Laser Colour Printer?
I’d like to purchase a good laser colour printer so I can print out some shots for friends and family as the need arises. Typically nothing larger than 8×10, and probably more like 5×7 prints. Anyone have any suggestions on a good, fairly affordable colour printer? I’m foreseeing spending about £200.00 - £250.00 or so, but perhaps my estimate is way off. Thoughts?
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April 20th, 2008 at 10:03 am
At our office we have an HP Color LaserJet 2600n. Good quality colour printer, but I haven’t tried it with photo paper though.
April 20th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
Ive got a Samsung cl300 (£150), its ok for photos, but not a patch on the inkjet I used to have. Are you sure you want laser?
April 20th, 2008 at 5:50 pm
@Tom. Im fairly sure you cant put glossy through a laser because the coating melts i the fuser, but there could be special paper I suppose
April 20th, 2008 at 8:33 pm
Pete, there indeed is special laser photo paper. Search for HP Laser Gloss Photo Paper.
April 21st, 2008 at 5:19 am
Tom, thanks I’ll keep an eye out for that - might improve the output
April 21st, 2008 at 7:24 am
I have the HP2600 laser printer too, but it’s not really a presentation device and is pretty lousy for anything with detail. Laser printers work with a scorching hot drum by melting the plastic toner, so I’d like to see this photo paper fares up. Inkjets are much better for photo work. I just bought the HP B8350 which prints on A3 with 7 inks for £260. And here’s New York street photographer Joel Meyerowitz on his latest large format photo-inkjet purchase http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lv_qE_J_mHg
April 21st, 2008 at 7:43 am
Great link Paul. I’m just off to see how much that baby costs, not that I’ll be able to afford it, I just want to depress myself.
Can I ask, Lor. Why you want to be able to print from home?
I have this conversation with people, personally I prefer to have my work printed at the lab, which is going to be better quality than anything I can afford (£200-£300). I would have to have a lot of prints done before a printer paid for itself, digital C-Types (12×8) at 2 quid a go. My advice, is to find a good local lab, get a relationship going and you might some discount over time.
Also, don’t rule out the supermarket…
I have all my 35mm film developed at either Tesco or Asda. I wouldn’t be able to afford to shoot as much as I do, if I didn’t get it done so cheap.
Asda develop one roll for £1.50 and charge 75p to have them put to CD, they charge per CD and can put 3 rolls to one CD. Tesco charge £1 per roll for dev and the 79p per roll to put to CD. I know we’re not talking about film development here, but I see Tesco have an offer for poster prints at the moment, I’ve not tried them yet, but might do soon just to see what they are like.
My point is, I question how much you would have to spend on an inkjet to get that sort of quality and then how many prints you would have to make (plus ink cartridges and paper) to make it worth while.
April 23rd, 2008 at 8:37 am
Heya guys,
Thanks for all the great info! Looks like I need to do some rethinking on this.
@Pete: I thought Laser would be best since I also need to do just colour printing for work items. Inkjets just seem to eat up ink cartridges like crazy and end up costing more in the end. Maybe I’m misguided though and need to rethink the Inkjet vs. Laser.
@Andy: Mostly it has to do with laziness and time, to be honest. I plan on using the printer for colour work items as well - letterheads and so forth, and really need to just be able to print that out on the go. I could do a large order through a company for letterheads, but really I was thinking that an overall printer would save in those costs in the long run. Maybe not. There is a place nearby where I can get photos printed, so maybe that is the way to go. I did want the convenience and time-saving of having a printer right at my beck and call, but perhaps that’s just really unnecessary
April 23rd, 2008 at 3:39 pm
Well, I use an HP Inkjet CP1700. It’s oversized A3 colour printer. It’s not bad, I use it for printing design visuals etc, on glossy paper it’s pretty good. But not good enough for photo prints, IMHO. I’ve had it several years now, cost about 300 quid at the time.
April 27th, 2008 at 2:52 pm
If you change your opinion about an inkjet printer, have a look at the Canon Pixma MP610 (scanner, revert printing, 5 different ink cartridges) http://www.amazon.co.uk/Canon-MP610-colour-screen-Scroll/dp/B000UX3U6I/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1209310650&sr=8-4
I do not know if it is true that laser printers emit dangerous micro particles as claimed by an Australian university last August.