The need for a home / office printer has increased as more of us are working or schooling from home. You could be a parent who needs to print out workbooks for your child. Or you may find that it’s easier to make notes on a business report using a pen or pencil rather than a keyboard.
Whatever the reason, if you find yourself in need of a printer, it’s not difficult to find one. Printers have not changed a lot over the past few years; they’ve just become more efficient and less expensive. You still will be choosing between laser and inkjet printers; color and black-ink-only printers; and print-only and multifunction devices. Because of all these decisions that need to be made, it’s a good idea to figure out what you want before you click “Buy” at your favorite shopping site.
In this article, I won’t be telling you which specific printer to buy. We recommend calling us on 021-4277841 or emailing sales@ronniemoore.ie so we can help you decide which printer is best for you.
But I will go through some of the choices you are going to be faced with and some of the features that you may want to make sure you’re getting.
So let’s start.
INKJET VS. LASER PRINTERS
If you haven’t bought a printer lately — or if you haven’t needed a printer until now — you may want a quick refresher on the difference between inkjet and laser printers. What follows is a vast simplification, but it will give you a general idea of how they work.
DO I NEED A COLOUR PRINTER?
Do you need to print in colour? Colour cartridges cost significantly more than black, for both laser and inkjet printers.
Some printers don’t just use black ink to print a black and white page – they can use as much as 50% from the colour cartridges, driving up the cost per page. This is more likely to be the case if the printer is really intended to print photographs.
Mono printers (laser only), are generally cheaper and smaller than colour printers.
SO WHICH SHOULD I BUY?
One way to decide whether to buy a laser or an inkjet printer is to look into what you want to do with it. If color is not important to you, then it’s a no-brainer — a laser printer will be more cost-efficient and faster. But if you want to print out your kids’ computer artwork in color, or print the occasional photograph, then you’re probably in the market for an inkjet.
