The amount of ink I am going through lately is nuts. I dont have the best printer in the world...a Lexmark all in one that I got for around 60 dollars. What do you use and how does it do on ink? How much do cartridges cost to replace? I have had to replace my ink twice in the last two months, and it is 20 dollars a cartridge, but that includes color and black and white.
This may be a silly question, but do you set your printer on draft when printing? It uses less ink this way. I print everything in draft unless it's something important. Or on color things you could set it to grayscale...I do that a lot as well.
We have an hp photo printer, and for photos it uses a lot of ink...however when I am printing for school work I can usually get 500-900 pages if I use the fast draft setting. My regular black and color cartridges are about 28-35 dollars depending on where I buy them...my photo color and black are 30-50 depending on where I buy them. And I can get about 100 pictures from them.
Oh, and have you thought about refilling your own cartridges or taking them to Walgreens to have them filled...it's cheaper than buying new ones and you can usually fill each cartridge twice before your print quality starts to suffer.
They charge 10 for black and 15 for color. They do a good job too. If you go to their website www.walgreens.com you can search for a store using store locator that offers that service because not all do.
Another idea is a cheap laser printer.... http://www.provantage.com/brother-hl-2140~7BRTL026.htm --- it's $58 THEN there is a rebate on it http://www.brother-usa.com/Promotions/Prom...RebateID=hl2140 I have a REALLY old HP LaserJet 5. I use 1 toner per year and I go through a LOT of paper. I have a color all-in-one in case what I am printing NEEDS color. And I would LOVE to have a color laser printer that does double-sided printing... but it's just not happening right now with the budget.
See...I want to go laser - but I need a laser printer/copier....any suggestions there? A lot of what I need is to copy - not just print. I'd LOVE suggestions!
Hmm--just went to print a test page and I dont see an option for draft. There is Quick Print, Normal and Photo. Most things I print are b/w, so I dont get why it goes through ink so fast.
Closest Walgreens to me is about 40 miles away, so it costs more in gas to get there than it would take to refill it, lol.
Use Quick Print....that's proably the draft option for your printer...it's just prints faster and with less ink...really unless it's something like a resume or office presentation...quick print will work just fine.
Tbog...yeah for some it's not an option..but I figured just throw it out there...you could buy a kit and refill the cartridges yourself......it's very easy and not too messy!
We have a Canon ImageClass MF3110 all-in-one (copier/scanner/printer) laser printer and we really like it. We bought it on clearance on Amazon for ~$70.... It doesn't look like they carry it anymore, though. (http://www.amazon.com/Canon-MF3110-...1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1216675374&sr=8-1) If you can find one, they're really nice. It is only b&w... We use a Canon S750 for color printing. Canon's ink cartridges are considerably less expensive than HP's or Lexmark's, and it has been a great printer for 5+ years now.
Thanks Birbitt, not sure why I didnt see that before. When I change this cartridge, I will definitely change to that setting and see if it makes a difference. Dd is totally hooked on lapbooks, and between those and worksheets we print a lot.
Personally we want to go back to our Lazer printers. The dot's are going through too much ink and then its true that it is cheaper to get a new printer.. so then you have another question; What do you do with your old printers? WE gave a couple away... and have a spare, for what its worth lol. We have used refils but you usualy can do them a few times and then it leaks, so so much for that option!
I have a Brother DCP 7020 (B&W). We got it on sale at Staples for $130 and had a $50 gift card so it came out to $80. Amazon.com has it for $169 right now but it's a model that seems to go on sale a lot so watch your flyers. It's a great copier/scanner/printer. Very good reviews and one of the cheaper ones in terms of price per page. We've had no problems whatsoever and I can't tell you how great it is to go 6 months or more eithout even thinking about toner or ink.
I use the same type. I love it, my ink is so much cheaper than the lexmark and it doesn't use near the ink. I get my ink at staples, it costs me 21.99 for a twin pack (one black tank and one color tank).
okay, I think thats what we used to have, it died after man pmsing moments , its not mine! Lol! When did you find your lazer at Staples
I just bought a Kodak ESP-3 printer and I love it. You save 50% the cost of ink in a normal injet printer because you can buy a black for 9.99 and color for 14.99. The ink lasts quite a while too and it does pretty well with everything I have printed so far. Heres a link to the one I have. http://www.kodak.com/eknec/PageQuerier.jhtml?pq-path=1441/10580&pq-locale=en_US
