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My printers (3!!) are all dead

Yup. They're also not very constructive in their criticism. "I contacted customer support and was asked to spend 40 minutes to troubleshoot. I had read online in a support center that the only way to solve the problem is to get new cartridges. They are sending those in 5-7 days. I could have new ones through amazon." Mmm. Amazon isn't HP. 40 min to troubleshoot isn't terribly long and you convinced them to send you $40 in print cartridges. That's actually decent service. I've never told $company that I read something online somewhere and they sent me free stuff. Also, if you just bought the thing, send it back to Amazon. It's free. All you have to do is write a comment on why you're returning it. They really don't care why. I bet I could return something with a reason of, "Paper output scares my cats," and I wouldn't have any problems.

I do think there are a lot of folks that don't read the manual. One of the reasons I decided on this printer is because the specs say it can print pretty high-resolution pictures, but that's only if you use photo-quality paper. Also, if you're printing 8" x 11" photos, you're going to probably go through one of those XL cartridges. If you're not used to printing photos, this will surprise you.

FWIW, Gandalfe, you might want to look into getting a laser printer, if you don't already have one. It'd probably be pretty cost-effective for printing that much. Even if you get an old HP 8150 and have to replace the fuser, pickup rollers, etc.
 
I just did the fuser & roller update on my 8150. These guys sell high quality replacement parts, and will also talk you through any issues. Nice step by step instructions on their site for a lot of different printers. I had a spring clip go flying across the room when I was replacing the fuser, and I couldn't figure out how it went back in place. Ten minutes on the phone with them and all was good. They also have good quality replacement toner. They called me a week later to make sure I was happy. You don't see that very much these days.
 
Cool.

For those people who don't know what an HP LaserJet 8150 is, it's a very old, very large printer (like, close to 115lbs). However, the advantage of the 8xxx (8000, 8100, 8150, etc.) and the older 5si (which looks practically identical) is that you could fairly easily replace any part and no part was outrageously expensive. As an example, you can buy a toner cartridge for $70 and it has a yield of 20,000 pages. I also think that the most expensive part is about $200. In my days as a tech, I've probably replaced everything on these except the high-voltage power supply.

There are disadvantages, though. The number one thing is where are you going to put a 3 foot tall 115lb printer. The second is that it can be finicky with what paper you use. But, when all the stars align, it's a majestic beast.
 
Well, I got the printer in today and IT'S TERRIBLE. GARBAGE. I HATE EVERYONE WHO HAD ANYTHING THAT HAD ANYTHING TO DO WITH THIS PRODUCT!!!!!!111111ONE

Erm. It's pretty decent. Setup only took slightly long because HP's website is fairly slow. Unpacking the machine was a snap. Installing the software was easy. I do wish that HP (and other manufacturers, not to single HP out) would print out a little card with the MAC ("hardware") address on it for any wireless device so it's easier to add the thing to a secured wireless network. However, it's not that difficult to find it. Just an extra step.

I do think some of the pictures in the installation instructions aren't really good and I really see no reason why HP doesn't have a card that says, "Go to http://youtube.com/hp and select your printer to see how to set it up," or something like that. For me, though, I didn't care. They were easy enough to figure out. Hey, I've built Ikea furniture before.

The printouts take as long as it did on my Epson or close to it, so no gains there. The colors are an awful lot more saturated and pretty, which is good. A feature that this printer has that I didn't know about is that you can scan from a web page, meaning I don't have to worry about attempting to set up the scanner in Linux, which can be tricky. The printer's also 1/2 the height of the Epson, which isn't good or bad for me. I do like that the printer has a touchscreen AND an iPhone app.

So, I'm currently happy. Only problem: the delivery guys delivered it to the wrong address. There's a street directly north of mine that starts with the same letter and it was delivered to the folks that live there. This has happened with mail before, but this is the first time for a package.

As a side note, my youngest daughter noticed that the box said that you can print photos from your phone/tablet to this printer. So, I rehashed the explanation about photo paper and print cartridges ...
 
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5 1/2 years later and no problems with the Samsung. Copies as fast as a big copy machine and spits out music as clean and fast as anything. Ink is a bit steep, but lasts a long time.
 
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