Best "cheapass" printer recommendation...

The title says it all.

I have two Lexmark printers; an old Z51 that seems hopelessly outdated, and another at work the series of which I can't remember. Its still operational and doing OK. My wife (sitting across from me here in the "IT" room), has a lexmark X1270 which is pretty good but alas, not wireless. I "plan" on getting a new laptop (a separate question) soon but haven't selected one as of yet.

(1) do I need/want a wireless printer? are they that "fire and forget" great?

(2) what brand and model do "youzguys'ngals" suggest?

regards, m

 

according to pc world, brother tends to have the most cost effective printers regarding purchase price and ink prices. I have an HP, and have always used hp. I don't print alot, so ink prices dont really matter too much to me.

 

Albeit not wireless, I just bought a Brother MFC 290C which is printer/scanner/fax/copier and it works great. Reason I bought it is that you can replace the color ink cartridges separately only as each runs out, at about $10/each, as opposed to having to buy one color cartridge at $40-$60 for all colors. Works great and was only about $100 total.

 

son and his wife use a wireless HP printer that is set up downstairs and they have no problems printing from upstairs or even their loft.
How much printing do you do? once in awhile, couple times a week, everyday, several times a day?
what kind of quality do you need? photo printing?
how about speed?
need to think about all that. I've got 2 printers...one for speed and one for photo printing,,but
I have to do a lot of printing for the family and others on an almost daily basis. I can't stand to hit the print button and wait for a minute for a print to finish when I've got quite a few copies to get out. the photo printer is a different story. I can afford the extra time as long as the quality is great. the only printers I have ever owned were, and are epson. used HP and great also..
if it were I, needing an everyday workhorse I would buy the cheapest, wireless machine out there and buy replacement cartridges from a reliable dealer on ebay. However, I have not found the HP, brother, canon or lexmark compatible inks as cheap as the epson replacements. also, if you print a lot there are CIS systems out there that are not that expensive, but the printer model will determine if one is available.
I would stay away from kodak at this time........they have a good idea but have known of quite a few random problems with their machines from people I know who are not to happy.