Home Printer Buying Guide: How to Choose the Best Printer for Your Needs

Inkjet or laser? Do I need an all-in-one? What is PictBridge? Do I need a network capable printer? We answer these common questions and help you decide which type of printer suits you best in our home printer buying guide.
Essays. Coupons. Last-minute directions to Grandma’s house. Whatever you need to print, there’s a home printer that can do it. And intense competition among competitors like HP, Lexmark, Canon and others has ground prices to such absurd lows that you can now walk into a store and walk out with a brand new printer for $60.
But selecting a home printer among so many options can be tough, especially with all the convoluted terms that can complicate the process. With that in mind, we’ve put together a quick-and-dirty guide to selecting a home printer, with simple explanations of the most common terms and our recommendations for a majority of users.Inkjet or Laser?

The first question all printer buyers must tackle comes down to a simple matter of what you plan on printing.
Color inkjet printers comprise the bulk of the market simply because they can print just about anything: essays, pie charts, or glossy photos, you name it. But printed text from inkjets doesn’t always look as sharp as from a laser printer, they’re typically slower, and they cost more to keep running.
Laser printers rule the roost in offices because they can print large volumes of text quickly, reliably, and on the cheap. And besides looking sharper than text from an inkjet, laser printouts won’t run when they get wet. Color lasers have also fallen into the range of affordability for consumers recently, but the cost of replacement color laser toner remains prohibitively high, making them a poor option for home use.
Unless you plan on printing novels or page after page of school reports, inkjet printers usually make the best bet for home users due to their flexibility. But for practical printers who just want to be able to read their printouts – not make an artistic statement with them – laser printers are still a best bet.All-in-One?

Both laser and inkjet printers often come built with a scanner bed up top, turning them into all-in-one machines: printer, copier, scanner and fax. Although you might not need all the functions, buying an all-in-one printer for home user makes a lot of sense, not only because it’s cheaper than buying a standalone scanner, but for the sake of saving room. Since all-in-ones are extremely common and manufacturers rarely charge much of a premium for them (HP’s cheapest goes for just $60) we highly recommend them for home users.Photo Printers

If you’re more interested in preserving family photos on paper than printing off homework assignments and pie charts, consider a dedicated photo printer. Though they lack the flexibility of multitaskers, the quality of prints is typically much better, and often rivals what you would receive from a kiosk or mail-order service like Shutterfly. The price you’ll pay for the convenience comes out in the print cost: Typically, photo paper and inks (dyes) are sold together in cartridges that can push costs to more than 30 cents per 4 x 6 print.
Supply Costs

Remember the mantra “give away the razor, sell the blades”? That century-old business model is still alive and well in the printer business, where many companies entice consumers with unimaginably low prices on their budgetprinters, knowing they can milk them over and over again when it’s time to replace the ink cartridges.
Research the cost of replacement supplies before you buy any printer to know what you’re in for when the initial cartridges finally run dry. Depending on how often you plan to print, it can actually be worth it to purchase a more expensive printer in order to buy into a cheaper line of cartridges. Also, look into the possibility of refilling your own cartridges, which can cost dramatically less than buying new every time.Duty Cycle

Why do office printers with features similar to home models cost so much more? Longevity. Those cheap home machines weren’t built to supply a stream of paper to an entire office, a number reflected in the manufacturer’s suggested “duty cycle,” which is the number of pages it can printed in a month without damaging the printer. A home printer, for instance, might be rated for 750 pages, while an office printer might hit 8,000 pages. Keep in mind that these are maximums – you should operate well below them unless you want to shorten the life of your printer by pushing it right to the brink. However, most printers marketed for consumer use should hold up just fine under casual printing.Networking Capability

Do you plan to print from multiple computers? Investing in a printer with networkingcapability will make that process much easier. Although you can configure any printer (connected to a single computer via a USB cable) to be shared on a network, it will rely on that computer for access to the network. Unless you want to keep a computer blazing 24 hours a day just for print capability, you’ll want a printer with its own built-in networking capability. An Ethernet jack will force you to put it somewhere near your router, but Wi-Fi can prove especially convenient, since it will allow you to place your printer in a central location where all members of the household can easily pick up their documents – like the living room.
Memory Card Slots, Bluetooth and PictBridge

If you plan to print a lot of photos, consider a printer with built-in memory slots,Bluetooth capability, or PictBridge support. All three will allow you to print photos directly from a camera, rather than transferring them to a computer and printing from there. Memory cards can be popped out of the camera and into the printer, Bluetooth cameras can send images wireless to the printer, and PictBridge cameras can be plugged into the printer with the same USB cable you might use to connect to a PC. Just don’t overestimate the usefulness of these convenience features: You’ll probably need to transfer your photos over to a computer to empty the memory card anyway, and most photographers will want to examine their prints on a bigger screen before printing them.Paper Handling

Every printer will feed on a fat stack of 8.5 x 11 copy paper, but what about legal envelopes, index cards and 4 x 6 glossy photo stock? Many printers include dedicated feed trays for printing on unusual papers, which can make them easier to deal with them. Also consider the size of the ordinary paper tray: Smaller trays will require you to add paper all the time, while a nice 250-page hopper or even dual trays can make it a once-a-month affair.Speed, Resolution and Color Claims

Much like the refresh rates for TVs and mile-per-gallon ratings for cars, these specs are easily manipulated by manufacturers. Take them all with a grain of salt, read published reviews and independent evaluations, and if possible, see actual printouts at a retail store to decide for yourself how quick a printer is, or how good the image looks.

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