Best Printer for a Dorm?

I bought my son an HP 1210 printer/scanner/copier. It's the smallest of the "all-in-ones", and it does a nice job. Scans are not as good as from a dedicated scanner. Copies are cheaper at the school library, but it's nice to have the option in a pinch, and it does make nice prints.

Dude, don't get the Canon. It is a fine printer, but the ink is very expensive. I don't know how small your dormroom is going to be (mine was tiny) but you might want to invest in a small laser printer from Brother or Lexmark. It will cost a little more up front, and be a bit bigger, but it will last all four years and be much cheeper in the long run.
I went to school with a portable HP. I thought it would be great, but it became so expensive to buy ink that I gave up ans started taking things to the library to print.

But as always, YMMV

applenut: I didn't buy a printer until second semester Senior year, and then only a refurbished Apple StyleWriter, which didn't work well. It was a pain to run to the computer center to print papers before the deadline. But the printers they had there (including some early phasers, color lasers and whatnot) were infinitely better than what I could have afforded.

If I had to do it over again, I would buy an inexpensive laser printer, or an HP 1000-series laser if you want better PostScript driver support and have a bit more money. Nothing beats a laser printer for the usual college paper fare. For large B/W print jobs and color stuff, I'm sure your computer lab will have much better options. This is especially true for large-format plotters you might need for architectural drawings and renderings. No point in getting anything too sophisticated for your dorm room.

Cold Turkey

First, what's so Cold Turkey about quitting if you still post, Roland?




Secondly: I bought an HP Photosmart 1000 - photo printer/card reader/ink-jet It's been overkill. I've printed one photo- used the card reader twice.

My roommate last year bought a cheap ($250?) laser printer. It was horrible- manual feed, didn't feed straight, went through toner like Darryl Strawberry goes through coke--- in short... i'd say go cheap inkjet. Remember that friends/neighbors will be asking to use your printer, a lot. Keeping cost per loaned-page printed down is probably a good thing.

Some lasers come with a 'starter' toner catridge the same way inkjets often come with starter ink cartridges that have only a fraction of the capacity of a refill.

I'd lean towards laser without a good reason to go the other way.

Definitely laser. It's the best way to print out papers for class.

Just go for a $100 inkjet printer. You can't go wrong there...

If you want color, lasers are really expensive.
If you don't need color, then I've seen some good deals on a Samsung ML-1710 laser printer on dealmac.
I don't know a lot about it, but the reviews I have read seem to be positive, and it's got a relatively small footprint for a laser printer, which could be a plus for a dorm room.

Applenut, where in berkeley are you going to be living? The size of the dorm room could make a difference here. I personally had an Epson 740 my freshman year at UCSB, and I have a Canon i850. I think printer size isn't that big of deal (especially since my roommate had a 19" CRT that took up massive space, yet we still seemed to have room to move around).

Toner cartridges for laser printers are indeed (relatively) expensive. But they usually last for several thousand printouts (or even ten thousands). A laser toner cartridge will go much further than the average ink cartridge of an inkjet printer. So if you're a normal individual user who doesn't print a bazillion copies a week, your toner will last a very long time.

Case in point: I bought a cheapo Epson laser in early 1999 (an EPL-5700i, don't ever buy this model, it has terrible driver support). I'm still running on the first toner cartridge, even though it is starting to get low.

I spent a summer at Berkeley and remember that computer labs were spread all over campus. If there's a lab within close walking distance, possibly even inside your dorm, you might just want to print to the lab via the network. At least initially, that wouldn't be a bad way to go.

Cold Turkey

I find that if you need color, the Canon is the cheapest per page and the best quality. I have an S520 and I love it! Prints great text, wonderful pics and the ink tanks last a really long time. Has individual tanks, too, so if one color gets used up, you only have to replace that tank, not the whole set. I buy cartridges at Sam's and get two black and one each of the color for about $40. They generally run $10-$12 individually. I have had mine 1 1/2 years and only just replaced the yellow cartridge only (and I print a lot of pictures), and have only replaced one black cartridge. Cost of the printer was $150, but they have other good ones for less/more. Good luck!

Well, I don't know anything specific about Bowles, but I've had friends (and parents) who've lived in both Foothill and the Units, which are both comparatively large as dorm rooms go (at least compared to the dorms I lived in Santa Barbara). The main advantage of the i70 is that you can easily carry it around and go places. But, in reality, you'll likely set your printer up once, and leave it in the same place for the entire year. So I'd either spend the same amount of money on a more full featured printer, or less money on a printer with the same specs but in a fullsize form. Inkjets aren't that big in the first place. And lasers are probably cheaper long term, but I like the ability to use color (plus my i950 seems to use like no ink at all).

i had a hp deskjet 935c, and i strongly recommend against it. we had bought one for the home like a year before college, and all was well ... or so we thought. i get to school, and my new one (since the family still needed the other one) gives me nothing but trouble. every so often it decides i've printed too much, and goes goobly. it will give me errors, so i turn it off then on, and it'll give worse errors. meanwhile, back at home, that one goes bad too. very similar problems.

but i still like hp's printers in general. i've since bought a scanner/printer/fax/copier from them for about a buck thirty (~$130 US). its really great, except its not supported on macs, so the scanner doesn't work; and i had to use gimp for printing. i love how it copies and faxes though. i think people have gotten its scanner to work in linux, so i'll look into that, but i'm content with it as a printer/fax/copier.

If you don't need the printer right now, that's probably the best option. The Cal bookstore I recall has a nice selection of stuff (as do most university bookstores).

Oh, and I do remember that I had one friend in Bowles, but he quickly got moved into Foothill

Well I'm starting classes Sept 29 and I've pretty much decided on the Brother HL-5070n. http://www.macworld.com/2003/06/revi...theinprinters/

It's not the smallest but it

1. Support Rendezvous
2. Toner last 6000 pages
3. Available through Costco.com for $399
4. Has built in 10/100 Ethernet
5. Has been getting good reviews.

Well, I think he asked.

All male dorm? Forget the printer and go to the labs to print... computer ownership is much less prevelent among women? They'll be at the labs too. Waiting on the printer is a great place to pick up college babes.

I use a Canon S630. I've used it for 3 semesters so far and have yet to replace any of the ink cartridges (It has individual k/c/m/y). It's an average size inkjet, though I didn't really find size to be an issue one way or the other. I think it ran me a little over $200, though I can't remember for sure. I do a lot of digital photography and PS work so I wanted the option for relatively high quality color prints. I think the best thing about it though is that it is so quiet. I've used Epson inkjets in the past and they're so damn noisy (not to mention shitty, don't even get me started on all the problems I had with the printer I initially went to school with (some bubbly blue and clear Epson))...Using one of those I'd be afraid of waking someone up if I printed late at night, but it's not a problem with the cannon. Anyway, my 2¢

I got a canon i850 recently and it rulz. It's so quiet you can print at 3am and not wake up your roommate. Print quality on photos is great, it's very fast, and prints text nicely too. Individual ink tanks so you spend less in the long run. Also, if you hook it up to an Airport Extreme base, you can print wirelessly. Get one or be square.

haha eric's living in a sausage factory




they work hard, they play hard...

You can get an idea of what's available on campus here.

There's a storefront on campus somewhere, but I haven't seen it. A quick comparison of Apple prices shows that the prices at UC are up to $300 less than at CSU, but the same as at Stanford.

I live in a dorm, I use a Canon i320. It's small and it uses $6 black ink. I use it to print out my documents, it does it pretty fast. Never had any problems with it, but don't suggest you use it for anything other than documents. Got mine for 30 bucks.

Bowles used to have the best dining hall. They'd have fried chicken, all sorts of ice cream and stuff like that a lot. Unfortunately I think Bowles just shares the Foothill dining hall now.

Oh, and Bowles is very haunted!


My LaserJet 1200's cartridges cost about $80 a pop, while my Stylus C80's black cartridges cost ~$27. Toner is definitely more cost effective. I'm still using the cartridge that came with it...

yes it is
that is where I work on campus and there is ALWAYS someone waiting for a printout and more often then not they are a cutie

anyways it makes a lot of sence to just use the lab's computers to print (or if you have a laptop just bring your computer to the lab and print) they should have a scanner setup as well if you need one...

I plan on never getting a printer... I will always hope to have access to a decent laser in some office nearby (be it where I work or where a friend of mine works)

While a student at Cal I used to work at The Scholar's Workstation. Funny to see a link to it here. The store itself is located in the basement of University Hall. Address and Map. The prices are standard educational discount as found on Apple's online store for education, but PC and Printer prices are worked out on a manufacturer by manufacturer basis.

Back on topic though... Most of your time at school will be spent printing black and white documents. However, the need for color will arise from time to time. Yes, people will mooch your printer. My Freshman year I just ran down to the compuer lab in the dorms. The dorm-based labs are far closer to your room than on campus ones. Also, with the campus network, I could leave file sharing on and run down to the lab with no disks or anything. Hell, maybe you can print right to those printers and just run down and grab your pages! The ideal solution is a reasonably fast inkjet printer. Yes, a laser is nice, but a fast color inkjet will cover all your bases. We paid slightly more to upgrade to an epson 880 rather than a 740 for the extra print speed and it was well worth it.

I can provide tons more info on TSW and Cal, just ask away.

Well I'm a guy who has owned both a laser and an ink jet in the past and owns both now.

When I was in college, I owned a Stylewriter II which used the Canon engine. It was an excellent printer for grayscale and text. I am very picky on text and it was great for the inkjets available at the time.

As soon as I was a working stiff I went straight to laser. As others have mentioend the toners are more expensive, but they last thousands of pages whereas you might get 500 from an inkjet cartridge.

The last laserprinter I purchased was a Laserjet 2100m. I have bought exactly one toner cartridge for it and often use it for 33 copy printouts for my classroom. It is fairly large and fast. I like the crispness of 1200 dpi for text.

On the prompting of my wife we have just purchased a photo-quality ink jet printer. I will only buy Canon as I have read about HP and Epson putting chips in their cartridges and having them say they are empty when they aren't, expire, etc.

We purchased a Canon i470D printer for $129 with a $20 rebate. Let me tell you this printer is awesome. The cartridges for it are cheap. It does borderless photo printing in 4x6, 5x7, and 8x10 that looks as good as anything you have developed off of film. (with photo paper)

It prints very sharp text (I am super picky about text clarity) at up to 18 pages per minute (take with a grain of salt).

It also has a memory card reader that, get this, not only works with the printer so you can print your photos without using a computer, but will actually alert iPhoto and import your pics through the printer. (No need for a seperate card reader)

I have been profoundly happy with this printer. It is cheap, fast and has astounding quality. It also has a fairly small footprint.

Even if you don't get this printer, do consider a Canon inkjet because they don't jerk you around with chips in the cartridges. About half their printers even have clear or translucent carts so you can see if you have ink or not. We got ours at Best Buy.

Nick

The other thing with the Canon's is that you don't have to replace all the color cartriges because one color is empty. I hate that with my Epson 880. I always use a lot of blue in my prints, so when I run out of blue, I have to replace yellow and red at the same time, even if I haven't used any.

This might be important in college because you don't have that much money to spend on ink, so spending less is always good(duh).

Keep in mind that I'm only in eigth grade, so I have no idea what might be useful in college and what isn't.

Hey Jonathan, I didn't even notice your reply until today. I had told myself that I wouldn't post again until my trip to Montana, from which I got back last night. When I had spare time after my MPRE exam on 8/8, I decided to create a new identity. But being a Cold Turkey wasn't all it is cracked up to be. So earlier this morning, I logged out and back in as Escher in order to be honest with myself. It feels great!

As for a choice of printers, I still favor a laser printer. But I'd forgotten about the stress and trauma of packing up all of my shit at the end of the academic year. Of course, unlike some of my classmates who got their parents to pick up their stuff in their Suburbans, I had to pack anything I didn't want to put in storage in a bunch of dufflebags to take on the plane back to Switzerland. \

Bottom line: The less crap to pack, the better. IOW: Skip the printer if you can. If you don't want to skip the printer, then get a laser.

Escher

Uh, you've never been to Berkeley, have you? We're not talking Sorority Pool Party here, if you know what I mean.