Printer advice

[Robert Heller]

At Thu, 20 Jul 2023 23:03:58 +0100 "Ubuntu user technical support,? not for general discussions" <ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com> wrote:

> 
> On 20/07/2023 19:49, Robert Heller wrote:
> [...]
> > Ink Jet printers are generally crap. 
> 
> It depends what you use them for. I need four-colour calibrated drafts 
> for my clients, usually A4 pages printed on A3 so that the crop marks 
> are visible. I can't afford a 4-colour A3 double-sided laser printer, so 
> an A3 inkjet for which I can perform colour calibration on specific 
> substrates is fine for me. I also need reliable registration and feed 
> for 2-sided drafts; HP isn't perfect but it's close enough. But in 
> general, yes, the quality of inkjet manufacture is indeed crap.

I've *never* been able to get even close accurate registration or even close 
scaling with inkjets.  OTOH, these would have been "cheap" models pre 2010.  
Maybe they have improved some?  My "cheap" Brother Laser printer is quite 
accurate and does double sided printing accurately.

> 
> > HP *used* to make quite decent *Laser* printers.  
> 
> They did indeed. When we took delivery of our first Laserjet way back 
> when, we were struggling to extract it from the expanded polystyrene 
> wedges that held it in the box, and at some stage everyone let go of 
> their bit and we dropped the whole thing about 90cm onto a concrete 
> floor. When the cussing and blaming subsided, we plugged it in, unbent 
> the one paper guide that seemed to have been a casualty, and it worked 
> perfectly for the next decade.
> 
> > a Lexmark color laser printer available from Amazon for $226.
> 
> What Gene said.

It appears that Lexmark has gotten better.  Yes, earlier model Lexmark inkjets 
where nearly imposible to get working under Linux, but newer model Lexmark 
*laser* printers are actually *easier* to get working under Linux than 
Brother...  (Again, I haven't looked at inkjets of any brand in like 13+ 
years.) 

> 
> > Inkjets can be a bitch to get working under Linux (even/esp HP).
> 
> Used to be. Last time I had a problem installing one was probably in the 
> 1990s or early 2000s. If you buy a common brand, and not something 
> released last week, Linux will just recognise it and that's it. But 
> definitely if you go buying some discount-store own-brand unlabelled 
> stuff with no indication of what it is or how it works, it will be 
> harder to get working.

I guess my experience was dated... (And I would have been using a non-bleeding
edge Linux, so bleeding edge drivers would not have been available or
compatable with things like the version of glibc, etc.)

> 
> P
> 

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