The list of available models here is HP Deskjet 3744, Canon Pixma IP 1000, or Epson C43. The machine is running on SUSe 9.3 with the unchanged 2.6.11 kernel, a Fujitsu Biblo, mainly using Openoffice to write, printing either .odt or .pdf files. The machine printed nicely to a HP Laserjet 5m. I'd like to get a printer printing clear black and white text with some photos and figures (academic papers and reports) at least 600 dpi.

Looking around suggests drivers are available for the Pixma - handmade -, but seems a mediocre printer. Drivers seem to be there for the Epson, and the HP might work on a 3740 driver.

Which of these options would seem the most hassle-free? Not a linux newbie, so some rewriting of .conf or .ppd files is ok, but then the thing should just print. How about the quantity of ink used, other associated costs?

Anyone experiences to share, an opinion?

Cheers,
Markus

my personal experience has always been good with HP, both in quality of print, and support in linux. I used to be a graphic designer, for whatever that is worth to you.

I had hell getting a recent Canon pixma to work under SuSE on my sis's comp. Eventually grabbed the turboprint drivers and things worked decently...however HP actually actively works on and supports their linux drivers, so they are always my first choice. I've never had issues with any HP printer working in linux, pretty much out of the box, in any distro.

Hi,

Thanks for the answer. It looks like a Canon pixma is not a good idea, due to lacking Linux support - although some people write they compiled drivers themselves, which does not give me all the confidence I'd like, so its of the list now.
HP printers have visibly a lot of trust from people using them, professionally or as home users, for the Linux support and the hardware standard. Nobody has much to say on the small Epsons, neither good nor bad - except that their printer nozzles may clogg if not used for a while, which might become a problem in my case. Wondering which one is better for text printing, though - but in reality, I suppose I wont see the difference...
What puts me against the HP, which seems to be the best choice, is just the price for ink. Is it possible to refill the ink tanks, would be the next question...

Markus

If you want to print a lot of text, cheaply, and crisply, you want a laser printer. I have a b/w HP laser for that purpose, and a color inkjet for anything that needs color.

Don't refill cartridges. I've seen more printers mess up by this then i can count. Some people manage to get away with it, but the bottom line is that not only do none of the manufacturers design their cartridges to be refilled, many of them go out of their way to make it difficult for you to do so.

Printers are sold at a loss. All the money is in the ink.

The only thigns I've seen that you can reliably refill are the old canons or hps where the top of the cartridge actually came off. These days, refilling involves actually cutting a hole, and trying to seal said hole up when done...which usually doesn't happen. Besides that the printer heads are designed to only work for roughly the amount of ink they come with. Re-using the printer head with an ink re-fill increases the chance that you clog the printer head, which renders the entire cartridge useless.

As far as the epsons...they do make some nice printers, and so does canon. The catch, is its their high-end stuff thats nice. The low-end stuff has traditionally been garbage. I would say that HP has the market hands down for low to mid range consumer printers. I've never had a low-end canon or epson unless it came free with something...and in every case, even free was probably too much.

Looks like Epson and Canon have both rather mediocre reputation for their cheap printers, both concerning linux support and hardware quality. That brings me to the HP 3744 - which seems to be a localised version of the 3745.

I calculated that after printing 1000 pages, the ink-price will pay me a budget laser printer like the Samsung 1520, and from then on printing will be cheaper on the laser. The decision then depends on, how long will I take to print 1000 pages, and how bulky is the laser compared to the inkjet, as I'm moving around a lot - and, and perhaps colour could be useful, nevertheless.

Its nice to make choices, so it looks like I'll just go down to the shop and have a look at the machines. Unfortunatelly, informed advice is not the strong point of the local sales-people here...

i just bought a samsung laser printer from newegg for $65. it's $125, and there's a $60 mail in rebate. not sure if you're in the US or if that's an option, but it seemed like a really good deal. supposedly the linux support is really good, too, i'll find out in a day or two when it gets here.

stay away from the cheap epson inkjet printers at all costs, imo. the quality sucks, and they will soak you on ink/cartridges. in the long run, for mostly just text, you usually will actually save money by paying a little more now for laser.


>>oops, i see now you're not in the US. still, i would highly recommend looking around for an inexpensive laser. you will be better off in the long run, imho.

I was in trouble with canon printer

Please do not dig up old threads like this---especially for something like printers. I promise you that the choice of a printer now is nothing like it was in 2005.

Also, what is the point of a post like this if you don't tell us the problem?

Since the original topic is obsolete, this will be closed. You can start a new thread with any questions you have.