Printer advice

[Peter Flynn]

On 20/07/2023 03:26, Bill wrote:
> 1. The most important thing is that it must work with Linux. (This
>    goes without saying.)

AFAIK all the major manufacturers now support multiple interface 
protocols, so they should all work with Linux. Basically if CUPS can 
talk to the printer, it should work.

> 2. It must operate with a USB connection.  (Wireless connections are
>    problematic.)

Hardwire is fairly failsafe. Mine is Ethernet, but I agree that printer 
wifi connections need more work.

> 3. It has to be a color ink jet printer.
> 4. It should be inexpensive.

They're all of that: they rook you on the ink as usual.

> I would prefer it to be a HP printer.

I have had HP printers for decades and while they have deteriorated in 
design, and in their relationship with ink, they still work for me. 
Currently I have an OfficeJet Pro 7720 which scans and prints, and also 
prints A3 which is important for me (it can also act as a fax, FFS :-) 
The strong support for Linux is a big plus point.

It's set to auto-update, so it suffered for a few months from a bodged 
driver which made it cycle through the power-up routine on each job, but 
when I logged it as an error, it was fixed in a few weeks. I use it 
almost daily, on jobs from single pages to c.50 pages, and it's fast and 
fairly good with the ink.

I hesitate to recommend HP because of their declining customer service 
and fading technical knowledge, but I have not used much else. The 
occasional times I tangled with a Brother or Epson, it meant hunting for 
and downloading "special" drivers for Linux -- they *did* exist, and 
they worked fine, but it took maybe half a day to find them because 
no-one knew where they were :-) But both make good printers, with the 
same caveat about profligacy with ink.

Peter