Here is a list of the top selling printers at Amazon.com during December 2009. I also thought is would be useful to include some ratings from some of the consumer electronic rating web sites. If you are in the market for a printer, these are some of your best choices.

	Canon PIXMA MP560 Wireless Inkjet All-In-One Photo Printer (3747B002) Pros: Very nice photo quality, Fast scanning speeds, Automatic duplexing and roomy paper trays Cons: Mediocre print speeds Bottom Line: For a reasonable price, you get automatic duplexing and dual 150-sheet input trays, but the trade-off is mediocre print speed.
	Canon PIXMA MX860 Wireless All-In-One office Printer Pros: Large 2.5-inch LCD; built-in memory card reader; stylish design; robust software suite; fast output. Cons: Output quality can use improvement Bottom Line: The Canon Pixma MX860’s auto-document feeder, large LCD screen, and quick print speeds are sure to increase your productivity, but it also includes plenty of software to nourish your creative interests. At $199, this multifunctional printer earns our recommendation.
	HP DeskJet F4480 Inkjet All-in-One Printer (CB745A#B1H) Bottom Line: With a very simple setup you’ll be printing, scanning and copying in no time Easily make prints, scans and copies with clear, straightforward buttons Have ink ready when you need it thanks to automatic low-ink alerts Print great-looking photos right at home with borderless printing Save money and energy Use paper more efficiently Take a step to a greener way of life Print from the web easily and efficiently Enjoy high-quality, worry-free printing.
	Brother HL-2140 Personal Laser Printer Pros: Low price, fairly compact size, good quality output, drum rated at 12,000 copies, easy to setup Cons: Not recommended for large print jobs or photos, cost of toner cartridges Bottom Line: I have been a brother laser printer fan for about 10 years. I started with the HL-1240, then moved on to the HL-2040 and now I have an HL-2140. Every time I get near the end of the life cycle with the drum unit, I find that it is cheaper to just buy another printer. I’ve never had a problem with a brother and am happy with mine.
	Canon PIXMA MP490 Inkjet Photo All-In-One Printer (3745B002) Pros: Inexpensive; excellent documentation, Simple, intuitive control panel Cons: Garish skin tones; expensive black ink, Poor paper tray design Bottom Line: It’s a surprisingly decent machine for the price, but its high black ink costs are the tradeoff.

If you own one of these printers, please take a minute and give us your review of it. Thanks!

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Here is one that drives me completely crazy.

All printer cartridges have a page yield, the number of pages you can expect print with a cartridge.  But, page yields are not based on printing a full page or the number of a certain size of photos you can print (disclaimer: some manufacturers now publish page yield in terms of the number of 4×6 inch photos you can print), they are based upon printing 5% of a page. How on earth does someone determine 5% of a page, and who decided that page yields would be based on 5%?

Fortunately we have some answers!

First let’s talk about the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). The ISO is a non-governmental, international-standard-setting body composed of representatives from various national standards organizations. Despite its claim to be non-governmental, the ISO’s ability to set standards that often become law makes it more powerful than most non-governmental organizations. This is the group that decided that printer page yield would be based on printing 5% of a page. In doing so, the ISO put forth a document that depicted their standard. This is what 5% looks like:

Consumers have purchased printer cartridges for years without every really understanding what page yield actually meant. Vendors are just as guilty. They’ve relayed page yields to consumers without really understanding what they meant. Well, it is time for that to change!

Thanks to our good friends at  Stinkyink (if you live in the U.K., you should buy from these guys) we now have some additional visual references of what we can expect from our printer cartridges.

The “Stinkers” took the ISO’s demonstration one step further. They decided to do some cartridge testing using different fonts, font sizes, lines, and border. Their goal was to determine if these kinds of things had an effect on page yield. Their work was judged on how many words could be printed within the 5% page area. The more words printed, the more efficient the font, the more ink you could save.

Below are visual results for the fonts tested, Calibri (size 11), Arial (size 11), Times New Roman (size 11), Tahoma (size 11), and Comic Sans (size 11).

As you can see, using the Calibri (size 11) font will give you the most bang for your cartridge buck. It gave the most number of printed words. Arial, Times New Roman, Tahoma, and Comic Sans followed, in order of number of words printed.

So, what does this mean for your printing habits?

Well, if you are in to ink conservation and maximizing the money you spend on printer cartridges, you should do the following:

1. Always print text with a Calibri or Arial font, size 11 or lower. The smaller the font size you can use the better. Make sure your work can still be read though!

2. Stop using fancy, over sized, bold fonts. Every page you print is costing you more than it should.

3. Avoid using any unnecessary lines or borders.

4. If you won’t be giving your print out to someone, use the draft print mode on your printer.

5. Only bold and underline your text when necessary.

6. Black cartridges are typically less expensive, so print text using your black cartridge as much as possible.

If you have any cartridge maximizing tips to share, or reactions to this post, take a minute and let me know. Thanks!

So you are in the market for a new printer? Or, maybe you’ve just been pondering some myths you have heard about printers (probably not!).  There are a whole bunch of printers available to you, many with some amazing features. Unfortunately making the decision to by a certain type of printer is not as easy as one might think. There’s a ton of knowledge out there, so all you really have to do is make a list of the features you like, then find the printer that has all, or most, of them.

Problem is that there are a few printer myths floating around out there that make things harder than they should be. The goal of this post is to address those myths and turn them in to fact or fiction. Hopefully it will make your printer purchase a lot easier. Let me know if it does, or does not.

Inkjet printers do not print text well.

FICTION. Inkjet printers now do a great job with text. Most give you something that looks like it came off a laser printer. But, I have to stress the word “looks”. The way the inkjet printer is build means that it will never printer text as well as a laser printer. Inkjets spray ink on to the page. Laser printers place the toner and then fuse it to the page. Add that fact that paper is porous, meaning that ink will bleed, and you you’ve got a double whamee! So, while the latest inkjet printers do an excellent job printing text, the text they print will never be as good as a laser printer.

If you are looking for a printer to print photos with, go with an inkjet. Only consider a laser if you require presentation type text documents. An inkjet printer will do fine for any other types of text documents.

Image quality from multifunction printers is poor.

FICTION. As this question a few years ago and it would be fact. Printer manufactures got to understanding that consumers would really like printers they could do more than just print with, but they also wanted a high level of quality of print from those printers. Current multifunction printers do a great job of printing, faxing, scanning, copying, etc. Instead of reinventing the wheel, many of the manufactures just added the scan capability to their existing printer designs.

Now, there’s a catch to this. If you are in the market for a high end printer, one that costs $800.00 or more, you are going to have to purchase a printer without the multifunction capabilities. Manufacturers don’t make this high end printers in the multifunction form. Most printer users aren’t looking to spend this much on a printer, nor are they printing fine art or archival prints.

You need an Apple Airport base to share a printer.

FICTION. This is definitely an easy way to network  your printer, but there are a few other ways as well. The Old School, and easiest, way was to share the printer through the computer is was physically connected to. Printer networking has advanced far enough that you don’t need to do this any more. It is still an option though.

Modern printers offer both wired and wireless networking options. The manual that comes with your printer will walk you through the networking steps.

Laser printers are hazardous to your health.

FICTION. Okay, not totally fiction, but the circumstances that would make them hazardous to your health are so easily avoidable that is really does not make sense to call this fact.

Several years ago, Queensland University of Technology found that laser printers emit tiny particles in to the air. The emissions are caused by the paper, in the printer, being heated before tone is applied. The researchers then theorized that the ultrafine particles could have the same health effects of other small particles (cigarette smoke, polluted air).  BUT, the theorized health hazards have not been definitively confirmed.

Now there are those that even the suggestion of a health hazard means that a laser printer should not be in their home or office. I can’t say I totally disagree with you. If you have some worry, but need a laser printer, here are some things you can do. 1) Don’t set your computer on your desk. Find another area, away from you, you can place it.  2) Place your printer in a well ventilated area.

Your color laser printer is a government spy.

FACT. Okay, not totally fact, but the conspiracy theorist in me finds this one interesting. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) maintains a list of color laser printers that, it says, lay down light yellow code-patterns on every print. The dots of the patterns can be viewed under blue light or magnification. These patterns were originally developed to help the federal government track criminals who where printing counterfeit money. The EFF claims that the patterns could be used to track and monitor anyone who uses a color laser printer.

If you don’t want the government to monitor your printing habits, make sure to buy a monochrome laser or inkjet printer. These printers don’t leave the patterns.

So there you have it. A little printer fact or fiction (mostly fiction). Hopefully this helps with your purchase. If you have any fact or fiction type comments to share with us, please do so. Definitely take a minute to share if you have any printer conspiracy theories. Love ‘em!

A continuous ink system (CIS), also known as continuous flow system (CFS), or bulk feed ink system, is a cost-effective replacement for ink-jet printer cartridges. In contrast to conventional cartridges, a CIS/CFS uses very large (about 100ml/color) ink tanks, which are connected with tubes to the printhead nozzles. The tanks can be refilled from an ink bottle or sometimes a syringe. Many CIS systems have been developed to cover most Epson, HP, Canon, and other printers. These bulk feed systems also allow users to use inexpensive aftermarket inkjet inks as well as specialty inks for T-Shirt transfers or Black and White inks for B&W printing. These options have allowed users to produce specialty prints at a fraction of the cost of purchasing special cartridges or using more expensive printing solutions.

A continuous ink supply system feeds ink cartridges by way of silicone tubing.

Continuous ink tanks designs vary, most incorporate a constant level, barometric pressure design. Constant level CIS delivers a smooth flow of ink to the cartridges as needed. Front tank is vented to atmosphere, negative air pressure in the back tank delivers ink to the cartridges. (Source: Wikipedia.com)

Ever use an continuous ink system? Let us know how it worked for you.

You’ve spent a good amount of money on your inkjet, or laser, printer. You definitely want to be able to keep it printing as best it can for as long as possible. Here are 11 tips that will help you do that.

1. Clean your printer: Clean the outside by wiping it with a soft, slightly damp cloth from time to time. This will keep dust from accumulating on your printer and keep it looking pretty. More importantly, CLEAN THE INSIDE. It is very easy and will have the biggest impact on your printer’s performance. Whenever you open your printer look around for paper dust and debris. If you see any, use a can of compressed air to blow the dust and debris out. Better yet, set a monthly task reminder to do this.

2. Don’t use bent, torn, or used paper: I am all for recycling paper. The stuff that has already been through the printer once but still has a blank side. Unfortunately this is not what is best for your printer. This type of paper is more likely to cause paper jams. A paper jam increases the risk of other problems within your printer. Paper is meant to move smoothly through your printer. A jam, or how you remove the jammed paper, can cause other problems. These problems are usually costly ones too. We now use our blank sides for taking notes, or letting the kids draw on.

3. Use quality paper: In an attempt to save some money, many of us purchase medium to low grade paper. Not good! You should always use 20-24 pound paper. Your printer manufacturer may also publish a minimum paper standard (the lowest pound paper you should use). Check the manufacturers web site to find out what this is. You can also check the box your printer came in (specs are usually printed on the box) or in the user manual that came with your printer. Using the wrong kind of paper can cause paper jams, which as we said above, leads to added expenses.

4. Don’t fan the paper before loading: Guilty! Or at lease I used to be. Fanning the ream of paper before loading it will not reduce paper jams. It actually can cause static electricity to build up between the pages, which will cause more paper jams. Just put the paper in the paper tray and let the printer worry about seperating.

5. Store your paper in a low humidity environment: High humidity can cause pieces of paper to stick together. When paper sticks together, you get paper jams. Always store your paper in a low humidity environment. You should also operate your printer in a low humidity environment.

6. Use high quality labels: Whenever you use your printer to print labels, make sure you use a high quality label. When you use a laser printer to print labels you should definitely use high quality labels. The heat from the laser printer will cause cheap labels to peel from the sheet and stick to your laser printer roller. It is a tough task to peel the label from the roller and then make sure there isn’t any label adhesive left. Major, major headache! It can cost a few hundred dollars to replace damaged parts in a laser printer.

7. Use the straightest paper path for labels: This means that use the paper tray that will allow for the fewest bends. If you can do a straight feed then that is the way to go. This will reduce the chance of labels peeling from their sheet. We all know the damage labels can do to a printer (see #6).

8. Replace old and worn rollers: The rollers are what move your paper through the printer. As they get older then become smoother and won’t pull the paper as well. This increases your chance for a paper jam. You can buy roller kits, which provide new rollers. You can also purchase kits that will allow you to ‘rough up’ your rollers. If you want to save a few dollars you can rough up your rollers yourself. Just use a small file and rub it against the rollers. When you do this, be sure you rough the roller surface evenly. Uneven rollers will cause problems too.

9. Close the manual feed tray when it is not in use: Leaving an unused tray open will allow excess dust in to the printer. Worse, you could accidentally bump something up against the open tray and break it. At that point the tray will be permanently open, and you will have created an additional step when it comes time to print. You might need to continually tell your printer which tray to print from. Printers often sense an open tray as the default paper source.

10. Be careful when you replace printer parts: Printer manufacturers are using more and thinner plastic. This makes printers more prone to damage if they are not handled with more care. Any time you open your printer, be it to replace an empty cartridge or to replace parts, do so with great care. Never use excessive force. When a plastic component breaks it most likely means that you are going to purchasing a new printer.

11. Purchase a service manual: NOT a service warranty or plan, but a manual. You can get these from the manufacturer, and they will tell you how to take care of your printer. They will also tell you how to repair your printer should anything break. Most even come with a pretty good set of diagrams. If you plan on doing any type of self-diagnosing and fixing of your printer while you own it, you are going to need a service manual.

Do you have any printer care tips that we have not mentioned here? If so, take a second to comment and let us know.

Travel back to the olden days of the 20th Century. People around the country celebrate their own holidays in their own ways and don’t think too much about it. Merry Christmas they would wish each other. Happy Hanukkah then became more popular. By 1966, they had added Happy Kwanzaa to the list.

Eventually, a few folks started to say Happy Holidays. After all, New Year’s came a few days after Christmas, and typically was pretty soon after Hanukkah and Kwanzaa, so it seemed to make sense to lump everything together. People then started saying Seasons Greetings. Isn’t that interesting? You don’t hear too many people saying Seasons Greetings to each other in July, but Summer is still a season, isn’t it? The years went by and people began adapting to the changes around them.

Then came a terrible development for the nations children…Christmas Break had vanished! Well, no, it hadn’t literally vanished. Luckily for them it was just replaced by a Winter Break, a Winter Holiday or a December Holiday. Potentially even more frightening was the recent news that Christmas Trees had been replaced by Holiday Trees. Then we learned they were the same thing. Phew!

So, on Winter Break, a few weeks before Christmas people began picking up their Holiday Trees. They began displaying their Menorahs in anticipation of Hanukkah (or maybe even Chrismukkah). And they began putting up their Kinaras and other decorations for Kwanzaa.

And now as we celebrate the special days that mark the end of 2005 the use of the all encompassing, and vigorously promoted, Happy Holidays will get you boycotted faster than a child can open a wrapped gift.

With every adult and poor child now thoroughly confused as to how they exactly are to express their joy of the season, the inevitable next step has been taken: the ringing in of the Season of WHATEVER.

No more worrying about offending anyone with your warm wishes…just call the season Whatever. Merry. Happy…Whatever! Shout it in the streets, no one will sue you, no one will boycott you, no one will be excluded. Whatever is open ended. It’s safe. It’s whatever you want it to be. No more worrying about what cards to send people or what to hang up in your office now that Whatever is here.

So rest easy this Chris…this Hanu…this Kwan…this, this WHATEVER.

This post was created in 2005 by A.W.M., a staffer at Pacific Ink. I came across it the other day, got some good laughs while reading, and decided to dust if off and share with you. Enjoy!

Happy Holidays from Pacific Ink! Thanks for your continued business and we look forward to working with you more in the upcoming year.

Did you know that it takes 3 ounces of oil to produce an inkjet printer cartridge?

Did you know that 500 million inkjet cartridges are sold, per year, in North America alone?

If you do the math on this one, 1.5 trillion ounces of oil are used to manufacture printer cartridges. That’s 11.7 million gallons of oil. A staggering number!

Some of you may be wondering what can be done about this. The answer is . . . Use remanufactured inkjet cartridges.

Remanufactured inkjet cartridges are cartridges that were originally manufactured by your printer maker (HP, Lexmark, Dell, Canon, Epson). Once that original cartridge ran out of ink it made it in to the hands of a remanufacturer who did a whole bunch of cleaning and testing (simple description) before refilling the cartridge with ink. Once the cartridge was refilled more testing was done before the cartridge was made available to sell.

Actually, I should have prefaced the above description with “A good cartridge remanufacturer will do the following”. There are a whole bunch of remanufacturers out there who do nothing more than put ink back in the cartridge. Not good!

Okay, back to saving oil. Typically a cartridge can be remanufactured 1-2 times. Because the same cartridge is being used twice (we’ll assume just one remanufacturing per cartridge for this example) you are saving 3 ounces of oil.

If we do our math again, assuming every new cartridge is manufactured once, that 500 million becomes 250 million. Our oil consumption goes down to 5.8 million gallons. Split these numbers in half again to assume a cartridge is remanufatured twice.

If remanufactured inkjet cartridges are environmentally friendly and cost less then manufacturer brand cartridges (they really do!), why aren’t they more popular. How come everyone does not use them?

For a few simple reasons.

1) As mentioned before, not all remanufacturers are good remanufacturers. Let’s face it, it only takes one bad experience with a product to turn you off to it. Additionally you will tell a whole bunch of your friends about your experience with the remanufactured cartridge, causing them not to purchase either.

2) Remanufactured cartridges are not as good as manufacturer brand cartridges. As much as those in the industry hate to hear this, they level of quality is just not the same. It’s close, some reports say with a half of a percent. Probably more like 1% for those that do the job right. But when you are talking about millions of cartridges a half to one percent is huge number. Printer manufacturers do not make perfect cartridges either. They have an error rate and you will get defective cartridges from them.

3) Customer support by remanufactured vendors is not that good. This is not a blanket statement because there are remanufactured cartridge vendors that do a terrific job supporting their product. But again, there are those that are completely useless and they are killing those that do a good job. If we are honest about our buying habits, we are okay with a product that we might have problems with as long as we know there is someone there to take care of us when things go wrong. In a lot of cases it is the support that sells the product.

4) Printer manufacturers have deep pockets! The folks that make your printer have a lot of money to spend on advertising. Advertising that convinces you that you would be foolish to buy anything but the cartridges they make.

So, what should you do? This depends on you.

If you are environmentally conscious and want to save some money, go with a remanufactured cartridge. Remember, you are buying a product with a slightly higher defective rate so make sure you find a reliable vendor (ask them about their remanufacturing process) with verifiable positive feedback. Heck, leave a post here and I will email you some good ones.

If spending more for printer cartridges because you know you are getting a higher quality product is for you, buy a cartridge made by your printer manufacturer. These are easy to find and you don’t need to be to conscious about who you buy them from.

Let me about your experiences with either remanufactured or manufacturer brand cartridges. I’d love to hear from you.

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Well, they are at war about as much as two companies that sell printer cartridges can be. But they did do some verbal sparring on the mean streets of Twitter.

Things heated up a while back when HP called attention to Kodak’s marketing techniques and the FCC got involved. Kodak was claiming that using their printers and inkjet cartridges would save consumers $110 a year. After an FCC investigation Kodak had to change their claim to a savings of $110 per year if you print more than 4 pages a day.

So, what was today’s tweeting all about?

HP came out and criticized Kodak’s marketing claims and the quality of their printers. Kodak responded by trying to take the high road using the “shame on you HP” tactic. HP then followed up with “We are HP. You can’t possibly beat us.”

Here is where it gets interesting though. Kodak decided they would try to change the game by charging more for their printers and less for their printer cartridges (polar opposite to everyone else). Kodak must be making some sort of dent in the market share for HP to come out like this. Last time HP reacted, Dell was giving away printers with every computer they sold and gaining 13% of the market. Where is Dell now?

Okay, back to Kodak . . . Expensive printers, cheap ink. Kodak is now deviating from this philosophy and cutting prices on their printers. As of Monday, BEST BUY.com lists three Kodak multi-function printers for 25%-40% off. HP printers are discounted as much as 30%. Additionally, both companies are offering $50 trade-in credits.

As with most price wars, the consumer will be the winner (yeah for us!). So we’ll all be enjoying our inexpensive printers this holiday season, but wouldn’t we like to see HP and Kodak fighting over the price of printer cartridges? This all seems like a well played out scheme to sell more printers and then reap the benefits of selling cartridges for these printers. Let’s face it; cartridges are where their money is! So, if you need one, buy a new printer and enjoy the savings. Just remember, you will still need ink.

Let’s take a second to address HP’s claim about the quality of Kodak’s printers. A quick online search of printer users shows that most of Kodak’s printers are receiving average ratings (2.5 or 3 stars out of 5). I’ve read a lot about how pretty their printers look (they’ve done a very good job on design), but not much else gives a sense of quality. Most complaints focus on how loud the printer is, troubles with the drivers, and the extensive number of error messages. CNET really did not have much good stuff to say in their reviews. Their best summary, “Your money would be better spent on alternative multifunction printers.”

My personal opinion . . . Take advantage of this price war and buy an HP printer. You will definitely be able to get more features for the money you spend. HP has a proven track record and some excellent printers that will fit your home or office needs.

Kodak is an upstart. Not to say they won’t make a printer worth your money, they just have not made one yet.

If you’ve had an experience with a Kodak or an HP printer you would like to share, take a minute and let us know. Thanks!

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Digital cameras are perhaps one of the best inventions ever . . . Instant photo gratification! We don’t have to go to the photo lab and wait an hour, or more, to actually see the pictures we took. I can’t even remember what it was like to wonder if the picture you took was any good. We can immediately distribute our photos via a variety of online methods and share them with others. But, and this is a big BUT, it is still difficult to print your photos for display on your walls without going to the photo lab.

The best way to avoid your local photo lab and do the printing at home is to use your existing inkjet printer. Of course, the quality of your prints will vary considerably depending on the type of inkjet printer you own. Some printers are built for photo quality prints, some are not. Regardless you can still print some fairly decent images on just about any inkjet printer as long as you stick to printing smaller images. Stick with the 4×6 inch pictures and save the 5×7’s and larger for the photo lab. You can also make a huge difference in the quality of your prints by getting your hands on some glossy or matte photo paper.

If you find yourself getting more serious about printing photos at home then head out and pick up a photo inkjet printer. These will be more expensive than your typical inkjet printer but are far more capable of producing higher quality prints than your non-photo inkjet printer. Photo printers also allow you to print directly from your camera or memory card. This will save you the time of having to upload the pictures to your computer before printing.

For those than can wait a few days to get their photos in the mail, online services like Shutterfly and Snapfish are really good. Personally, I am a big fan of doing my photo printing at CostCo. Upload the photos and pick them up at your local store an hour later for as low as $0.13 per print. Some instant photo gratification!

Let me know how you print your photos. If you have any tricks or tips to share let me know about them too.

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