Inkjet colour printer for home-run business (advice pls)

[Roberto Smith]

Hi all,

I currently have a side-hustle which is designing and printing vinyl stickers for a small home-run business. I create the stickers using a Canon Pixma Pro 100s which does a great job, plus is easy to reflill with some great quality third party inks (Precision Colors).

What I need next is a "normal" inkjet printer for doing invoices, leaflets etc. I tried doing some quick research but there are sooo many options that I thouht it might be easier to ask on here! I think my key criteria are:

1) Price - I imagine somewhere around the £200 mark as an upper limit
2) Ability to easily refill the carts...my Pixma Pro carts are very easy to refll and the quality of the ink is superb, so was hoping for something along similar lines in terms of quality and ease of use
3) Must be able to print decent quality colour images (important for leaflets, examples of my work etc). I'm not expecting photo-quality though as I have the Pixma Pro for that
4) Not massive in terms of space requirements as I have limited space in my small office (basically the spare bedroom)
5) I'm in the UK, if that makes a difference.

In short I'm after a decent inkjet printer suitable for "admin" type tasks that also prints fairly decent colour and is cost-effective and easy to refill and in the £200 cost ballpark. If anyone has any ideas or recommendations then that would be great!

TIA
-Rob

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

you can get away from all refill hassles if you go for a printer with an integral tank system - Epson Ecotank models ET.... or Canon Megatank models of the G-series
You may have a look to this thread with the same subject

www.printerknowledge.com/threads/what-new-inkjet-printer-is-easiest-to-refill.13846/page-2#post-120260

 

[Roberto Smith]

That's great, thanks for the reply.

Just reading about the Canon G series...lot of complaints about the longevity of the printheads it seems...?

 

[stratman]

Canon Maxify.

If possible, go to brick and mortar store and see output quality. If image quality is sufficient for your needs then one of the Maxify's fit your needs.

Maybe our fearless Moderator @The Hat can post his link to the image quality of his Maxify. Looks good.

 

[The Hat]

Maybe our fearless Moderator @The Hat can post his link to the image quality of his Maxify. Looks good.

https://www.printerknowledge.com/threads/what-is-a-photo-black-cartridge-for.13821/post-120056

 

[Roberto Smith]

Thanks guys

 

[DKirk]

Just reading about the Canon G series...lot of complaints about the longevity of the printheads it seems...?

Print heads should do upto 30000 pages before issue (talking with focus towards the newer G5050, G6050 and G7050, GM2050 and GM4050 - they are also better constructed than the earlier models too, e.g. on the G60ho at least there is a little clamp you can use on the body which seals the ink lines - handy if you are in the position to need to change print heads). And one of the best advantages is they are designed for refilling - Unless there's any special offers, a full set of ink is £38.57 odd on the Canon store itself. I have compared the previous series to the new, and you do get better colours our of the GI-50 inks as you do the GI-590s (better Magenta formulation I think, may have been some other developments in the other colours).
FYI Keep an eye on the CRC-Tasktron website - sometimes they may have deals on the heads.

 

[paulcroft]

Hi Roberto, I'm a bit late to reply but, fwiw, I ran a small business from home for 20 years up until a couple of years ago and used a basic HP Laserjet 1200 for B&W printing for reports etc and a Canon inkjet for all colour related stuff and I still have this setup now for my personal use. The HP is still working fine after many years service and over 50,000 pages and only 3 or 4 toners. I'm on my fourth Canon printer, a PRO-100 which is still doing great service after several years and for which I have a couple of spare print heads just in case. This setup has served me really well and the PRO-100 is perfectly capable of printing flyers down to 4x6 if needed. I see Amazon sells an HP Laser Jet Pro M15W for under £90 so this may be another option for you.

 

[stratman]

@paulcroft - Great to hear your doing well.

 

[paulcroft]

Thanks Stratman. How nice that you remember me. I know I've not posted for a while but I still monitor this site every week or so to see what's happening and still print a lot at home. However, since I realised that the many experts on this site know what they are talking about and followed their advice to the letter I've been printing on my PRO-100 with great success and, touch wood, no problems for a long while now. The secret, without a doubt, is to refill the cartridges as soon as the printer warns that they're getting low. Once I started to do this religiously all problems disappeared and I wonder if the two extra print heads I bought as spares in the early days will ever be required. However, even if they're not it's very comforting to know I have them in case I do ever have a problem.

I remain indebted to all the printer VIPs here who helped me to understand all the secrets of keeping my Canon printers in fine fettle and how to refill the cartridges for myself and, courtesy of Precision Colors and their extensive help, my PRO-100 continues to provide wonderful prints using their Signature Edition inks.