I am giving up and buying a laser printer. The ink I spent on 3 kids last year was insane ! I use to refill but, the last two HP printers I bought won't refill. Ugh ! I need suggestions for a reasonable priced wireless laser printer or a HP you can still refill. I have enough HP refill ink for a year. :lol::lol: I also need a suggestion for a lesson planner for me to plan for three kids with. It seems like most of them are for one or two. TIA !
I can't help you with a printer, unfortunately. As far as a planner, I just use a spiral notebook. I grid off each page, with one column for each kid, and one row for each subject since everybody does some variation of Bible, Reading, English, Math, Science, and History/Geography. If there's a separate Phonics it goes in the Reading box, if there's a separate Penmanship it goes in the English box, and if there's a separate Spelling it goes in the English box, so the English box might have more lines. If there's art, music, or foreign language, it gets a box. College rule works better -- more lines. I have been known to get as many as 5 columns on a page, and if I had more kids than that I divided it up over a two-page spread. Three kids should be no problem fitting on each page. At the top, in the big margin at the top, I put Day 4, Thursday, xx/xx/14 or whatever's appropriate. I should probably say that my "lesson plans" consist of notes like "Lesson 4" or "pp 26-32", "correct quiz - Lesson 6". And I don't "plan" more than a couple of days ahead because by 10am on Monday, it's blown. STUFF will happen! But I can record what is to be done, what got done (check it off), what's to be done tomorrow (write Test or Quiz in green ink), attendance (if they're out that day, a big wavy red line down their column with a red note "dr's appt" and an A in a circle by their name at the top of the column), and if there's a quiz/test today I write it in red and put the score in red in a circle. It's not fancy, by any means, but it has worked for me for 13 years with as many as 10 kids at a time.
I have an old Dell laser printer that I love and it is SUPER cheap on toner refills, like $20 for the year and I print A LOT. The only downfall is it is not wireless. I also have a Samsung laser printer that is wireless but it costs about $60-$100 a year for the toner depending on how much I print. It is closer to $60 when I mostly use my Dell printer. I actually wish I had purchased a Brother laser printer instead of my samsung one. They are much cheaper to operate.
This is the one we have. It is not wireless but works really well. I bet they sell a wireless version http://www.amazon.com/Canon-imageCLASS-D530-Monochrome-Printer/dp/B008YD1V08 Amazon has this one http://www.amazon.com/Canon-imageCL...sr=8-1&keywords=wireless+cannon+laser+printer
Consider also LED printers. They are very similar to Laser printers. They use a LED array instead of a Laser array. For the end user there is little difference, but some times the LED printers are smaller more compact and intended for the home user. My first one was an OKIpage 4w. It was so cute. It printed a zillion copies from a single small cartridge that was easy to refill. The Okidate LED printers were the bomb back in the day, great machines for the money. Now they are way over priced because they have a niche market. A lot of auto garages and other industries that run on specialty software that is quite outdated need printers that will work with their old systems and these are the ones that still do. I am not sure who the latest players are, but am quessing Canon and Samsung are a good place to start for your intended purposes in either a Laser or LED printer. As long as you are intending to print mostly Black and WHite, you cannot beat the price per page with a small laser/led printer. For color do your research. Find out if the printer driver will let you print in shades of grey only and if the machine will still print black ink if a color cartridge is empty http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-ProXp...00COA3GVE/ref=psdc13_t3_B00DOV1COK_B00COA3GVE The above is a basic printer with few frills for a reasonable price, but it is network and does the cell phone thing., I like the larger paper capacity and not having paper sticking up from the back.
I have a Brother Laser printer. I love it. Very inexpensive. The cartridges are not too bad if you shop around the internet (like $50 - but they last for over a year!). I had an older version and it got to the point where i had to replace the drum AND toner, and it was cheaper to actually buy a new printer, so we upgraded and gave ours away via Freecycle. They are very faithful printers. I love mine. As for planners, I am too much of a control freak, so I make my own.
I tried to find a laser printer last year, but couldn't find an affordable color laser printer. I will have to look at the suggestions here. I instead bought a HP ink jet printer and I HATE it. I didn't know that with HP you cannot use generic ink and you can't even refill your ink. With my old HP printer, I could refill the ink cartridges and save a lot of money. I even tried buying Office Depot brand ink, and my new HP printer won't recognize it. I went to a computer and printer forum and they all said that HP now requires that you use ONLY their ink and they have a micro chip in the ink that tells the computer it's used up, so you can't refill it either. Also, if you run out of a color, it won't print in black either. To print in black or grayscale, you CANNOT have an empty color cartridge. According to the IT folks on the message board I visited, they are facing anti-monopoly lawsuits right now for this new ink design. I am spending a ridiculous amount of money on ink right now, so I'm going to start looking for another printer too.
Laura291 I have the new HP ink jet and I HATE it !!! I have a ton of refill ink and it won't refill. I owned two older HP's that I loved. I wish I had never bought the thing. I would just buy a new plain printer that can be refilled if I new what ones actually are still refillable ? Anyone have a clue ?
About two years ago I bought a brother laser. It only does black but for school that's all I really need for worksheets. It duplexes, enlarges and reduces, and it's a copier and fax machine too. A cartridge lasts me a looooong time, and even after it says "toner low" it has continued making perfectly fine copies for many many days. Even when I was making worksheets for four students.
For me inkjet printer, I have been using Canon all in ones for years. They are SO easy to refill. What you want to look for on a printer cartridge for refilling is: on the black, a lable that peels off easily enough or that you can pierce over the sponge vent hole. For the color you need to have the type that lets you put a knife blade in between the top and the body of the cartridge and pop if off. Under this you should find a vent hole for each color sponge. I usually just use electrical tape to hold this back on after filling. I have one friend whos black canon cartridge I have been refilling for about 7 years now. I was my printer and I replaced it with one that had wifi capacity. Once in a while on Canon printers they will tell you they are empty even when you have refilled them. Google and you will find a process for putting it back into shipping mode. This will make the printer think it is fresh out of the box and needs cartridges installed. On my friends it is like hold down this button while reinserting the power cord then press on, then double press this............ then you insert new cartridges and power cycle. It takes about 3 minutes and needs done only once or twice a year and we have saved like thousand in ink. With Epson cartridges you needed a little chip resetter from ebay. This would tell the chip it was full again as they get marked by the printer they are empty. It was a little device you would set the chip against then push a little button until you saw a green light. One some of the Epsons and Lexmarks there was also a way to manipulate and clear the ink counter but I do not remember because using the resetter was so much easier I resorted to it altogether. There may be chip resetters for the chips on HP cartridge also. Look on Ebay for your printer model or google you printer model and reset cartridge, or override ink empty and things like that. Some new HP carts need lots of suction for refill to be successful. see linked video. http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-refill-HP-ink-cartridges-in-two-minutes/ In all cases, a cartridge is best refilled before being run dry. Some cartridges will burn out the little tubes if they are run dry. By little tubes I mean: ink is sitting in an almost microscopic tube. A ammost microscopic wire contacts that tube before its end. When that dot pixel is required a nanosecond long bit of current is run through the wire heating the ink inside the tube. The instant expansion of liquid into gas projects a micro droplet of ink out the end. each and every micro droplet of ink in the high resolution printing job is made this way in some printers. In other printers, some epsons for example, this droplet is projected by vibration from a micro piezo of some kind. In either case the little tubes burn out when heated empty and or clog from evaporated ink. When burned out, melted and collapsed they cannot be unclogged. Be aware that not all ink refills all cartridges, the two systems of microdroplet propulsion use different solvents. Ditto the various coloring agents. Some are for dye and others pigments. Yadayada yada. Find something that works as long as you have that printer then find another system for the next printer. In the mean time LED and Laser are cheaper per page for the most part, and are much faster when printing multiple copies. They do draw a lot of power if you are living off grid and that is a consideration.
Wow vantage that is helpful ! I bought a black only laser printer yesterday off ebay. I may see if after reading that I can get my inkjet working for just color.
