Home office printer for arts and crafts, Linux snowflake edition.
January 24, 2018 2:20 PM Subscribe
Seeking a home office printer for art projects. Printer needs to be somewhat Linux compatible, and able to print on cardstock and inkjet T-shirt iron on material, and postcards.
Please help me pick out a new printer/scanner. I've read reviews and called manufacturers and am even more confused. I've owned printers like these in the past, do they just no longer make such items?
What I'm looking for:
1. Printer is available through Amazon, for easy shipping and easy returns if there's a problem with it.
2. Printer has decent Linux compatibility. I don't mind fussing around with the command line or aftermarket software to get it set up initially, but once it's set up, I want it to work.
3. Printer should have some "stand-alone" functionality: can print from a USB drive directly without computer, can print and scan test sheet to calibrate print heads without computer (important because not all Linux printer plugins do the calibration properly), can do color and BW copies without computer.
4. Printer can print on cardstock, t-shirt iron-on paper made for inkjets, "shrinky-dink" paper made for inkjets, envelopes and postcards. The cardstock I like to use for my mail-art is 270gsm, but I could switch to something a little lighter if necessary.
5. Printer doesn't have terrible reviews. I need to be able to print color photo images without the printer adding horizontal lines or "dot matrix" type artifacts. Repeated reviews of paper jamming is also a red flag.
6. Printer is in the $100-$150 ballpark.
I have owned two printers in the past that met all of these, for around $100 each, but neither are made anymore. At least one of them was an HP, not sure about the other brand.
The main issue I've run into is that when I track down a current HP printer that meets the criteria above, it has mostly terrible reviews.
This is not for professional use. I'm just a creative person who likes making one-off t-shirts, custom postcards, and other visual art. I won't be using the printer daily, more like once a week, so it doesn't need to stand up to heavy use, it just needs to do a few basic things well.
I have called and spoken to HP customer service on the phone more than once, and they weren't very helpful.
I am aware that there are many services online now that I could email files to, and have them print my stuff in house and ship to me. That does not interest me. I need to be able to print out hard copies in my home at short notice.
Thanks in advance for any suggestions!! :)
Please help me pick out a new printer/scanner. I've read reviews and called manufacturers and am even more confused. I've owned printers like these in the past, do they just no longer make such items?
What I'm looking for:
1. Printer is available through Amazon, for easy shipping and easy returns if there's a problem with it.
2. Printer has decent Linux compatibility. I don't mind fussing around with the command line or aftermarket software to get it set up initially, but once it's set up, I want it to work.
3. Printer should have some "stand-alone" functionality: can print from a USB drive directly without computer, can print and scan test sheet to calibrate print heads without computer (important because not all Linux printer plugins do the calibration properly), can do color and BW copies without computer.
4. Printer can print on cardstock, t-shirt iron-on paper made for inkjets, "shrinky-dink" paper made for inkjets, envelopes and postcards. The cardstock I like to use for my mail-art is 270gsm, but I could switch to something a little lighter if necessary.
5. Printer doesn't have terrible reviews. I need to be able to print color photo images without the printer adding horizontal lines or "dot matrix" type artifacts. Repeated reviews of paper jamming is also a red flag.
6. Printer is in the $100-$150 ballpark.
I have owned two printers in the past that met all of these, for around $100 each, but neither are made anymore. At least one of them was an HP, not sure about the other brand.
The main issue I've run into is that when I track down a current HP printer that meets the criteria above, it has mostly terrible reviews.
This is not for professional use. I'm just a creative person who likes making one-off t-shirts, custom postcards, and other visual art. I won't be using the printer daily, more like once a week, so it doesn't need to stand up to heavy use, it just needs to do a few basic things well.
I have called and spoken to HP customer service on the phone more than once, and they weren't very helpful.
I am aware that there are many services online now that I could email files to, and have them print my stuff in house and ship to me. That does not interest me. I need to be able to print out hard copies in my home at short notice.
Thanks in advance for any suggestions!! :)
AIOs don't often have the straight through paper path that you need for your heavy card stock. I've also not yet met an inkjet AIO that will print arbitrary files via USB.
My Epson Workforce is old and likely out of your price range, but it works. The open source drivers are quite limited. Gutenprint drivers are better if your printer supports them.
Also, not all Linuxes are the same. Brother printers will work fine under x86 Linux, but not on Linux ARM. Ubuntu has a habit of changing settings on you a lot, so your driver will change if you use that.
posted by scruss at 8:13 PM on January 24, 2018
My Epson Workforce is old and likely out of your price range, but it works. The open source drivers are quite limited. Gutenprint drivers are better if your printer supports them.
Also, not all Linuxes are the same. Brother printers will work fine under x86 Linux, but not on Linux ARM. Ubuntu has a habit of changing settings on you a lot, so your driver will change if you use that.
posted by scruss at 8:13 PM on January 24, 2018
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posted by stormyteal at 3:42 PM on January 24, 2018