[indymike]

Printers suck. They should be awesome. But instead, the print quality hasn't really improved since 1999. The last notable feture: tabloid size ink jets came out a decade ago. Printers still have paper handling issues, and inkjets still waste tons of ink unclogging print heads. All the innovation goes into lock-in and marketing strategies for consumables. The silver lining is that most printers have a Linux drivers these days.

I was a big advocate of Brother printers, but the last one I bought in 2020 has been plagued with paper jams and the cyan ink leeched into the yellow internal tank. So I now have a tabloid format scanner + B&W printer. I almost dread shopping for a printer because I feel like I'm entering into an abusive relationship with a loan shark (really, $75 for ink for the $200 printer?... or cheap toner! yeah! Oh, the developer unit costs more than the printer... Boo.)

[chongli]

I thought it was Brother laser printers that are the benchmark? Inkjet printers are simply the wrong technology for occasional printing. The clogging problem cannot be solved. It’s like trying to use 12V DC for household mains power.

Get a black and white Brother laser. They just work. Leave the inkjet printers to the photographers who print giant glossy colour photos every day.

[gandalfian]

Printers suck the print quality hasn't really improved since 1999.

In 1999 I was using a £150 canon colour inket with 360x360 resolution. Lasted ten years with fake ink at £20 a year. Now I am using a £150 canon megatank with 1200x4800 resolution, scan,copy,wifi and print plus an official bottle of ink costs £10 and lasts 5000 pages. Downside, I doubt the modern build quality will last 10 years but fingers crossed.

So adjusted for inflation my printer is much better. But having been been tantalised by £50 allinones for 15 years if you can just get past the expensive cartridge chips I agree it doesn't feel like it...

[indymike]

In 93, I bought an 720x720dpi Epson inkjet over the 600dpi Canon model. That printer was amazing, but by 99, everyone had caught up. By 99, I had a 1200dpi Tektronix printer at work, and at home the inkjet claimed to do 1200x2400 but looked about the same as the old Epson. My latest printer (a Brother) claims to do 1200x4800, and it looks... maybe better than the old Epson. The one thing, the Brother is really fast compared to the older printers.

[pshirshov]

Dunno. I've upgraded my brother mfc from 9020cdw to l8900cdw and both quality and speed are lot higher in the newer model. So the progress over 8 years is clearly visible in this case.