OT: Printers

[Tom Williams]

Slightly OT:

Many color printers produce a color called "Dark Black" by layering on a little bit of cyan and a little bit of magenta on top of the black ink (or toner), and it really is more visually satisfying than just black, because the toner may be more of a Very Dark Gray, and inkjet ink (if it soaks in) will always show up as dark gray. Some printers have a setup parameter that lets you turn off Dark Black.

 

Dan asks about using yellow to print black, and that's a slightly different answer: for decades virtually all color printers have deposited an imperceptible unique-per-machine watermark in yellow, which can be traced by law enforcement.

[Stokely]

We've gotten laser printers the last couple times we needed one. My wife mainly needs one, and she doesn't need color, so that helps with cost. Our current one is a Brother DCP-something, it does scanning as well.

 

I can't stand inkjets. If you print a lot, one or more of the cartridges runs out quickly, and if you don't, they dry up.

 

For toner, we've had good luck with the generic brands from Amazon. It's a lot cheaper than the name brand.

[J. Dan]

Dan asks about using yellow to print black, and that's a slightly different answer: for decades virtually all color printers have deposited an imperceptible unique-per-machine watermark in yellow, which can be traced by law enforcement.

 

Wow, good to know if I ever need to print a ransom note, thanks.

[Chris Link]

Dan asks about using yellow to print black, and that's a slightly different answer: for decades virtually all color printers have deposited an imperceptible unique-per-machine watermark in yellow, which can be traced by law enforcement.

 

Wow, good to know if I ever need to print a ransom note, thanks.

 

Yeah. Better use the classic letters cut out of a magazine or newspaper. Just be sure to buy them at a news stand. The list of print subscribers would narrow the potential number of suspects considerably.

[Polkahero]

Okay, you guys convinced me to upgrade to a laser printer. Just purchased a Brother MFCL2700DW multi-function monochrome laser printer, got a good Black Friday deal. This should save money in the long run as the toner cartridges cost the same as the ink jet ones with a paper yield of 2600 pages vs. 160 pages.

[Doerfler]

I can't stand inkjets

 

I haven't had an inkjet printer in a decade. Just say no to inkjets.

[Song80s]

Slightly OT:

 

Dan asks about using yellow to print black, and that's a slightly different answer: for decades virtually all color printers have deposited an imperceptible unique-per-machine watermark in yellow, which can be traced by law enforcement.

 

And I thought changing my name and moving 100 miles away would do it.

 

This is why I like this forum. old girl friends might have saved some of the notes I printed out. Like Happy Birthday cards off the printer, etc.

 

I suppose I better dispose of my 10 yr old inkjet. Its incriminating. That is, recycle it properly and discreetly .

 

This is why I should follow Daves advice on ink jets

 

[J. Dan]

Zombie Thread Alert!

 

After 10 months or so I'm finally pulling the trigger on a new laser printer. I need a color all in one laser printer. I do need to be able to feed multiple pages at times when scanning/copying. I'm not concerned so much on speed or wireless connectivity. I mostly print direct from my laptop, but wired connectivity would be OK. Normally if I needed to print something on another computer I can just send it to my laptop. I do need color because I print brochures for work. Most of my usage is expense reports - print a page, sign it, scan it back in along with all my receipts and email it.

 

Seems like Brother got a lot of recommendations, and I'd like to buy from a brick and mortar store rather than online. There's a Micro Center here and 3 printers seem to fit the criteria though one was out of my budget at $500. So following is the comparison of the 2 remaining:

 

Clonk

 

I would appreciate any comments - seem to be pros and cons of each. When it comes to PCL-6 and BR-Script, what's the difference between language simulation vs postscript support. Does it even matter since it was mentioned that Brother does a good job up updating drivers for legacy products? I don't need fax, and again speed isn't all that important to me. Most of the specs of these two seem pretty close.

 

Oh, and what is duplex printing?

 

Thoughts?

[J. Dan]

OK, I just googled "duplex printing". I don't need that. If I ever do, I can just flip the pages and run it through a second time.

 

Most of the negative reviews are around wifi connectivity - no surprise there, though many say it works flawlessly - and size and weight, which comes with the territory for a printer like this.

[dongna]

Dan, your link isn't displaying properly for me.

 

Do you have the model numbers?

[J. Dan]

Dan, your link isn't displaying properly for me.

 

Do you have the model numbers?

 

Ah, yeah checking back - that link only works on the computer that I did the comparison on, not any others, which tells me it's using cookies. Here are direct links to the 2 printers:

 

Brother MFC-9130CW

 

Brother MFC-9330CDW

[dongna]

Ah, I read your earlier post too quickly and missed that these are color lasers. Don't have any experience with those.

 

However, I've been a long-time Brother B&W laser user for work in an office environment. Probably purchased 8-10 of them over the last 5 years. My experience is the brand overall is fairly solid, but not ultra-reliable. But they're so inexpensive (again, in a business context) that I just treat them as commodities. If one breaks or stops working after 2 or 3 years I just replace it with another one.

 

Also, I trust you're hip to the printer game-- the real cost is in the consumables, not the printer itself. So factor that in addition to the upfront cost of the printer.

 

Not sure if that helps you, but there it is.

[MoodyBluesKeys]

I've been satisfied with HP Color Laser Printers, one for my shop, another for a daughter while working on her Masters.

PCL5 or 6 emulation is emulating HP's Printer Control Language. the other mentioned is likely Brother's own (no experience with them). My HP supports PCL and PS (PostScript) both.

Generally with printers, the lower end ones have toner cartridges that give a lot less copies per cartridge (but still cost about the same). As mentioned, consumables can add up quickly. Also looking at four cartridges instead of one (for B&W).

Rather often Newegg, Tiger Direct, sometimes Staples have sales on models after the "newest and greatest" come out. I bought mine for just barely over the retail cost of a full set of toner cartridges.

 

[Tom Williams]

Duplex -- I rarely use it, but it's wonderful when I need it.

 

WiFi: Evil. I am saying this as a wireless aficionado and former wireless networking consultant. Just don't. Connect the printer to an ethernet cable on the network, and set it up with a static IP address. You'll thank me one day.

 

Consumables: Third-party laser printer toner is between 1/4 and 1/2 the price of vendor brand. Unlike 3rd party inkjet refills, the off-brand toner seems to work fine.

 

PCL6 vs Postscript: I highly recommend PCL6. Postscript tends to use a lot of data to (literally) draw a single page. If anything goes wrong, the printer may spit out 150 pages with one line of crud at the top of each page.

 

I print with a Dell color laser printer (probably a rebranded Lexmark). Bought it new a few years ago for $200. I've had to replace the Black cartridge once. It can take a PDF file directly from a jump drive without needing any help from a computer.

 

Color lasers are great for everything (including brochures) except serious photo printing. For that matter, though, if you want to print serious photos you will need an inkjet printer with 8 or more different colors in order to get a good color reproduction gamut.

 

For scanning, I use an otherwise-retired Brother MFP inkjet printer; I just don't use it for printing. The scanner software allows me to redirect copier functions to the laser printer, which is much cheaper than inkjet.

[J. Dan]

I don't do a lot of printing, which is the whole reason I want to go to laser - my inkjet cartridges dry out between uses and well before I got anywhere near the page capacity out of them. So I'm not concerned with capacity in terms of pages per cartridge as long as it won't dry up on me like Inkjets.

 

My question on PCL-6 and BR-Script 3 wasn't on the differences between them. BOTH printers that I'm looking at say they support both of those. However, one of them lists both of those under "language simulation" and "N/A" under postscript support. The other one is the opposite, "N/A" under "Language simulation" and "PCL-6, BR-Script 3" under "postscript support".

 

So the question is what is "Language simulation" vs "postscript support" pertaining to those.

 

 

[J. Dan]

Here, the side by side comparison that I tried to post a link to initially should make some of my questions more clear. I combined some screenshots into an image:

 

http://ohbrotherstl.com/Pics/Printers.jpg

[Reezekeys]

I know this doesn't specifically address Dan's needs, but as someone who needs to copy, scan, and generate charts on a semi-regular basis I just want to add that the ADF on my Brother MFC-L2700DW is a feature I didn't know I would appreciate until the first time I needed to scan a bunch of pages! It's a giant time and energy saver.

 

The wireless on this Brother does occasionally need to be reset which is a bit of a PITA, however it may be router issues too, and it's not too frequent. The ADF along with the wireless connectivity & duplex printing makes these lower-end Brother MFCs a pretty good bargain imo.

[Synthaholic]

I just bought one of these last week. So far so good. Hard to beat a

Canon color laser printer for $185.00

 

Canon Color Laser Printer

[RABid]

I used to buy HP lasers by the dozen. They became problematic so I switched to Epson. Those were fine for a few years, then the quality took a dive and I switched to Brother. People complain about the print speed, but otherwise, no problem.

 

One warning, check the price on replacement cartridges. Color laser cartridges vary greatly in price. A full set can run as high as $600+. Printers normally come with "starter" cartridges which do not print as many pages as off the shelf cartridges. I keep a separate black only laser printer for most of my printing. That helps a lot with the budget.

[J. Dan]

So I bought the Brother MFC-9330CDW.

 

I gave the sales guy an opportunity to sell me something else with the caveat that I had done my research and he better know his shit. For the most part, he didn't, though he wasn't bad. We actually had a very long and interesting conversation. He tried to sell me on an HP and actually it offered many features of the $379 Brother including wired networking, but at the $329 price. His biggest selling point was drum prices, but based on my print volume and the brother reviews on here, I went with the $379 brother printer.

[MoodyBluesKeys]

The 9130CW shows support for Windows and Mac, but for rather old versions of OS. The 9330DW shows "N/A" for both Windows and Mac - I'd want to look further into that.

For the difference in price, built in Duplexer is a very nice feature if you ever need to print a significant amount of double sided stuff.

I also note that (unlike the HP models), the Brother has a separate Drum that has to be periodically replaced. HP print cartridges have drums built in, which means that they get replaced each time the toner gets used up and replaced. I have only had One such printer (an Okidata laser), and considerably prefer the HP cartridge design. Also check the drum price, it may be considerable. When the drum starts to go, you get streaks, unprinted areas, speared areas and the like.

A lot of genuine manufacturer sealed new cartridges are available on EBay for most business popular printers. Big corporations buy hundreds of the same model or frequently lease them. They then stock a bunch of the toner cartridges for what they bought. Next time, they get a different model that needs a different cartridge. Not unusual to be able to buy new toner cartridge for less than half of the list price.

Note that the one on the right is factory equipped with "starter" cartridges which are only filled with a bit of toner, so they don't last nearly as long.

High Yield cartridges typically last for about 180% of standard, and only cost about 130% as much so they are cheaper per page.

 

Dan, go directly to Brother's web site and Google for complete specifications on each printer. Way too many "N/A" on the listing you posted, in critical places where not applicable doesn't make any sense.

 

[Stokely]

My wife has printed a fair bit over the years for her home business. I hate inkjets for the same reasons mentioned...either they run out too fast or dry out because you didn't use them enough!

 

So she switch to b&w laser and these have worked great. Brother and HP, a couple different models. Iirc when the drum needs replacing it may be better trading it in (Staples etc will take old printers) and getting another one. Toner isn't cheap but it lasts pretty long and you can save a lot by getting generic toner via Amazon vs the brand name.

 

All that said, I'm REALLY hoping she will stick with her commitment to go paperless. Her home business means containers full of paper docs stacked up in our house. More and more businesses, including several real estate law offices we've been to (she is in realty) are completely paperless. Scan it, tag it, back it up/use cloud and you can always print specific docs if you need to.

[J. Dan]

I bought the 9330DW because it has wired networking and post script support. I figured it was the safe choice in the long run. Haven't opened the box yet.

[Reezekeys]

I also note that (unlike the HP models), the Brother has a separate Drum that has to be periodically replaced. HP print cartridges have drums built in, which means that they get replaced each time the toner gets used up and replaced. I have only had One such printer (an Okidata laser), and considerably prefer the HP cartridge design.

I always thought it was a plus to have a separate drum & toner. My Brother drum needs replacing way less often than the toner, so why pay for a new drum everytime you get toner?

[J. Dan]

The sales guy at the store mentioned that, but since I really don't do a lot of pages, I'm not so worried about it - main thing is not having my ink cartridges dry out (ink jet). If I keep up on my expense reports, we're talking maybe a dozen pages every other week and then the rare occasional dozen page color brochure.

 

I more or less told the guy everything I said on here and pointed to the 2 printers that I was looking at, and said go ahead and try to sell me on something else if you think it's better for my needs. He did point me to an HP. Same price as the lower cost Brother but with networking like the higher cost Brother. $50 difference. I think I made the right choice.

 

[mate stubb]

Printers are the devil's spawn.

[J. Dan]

Printers are the devil's spawn.

 

http://ohbrotherstl.com/Pics/devil.jpg

[J. Dan]

Finally got around to getting it all set up - using it wired ethernet to my home network. I installed the software on my PC laptop so far and plan to do the same on my PC desktop and MBP. Printing is fast and painless, and we printed from our wireless mobile devices very easily (wifi connection to home network, not direct to printer) with no problems.

 

The only thing we can't get to work is my daughter's school Chromebook and I'm guessing it has something to do with the school having it locked down. The printer shows up and it seems to set up as a valid printer but when you try to actually print, it doesn't work. Protocol is IPP (Internet Printing Protocol). She also briefly tried the Google Cloud Print which didn't work but I probably need to do additional setup. I'm guessing we'll run into the same issue that the Google Cloud from the school won't let me set up a printer on my network. She can also login as her personal account, which may be the way to do it. I'm not up on all this google stuff. I use the calendar and that's about it.

[Tom Williams]

Last I heard (as we're rolling out ~1200 chromebooks), their is no such thing as a direct printer driver on a chromebook. The only way it can print is to have google cloud print enabled -- which means your home printer would have to be either google-aware or served by a PC that maintains a connection to Google. This also means that everything your kid prints filters through Google for their commercial exploitation.

 

I've fought, and lost, the battle to reconsider the idea of sending all our kids' data to the cloud.

[Joe Muscara]

UPDATE: I finally bought a printer!

 

The situation where I could make use of a multi-sheet scanner went away (I already have a single-sheet scanner so I have one if I need it), so I decided just a printer would do. Based on the updated for 2019 Wirecutter review posted above as well as some of the comments here, I went with the Brother HL-L2350. I set and powered it up, connected it to my wireless network (despite the recommendation not to), and it's working great. It shows up as a printer on my two Macs, our three iPhones, and our two iPads. And, I didn't install anything on any of them! Whenever I get a new device like a printer or scanner for my Macs, I see if it works out of the box without installing drivers. Most of the time, they do. Then I don't have to worry about updates nor conflicts.