Canon or HP printer?

[Dana]

I was planning on buying an older printer such as a Canon because I
was told thant the seperate inks would save me money. However a store
owner told me that you will end up spending just as much with the
Canon because you will be replacing printer heads which will make up
the difference for your cheaper ink. Can anyone suggest an
inexpensive (under $100) printer for an iMac for mainly word
processing? I have avoided Lexmarks because of their expensive inks.
Please advise. Dana

 

[B. Peg]

I just became a Canon convert from HP. I got tired of pitching nearly full
carts when one color was low on the HP. The Canon i960 I now use is a far
better (resolution), quieter, and faster printer than either my HP960 or
1220cse wide-format printer. I believe, as long as you use the Canon ink,
they'll replace the printhead for free (don't know for sure but I think that
was mentioned here before). Never has plugged yet, but I have had the HP
carts with heads built-in clog.

Take some photo paper and try out both and see which you like.

B~

 

[Lucas Tam]

(e-mail address removed) (Dana) wrote in @posting.google.com:

I was planning on buying an older printer such as a Canon because I
was told thant the seperate inks would save me money. However a store
owner told me that you will end up spending just as much with the
Canon because you will be replacing printer heads which will make up
the difference for your cheaper ink. Can anyone suggest an
inexpensive (under $100) printer for an iMac for mainly word
processing? I have avoided Lexmarks because of their expensive inks.
Please advise. Dana

You only need to replace the print head if it goes bad (rarely). At that
point, it's cheaper to pick up a new printer.

Canon i560 or the i860. i560 is around 100.00 and the i860 about 150.00.

 

[J. Bronson]

Canon, Canon, Canon.

The ink is MUCH cheaper than HP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Regarding print head I've been running for two years and about 4 cases
of paper with out any problems......

I just do a head cleaning each time i put in a new cartridge.

Jerry

 

[Al]

You only need to replace the print head if it goes bad (rarely). At that
point, it's cheaper to pick up a new printer.

Canon i560 or the i860. i560 is around 100.00 and the i860 about 150.00.

Note that the Canon printers below the i560 model have a single color
tank, so the i560 or above with 3 color tanks is what you want to
consider.

 

[Mark Herring]

I was planning on buying an older printer such as a Canon because I
was told thant the seperate inks would save me money. However a store
owner told me that you will end up spending just as much with the
Canon because you will be replacing printer heads which will make up
the difference for your cheaper ink.

This is nonsense---people rarely have to replace print heads. Ask the
store owner for some specifics

Can anyone suggest an
inexpensive (under $100) printer for an iMac for mainly word
processing? I have avoided Lexmarks because of their expensive inks.
Please advise. Dana

There are many good printers under $100 including, by the way, Epson.

If ink costs are a problem, then consider 3rd party carts or refilling
**************************
Mark Herring, Pasadena, Calif.
Private e-mail: Just say no to "No".

 

[Chris Stumpf]

Canon i560. Under $100, very fast, ink is cheap and the print heads don't
need replacing.

 

[Don Perley]

I have a couple of (now older) canon printers; one inkjet and one
laset-all-in-one.

I've never had to replace the heads on the inkjet in 10 years. The worst
thing is I lost a lot of ink to the cleaning cycles. I rarely print
color but it seems the color cartridges run out almost as fast as the
black ones (though the black is 2x as big). Often I will go through a
whole set of color cartridges without actually printing any color. You
can just let it go, but then you have to hit an empty-tank-override
button for every page you print.

On the laser printer I am still on the first load of toner, so it is good
on that front, but Canon is bad about updating drivers, like for linux or
WinXP, so I have a computer still on windows 98 to be able to print. It
also makes a pretty decent standalone fax machine, so it isn't totally
worthless.

Both printers have had trouble with paper feed after a few years, but
there are fix-kits available with new rollers etc on the net.

Anyhow, mostly because of the slack support on drivers, I would avoid
Canon for now.

 

[Dana]

I have a couple of (now older) canon printers; one inkjet and one
laset-all-in-one.

I've never had to replace the heads on the inkjet in 10 years. The worst
thing is I lost a lot of ink to the cleaning cycles. I rarely print
color but it seems the color cartridges run out almost as fast as the
black ones (though the black is 2x as big). Often I will go through a
whole set of color cartridges without actually printing any color. You
can just let it go, but then you have to hit an empty-tank-override
button for every page you print.

On the laser printer I am still on the first load of toner, so it is good
on that front, but Canon is bad about updating drivers, like for linux or
WinXP, so I have a computer still on windows 98 to be able to print. It
also makes a pretty decent standalone fax machine, so it isn't totally
worthless.

Both printers have had trouble with paper feed after a few years, but

What is the difference between the Canon i550 and i560? Are both
multi ink tray printers? Is the print head part of the cartridge or
printer on these?

 

[JustMe]

The i550 is an older model the I560 is newer.

Both = 4800 x 1200 dpi
I550= Black draft 18ppm
I560 = Black Draft 22ppm
I550= Color draft 11ppm
I560 = Color draft 15 ppm
Both Print Width = 8" (borderrless =8.5)
I550 buffer = 56kb
I560 buffer = 46kb
I560 accepts camera input.

I560
http://www.usa.canon.com/html/conCprProductDetail.jsp?modelid=9282&item=9347&section=10214

I550
http://www.usa.canon.com/cpr/pdf/Brochures/i550_spec.pdf

 

[Raybert]

I was planning on buying an older printer such as a Canon because I
was told thant the seperate inks would save me money. However a store
owner told me that you will end up spending just as much with the
Canon because you will be replacing printer heads which will make up
the difference for your cheaper ink. Can anyone suggest an
inexpensive (under $100) printer for an iMac for mainly word
processing? I have avoided Lexmarks because of their expensive inks.
Please advise. Dana

I am a Canon convert, too. I have an i850 that is MUCH quieter,
faster, and has better output than the Epson it replaced. I had no
idea how much I would appreciate the *much* quieter operation. Ink is
cheaper, too. As for replacing print heads.... I wouldn't worry
about it. With the way printer prices are headed *IF* it ever comes
to that just get a new printer. It's good to upgrade occasionally
anyway.

Now, if there was just a way to get these inkjet printers'
bi-directional status monitoring functions to work over a home
network. The i850 doesn't have separate lights to show which ink cart
is empty. It has a multifunction light that flashes in various
patterns and I'm not sure there is a separate pattern for each color
ink-out. So you realy need the software monitor. Any networking
gurus know why this hasn't been solved?