Are ALL home printers complete bastards?

[CharliesAngles]

As in, really unreliable, expensive and utterly contemptible temperamental twats?

We've had three.
All "good" brands - HP, Epson etc, and they've all been absolutely useless.
Only print come alive when they feel like it.
Refuses to connect to the WiFi.
Always running out of ink (Like, how???? When you've refused to print a damn thing ever?!)
Not even wanting to print out loads. It's just the odd thing for DCs school work now and then.

Just wondering if I'm missing something here, and all you wonderful MNs are in some secret club, and actually know of the Holy Grail of home printers?

Share please? 🙏

They're covert units for the instigators of the Rise of the Machines.

Network printers.

You've basically got yourselves baby Terminators whilst the T1000s (Ricoh) and T5000s (Epson) plan Judgement Day.

And then, of course, we have a crossover when the ED-209s (Hewlett Packard) thunder into view bellowing that there is an invisible paper misfeed that needs clearing and we have 20 seconds to comply.

I can relate to all the comments about printers on here. They are all b**tards, some more so than others. When I bought the latest a couple of years ago, a reasonably priced Epson with the ecotanks instead of cartridges I no longer had a computer. My desktop was an obsolete dinosaur and my laptop had died and I realised that I no longer needed it. I only really wanted to print from my mobile phone. There was no instructions on how to connect it to my WiFi network and phone without connecting to a computer first. I searched the Epson website to no avail. By this point I had obviously filled it with ink and thought there would be no problem.

After searching the internet I found that some very clever person had a solution. It now makes me so happy when I turn it on and I get a beep on my phone to alert me that a new device has connected to my network. I have actually had to set it up twice as I changed to a different broadband company. I have screenshot the instructions and "printed" them for future reference.

Although I think that Epson customer sales/service are useless and their instructions are hopeless the actual printer is probably the best behaved one that I've ever had. I have just realised that it is now at least 5 years old! WOW! The ecotanks go on ...and on. Nudged into action by this thread, I have just turned it on, got the reassuring beep, and it is still working. I am whispering now though as I don't want it to get ideas above it's station.

That's the only explanation. Why do they never do what you want, despite you following all the instructions? Why do they randomly turn off and on? Why do they demand feeding with 'cyan' 'ink' 🤔 when you don't want to print in colour? They are sentient and are just waiting for commands from their robot car overlords.

We had a wonderful, wired printer never any problems. Husband swapped it for a wireless version and it’s a total wanker.

Yes, yes they are!

Am agreeing with he posters saying a wired black and white laser printer is the way. I bought a Samsung one during Covid, and the starter toner lasted me a year. I am on my second full size toner. It is perfect for my needs.

Spent all day printing out student cards on a specialised printer which can only be described by the phrase ‘utter bastard’. Printers are evil. All of them.

We bought a colour laserjet (Xerox Phaser 6510 ) during lockdown to replace our 15 year old B&W laser. It works!! AND the dupe inks are now about £30 for the lot. [There are refurbs on eBay]. We probably get through a ream of paper every 6-7 weeks (so it is in use most days, but rarely has to tackle more than 20 double-sided sheets at a time).

I was toying with buying DD a printer for Uni, but new inks are £££££!

Small B&W models are much cheaper.

Then printer says - you have no paper in the printer. Yes I have! About 20 sheets. Switch it off, remove paper, tap paper so its all level, pop it back in. Switch it on and the message is cleared.

I know it's probably not the same thing but I love my Thermal printer. No ink to dry out and it just keeps going with a satisfying little whirr
Only good for things like postage labels so I suppose it's a good job that's all I need it for

I've worked in IT since the late 80s. All printers suck. All of them.

Particularly:

a) inkjets,
b) wifi-connected printers,
c) those that include scanners,
d) any HP or Canon printer made this century.

If your printer matches two or more of those red flags then you might as well set fire to it.

My 3-in-one rarely prints, and definitely gave up scanning after 3 months due to needing a software update (so it tells me) but the website offers the wrong update. It needs the other one apparently. However it does copy reasonably well, it's just I need it more for printing or scanning which is probably why it does it. Just to rub it in.

All inkjet printers are bastards. I’ve had a laserjet for about 7 years and it works without fail. Hasn’t run out of ink yet!

I think the ink in inkjet printers dries up after a short while.