Laser Printer Recommendation

Another vote for Brother monochrome laser printers. We realized we only really needed color for photos, and we have been using Costco for that (submit online and pick up in store). So we got rid of our color inkjet printers with all their problems and now have two Brother monochrome all-in-ones. Don’t print much but they are nice to have when we do, and having one in each of our home offices is convenient and inexpensive.

Watch for sales to get the best prices. Unfortunately COVID-19 seems to have made these a scalpers’ market. The DCPL2550DW I bought a year ago for $99 is going for $190 now. Maybe this Friday it will be less.

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I have a Samsung monochrome that I bought one night for the kids homework needs (instead of buying more inkjet cartridges) about 11 years ago. Turns out this is the same model as Brother laser printers. I finally replaced the toner cartridge last year. I paid $80 for the printer originally and $65 for a new toner cartridge.

Purchased a Brother 3 in 1 with wifi for my parents as a Christmas gift. Hands down the best bang for your buck printer. Purchased during an Amazon sale for $100. Hoping my printer will stop working so I can replace it with the same model.

Go with the Brother!

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I also have an ancient Samsung BW laser. And there’s no indication it will ever stop working. :smiley:

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I had a Samsung B&W Multifunction for several years and it worked great. It was from before the Samsung printer business was sold to HP, I’m not sure if the quality changed since. The reason I bought it was it had the lowest per-page cost I could find in a multifunction, (I wanted a scanner), that had good reviews. I would still have it if we hadn’t decided we wanted a colour printer.

We upgraded to a Canon MF634cdw, (a colour multifunction), I am completely happy with it. Its per-page cost is higher than the Samsung, even in black and white, but it’s not outrageous with high-capacity toner cartridges. Each colour can be replaced independently. It can both scan & print two-sided, (we were looking to save paper, even when buying a printer, and the Samsung didn’t have 2-sided scanning). It’s even got some customizability, so I have it set up to scan whatever’s in the document feeder and put the PDF in a network share on my Mac.

Why the upgrade to colour? We have a kid, and printable activities are way better in colour. And yeah, since homeschooling we print a lot more than before.

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Similar story here, though we had a Samsung Colour Multifunction laser printer bought when we were using MS Windows computers. When we cut over to Mac, went to look for software / Mac drivers but there weren’t any. Samsungs site pointed me at HP’s site and HP’s site basically suggested buying a new printer… so I did… I bought a Canon! :slight_smile:

I’ve always gone for laser printers for document printing but currently trialing an inkjet. I’d noticed with my canon photo printer, despite there being long periods where I didn’t print, the inks didn’t dry out etc. I was quite interested in the Canon MegaTank printers as you refill an ink reservoir from a bottle so it cuts down plastic waste. You also get a huge bottle of ink pretty cheap (huge bottle of black, sub £13, colours sub £9, each of which do 1000’s of pages). One year in it’s still going good, bit of banding noticeable in photo printing but text etc. looks perfectly acceptable. So far so good. :crossed_fingers:

That’s why I like PostScript or PCL-capable printers. You might lose some features with a generic driver (toner level,…) but you can essentially print fro any OS.

GutenPrint used to be a solution for nearly every printer out there, but it seems to be “broken” since Catalina or at least had some issues. Might check that one.

macOS runs on CUPS, which can also drive printers without “a driver”. In your browser go to http://localhost:631 and you can configure it. If you don’t get anything, enter cupsctl WebInterface=yes in the shell. If there’s a PPD (PostScript Printer Description). out there, you can get that printer to work. Many PPDs were written by Linux enthusiasts. For many printers, the huge 200MB “printer driver” just boils down to that single PPD file.

What won’t work: Windows printers, where the “firmware” is within the driver. Usually the printer translates PS/PCL/IPP/Whatever. If the printer is devoid of any “control software”, because it was moved into the driver…it’s too “dumb” to be accessed without that huge overhead (made manufacturing printers cheaper, less “chips”).

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Ah cool, yeah, I’d forgotten about CUPs, handy to remember, thanks! :slight_smile:

I really, absolutely need a colour printer because my wife says so.

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What model do you have?

Happy wife, happy life.

After divorce, happy bachelor, of course.

We have this one:

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I’ve had good luck with Brother monochrome printers, but a terrible time with the color models. I currently have an HP color printer that I got in super discount as a discontinued model and it’s been great.

I do … but not for documents. I’ve got a Brother HL-L6200DW B&W laser printer that I use for documents, and it is just dandy. I’ve also got an Epson SureColor P900 that I use exclusively for photos.

If you don’t print enough photos to justify the expense of a dedicated, high-quality color printer, you’ll be much better off taking them to a shop than using a color laser printer.

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