Ink Jet Printer

closed at request of OP

I use an HP-100 blue tooth portable printer. A bit pricey but small and most of the time I run it on its battery and have no wires at all.

HP-100 on Amazon

3oaks wrote:
I believe the O.P. was "looking for a small, lightweight ink jet printer". Not which printer people thought was better, an inkjet or laser printer. :R

Small, light weight, inkjet?

Correct, BUT if you take into account that with an small lightweight inkjet you PAY DEARLY for "ink".. So much so when the ink dries up from NON USE or after a FEW HUNDRED PAGES it is FAR CHEAPER TO BUY A NEW INKJET PRINTER instead of buying a new ink cartridge.

Sure, you could attempt to "refill" the ink cartridges but then you have the hassle and mess of doing so and IF the replacement ink you bough doesn't work well (good chance of that happening) you either have ruined the cartridge or live with a messy print..

Laser printers do have the advantage when it comes to low print usage . The toner does not dry out, does not damage a print head, does not freeze and over all is pretty darn stable.

Laser printers are my PRIMARY printer for all general printing that requires black and white printing.. I have an old OkiData laser which just recently bought a new toner for it, cost was $20 and get about 5K-6K pages..

Our color inkjet gets at the best 3K pages and the last cartridges we bought was $38 for black and $40 for a three color cartridge.. Often we get less than 500 pages due to the fact we don't print much color stuff AND the ink cartridges DRY OUT.

When that inkjet printer dies I am REALLY considering buying a COLOR LASER printer..

It would be cheaper due to the fact that I am not replacing ink carts due to AGE drying them out..

Ink carts the time meter starts running as soon as you break the seal..

Use them or lose them.

After all the OP DID SAY BLACK AND WHITE so really offering Laser printers as an alternative is not a bad idea at all.

The ONLY downside I have found with a laser printer is as someone else mentioned, they do have a startup "surge".. So that does kind of need to be taken into consideration BUT it is not nor should be a total problem IF you don't want it to be..

Startup surge is quick and the printer uses LESS power AFTER the initial surge so it isn't like it is going to require a battery pack the size of your RV to power it. Small laser printers should be able to operate from a 800W or larger inverter and once they are done with printing they go into a power down standby mode which uses very little power. There may even be even lower draw lasers, I just have not been in the market lately..

3oaks wrote:
I believe the O.P. was "looking for a small, lightweight ink jet printer". Not which printer people thought was better, an inkjet or laser printer. :R

Small, light weight, inkjet?

Perhaps he is a bit old school and never considered that a laser printer can be small, lightweight, and better than an inkjet. When you ask for advice on a forum, sometimes you get more than you bargained for. :)

Besides I couldn't recommend any black and white inkjet printer with a clear conscience.

We bought a small HP Printer several years ago and it works perfectly. Similar model is Hewlett Packard F5S23A#B1H Deskjet 1112. Small size fits on our closet shelf. $37 at Walmart. HP also make a wireless printer for less than $70.

One note about laser printers: They use a lot of power when first starting up. I have a Dell laser and my 300 watt inverter will not power it. I have to start up my generator. I don't use it very often, so it's not a big issue for me.

You should also look for one that scans and most of them do. This will let you get rid of receipts and other paper taking up room. When you get home, download them to a second computer as backup.

Bill

donn0128 wrote:
Canon ip100 series fits your needs. Cheap, reasonable ink. Just a solid basic printer.

I have the predecessor of this printer, the Canon ip90. Can't beat it for a portable printer. Very small and prints great. I have had the ip90 for years and never had a problem with it, especially clogged ink jets and I do not use it very often.

The ip90 does not have wireless capability as the ip110 does.

We have a Class B RV so compact is important.

I believe the O.P. was "looking for a small, lightweight ink jet printer". Not which printer people thought was better, an inkjet or laser printer. :R

Small, light weight, inkjet?

Thanks for comments and suggestions.