Most economical printers... and binding options

[Sunshine89]

Next year will be my first year homeschooling. I'm starting to get turned on to the idea of buying digital products that can be reprinted each year for each child, but I'm worried about the cost of printing. I currently have an HP printer with the instant ink service which claims to be economical but I'm not sure if it really is when you get to printing entire curriculum or planners. The best deal they have is 300 pages for $10 and it is $1 for 25 pages after that. I'll have to make it work for now but I might consider getting a new printer around Christmas or next year sometime if I can find a more economical option and I find we are printing quite a bit. 

 

So what have you found to be the most economic color printers?  

 

What do you use for binding if you print an entire workbook/planner? 

Edited May 23, 2016 by Sunshine89

[blondchen]

I can't answer your question about a color printer because I only have a B&W printer, BUT, I find that b&w is sufficient for almost all of our homeschooling printing. Once in a while I'm bummed that we don't have a color printer, but that mainly applies to non-homeschool things, actually. I am considering getting a color printer to use only when we need color, but our Brother 2270DW laser printer has been a workhorse and it's wonderfully efficient, especially on toner save mode (which I use for almost everything - it's fine for school worksheets, etc).

 

Regarding binding, I am IN LOVE with my Proclick. I don't know what I'd do without it.

[paulasue]

Refillable cartridges.... See if you can get refillable cartridges for your printer, or get a new printer than you can get refillable cartridges.  It will cost about $30 for initial purchase then in about 3-4 years it will be about $20 for more ink.  Get the ink that has a spout that fits into the hole in the cartridge, then you don't have to worry with needles and messing with ink too much.  You still need to be careful, but this way you are only transferring ink once, ink from ink bottle to cartridge, not twice, ink from ink bottle to needle then needle to cartridge.

 

http://www.printpayless.com/

[abacus2]

I recommend adding a laser printer for the majority of your printing. It is more economical, but also much, much faster.

[momof4inco]

I also do Instant Ink through HP, and I will also be printing a lot of stuff for my three kids this next year :) My plan is to start printing this summer on the 300 page plan, then print as I need things every week once the school year starts. I'll just give them their work as it is assigned and then put it in a binder once it is completed.

 

ETA: I have thought about a laser printer at tax time next year, but I haven't researched any yet.

Edited May 23, 2016 by momof4inco

[Sunshine89]

Refillable cartridges.... See if you can get refillable cartridges for your printer, or get a new printer than you can get refillable cartridges.  It will cost about $30 for initial purchase then in about 3-4 years it will be about $20 for more ink.  Get the ink that has a spout that fits into the hole in the cartridge, then you don't have to worry with needles and messing with ink too much.  You still need to be careful, but this way you are only transferring ink once, ink from ink bottle to cartridge, not twice, ink from ink bottle to needle then needle to cartridge.

 

http://www.printpayless.com/

 

I popped over to the website and found the kit for my printer model... if you don't mind helping me out is this what I need to try this out?

 

http://www.printpayless.com/products/Auto-Ink-Refill-Kit-for-HP-60%2C-HP-60XL%2C-HP-61%2C-HP-61XL%2C--HP-74%2C-HP-74XL%2C-HP-92-Black-Premium-Pigment-Archival-%7B47%7D-Waterproof-Ink.html

 

I can't answer your question about a color printer because I only have a B&W printer, BUT, I find that b&w is sufficient for almost all of our homeschooling printing. Once in a while I'm bummed that we don't have a color printer, but that mainly applies to non-homeschool things, actually. I am considering getting a color printer to use only when we need color, but our Brother 2270DW laser printer has been a workhorse and it's wonderfully efficient, especially on toner save mode (which I use for almost everything - it's fine for school worksheets, etc).

 

Regarding binding, I am IN LOVE with my Proclick. I don't know what I'd do without it.

 

I will have to check the Proclick out. Thanks for linking it. 

Edited May 23, 2016 by Sunshine89

[Sunshine89]

I also do Instant Ink through HP, and I will also be printing a lot of stuff for my three kids this next year :) My plan is to start printing this summer on the 300 page plan, then print as I need things every week once the school year starts. I'll just give them their work as it is assigned and then put it in a binder once it is completed.

 

ETA: I have thought about a laser printer at tax time next year, but I haven't researched any yet.

 

 

Yeah maybe adding in a b/w laser printer for the majority of our printing and using the HP instant ink plan for special color printing would be the most efficient, but then I have to have two printers taking up space. Hmm....

[RenaInTexas]

Black and white laser printer; Brother is the one I use; it was $99. 

[paulasue]

I popped over to the website and found the kit for my printer model... if you don't mind helping me out is this what I need to try this out?

 

http://www.printpayless.com/products/Auto-Ink-Refill-Kit-for-HP-60%2C-HP-60XL%2C-HP-61%2C-HP-61XL%2C--HP-74%2C-HP-74XL%2C-HP-92-Black-Premium-Pigment-Archival-%7B47%7D-Waterproof-Ink.html

 

 

I will have to check the Proclick out. Thanks for linking it. 

 

I am not sure about that kit, it looks like something to help you refill the original cartridges.  I have always used the refillable cartridges with Brother printers and bought cartridges that were made to refill.  Here's what mine look like, the hole on the front is where I insert the ink.

 

 

We have a laser printer also, but use our ink jet since the ink in the inkjet is SO MUCH less.  We bought the laser printer years ago when we had an HP with expensive cartridges.  When the HP went out, I got the Brother, then I found the refillable cartridges, which brought our ink cost down to about $10 a year.  Now that we have the Brother ink jet, we rarely use the laser printer. 

 

If you do go with a Brother laser printer, check what size of high yield cartridges it takes.  The high yield cartridge for my Brother laser is only 2600 pages, if I had spent about $10-20 at the time, I could have gotten one with an output of 8000 pages for about twice the cost of the 2600 page cartridge. 

[Lucy the Valiant]

I can't answer your question about a color printer because I only have a B&W printer, BUT, I find that b&w is sufficient for almost all of our homeschooling printing. Once in a while I'm bummed that we don't have a color printer, but that mainly applies to non-homeschool things, actually. I am considering getting a color printer to use only when we need color, but our Brother 2270DW laser printer has been a workhorse and it's wonderfully efficient, especially on toner save mode (which I use for almost everything - it's fine for school worksheets, etc).

 

Regarding binding, I am IN LOVE with my Proclick. I don't know what I'd do without it.

 

This.

 

Exactly.

 

I have the exact same printer and the exact same binder, and they have been HUGE cost-savers over the years.

 

When I *need* color (which is not that often, truly), I upload it to Staples and swing by and pick it up when running errands.

[Sunshine89]

I am not sure about that kit, it looks like something to help you refill the original cartridges.  I have always used the refillable cartridges with Brother printers and bought cartridges that were made to refill.  Here's what mine look like, the hole on the front is where I insert the ink.

 

 

We have a laser printer also, but use our ink jet since the ink in the inkjet is SO MUCH less.  We bought the laser printer years ago when we had an HP with expensive cartridges.  When the HP went out, I got the Brother, then I found the refillable cartridges, which brought our ink cost down to about $10 a year.  Now that we have the Brother ink jet, we rarely use the laser printer. 

 

If you do go with a Brother laser printer, check what size of high yield cartridges it takes.  The high yield cartridge for my Brother laser is only 2600 pages, if I had spent about $10-20 at the time, I could have gotten one with an output of 8000 pages for about twice the cost of the 2600 page cartridge. 

 

Okay thanks for sharing... I found a brother printer I like and the refillable kit that goes along with it and I'm excited... seems very affordable. You said you are only spending $10 a year on ink? That totally blows my mind so I'm just wondering how much printing you actually do? I'm assuming quite a bit but just wanted to make sure I'm getting my money's worth before I splurge on another printer. I have a few curriculum that I want to print out that are about 200-300 pages each and I want to use some free printable preschool curriculum for one of my children so I'm expecting to print a lot this year.

[paulasue]

I looked at my numbers, I only have 1 kid, but DH works from home.  Everything is sent to him electronically.  I bought a case of paper on 1/14 and 6/15, I've also bought a couple of reams here and there, so it looks like we go through about 300+ pages a month.  We don't use any of the ink saving settings.  DH doesn't want any problems when he's printing.  He has lots of deadlines with work and gets cranky if the printers don't work 100% perfect every time. 

 

I bought my laser printer on 1/14, and cartridges on 4/14 and 5/15 and the stupid thing needs another one.  We only used the laser printer for duplex printing up until last month. 

 

I bought the cartridges and ink for our old Brother on 10/11, back then it was about $10.  I don't think I put them in till 2012.  I bought a bottle of black ink 8/14 about $10.  Then on 10/14 I bought a 4 bottle set of each of the colors for about $25.   I still have about 1/2 of each of the bottles left.  I did go through 1 bottle of black and the other 100ml I used about 1/2 in 4 years. 

 

We just bought another Brother color inkjet last month and have been using it for everything, since it prints on both sides.  When looking for our new printer, I looked for ones that would use the refillable cartridges.  So I am on my 2nd printer that works fine with refillable cartridges.  I love not having to buy all those cartridges. 

 

Just be really careful when you are filling the cartridges.  My first set of cartridges had the holes on the top, very easy to get the ink in.  This new set the hole is on the side towards the top.  If you move the cartridge around too much the ink will come out..

 

Hope this helps... sometimes it's hard to believe how little I've paid for ink.  Refillable cartridges or the CISS systems are the way to go for cheap printing.

 

Let me know if you have any more questions....

[Guest]

I'd suggest watching sales and investing in a solid color laser printer. Mine is normally between $350-399 and I got it on sale for $199. It's awesome and I'm printed at least two reams of paper through it (mix of color and B&W) and I'm still above 80% on all colors. It's $60 for the complete refill. This is the one I got on sale at Amazon:

 

Canon Office Products ImageCLASS MF624Cw Wireless Color Printer with Scanner & Copier

 

I would highly recommend it or something similar. 

 

[happypamama]

It might depend on whether you want color or not. People say that a laser is more economical, but I think that's only true if you buy a black and white laser. I paid $100 for my Canon MX920 ink jet, but I wanted it to do color in addition black and white, scan/copy, automatic duplex printing, and automatic document feeder for scanning/copying multiple pages, and I wanted it to be wireless/use AirPrint. To get all of those things in a laser would be cost prohibitive, and I really didn't want to take up space with two printers (the ink jet for color and the laser for black and white), so that's what I got, and I've been very pleased with it.

 

Cheap ink was a must for me, and I get compatible cartridges from Blake Printing Supply on Amazon, and they're super cheap, three of each color (cyan, magenta, yellow, black, and a large black) shipped via Prime for $23.00. I print a lot of color stuff, so I go through a couple of those orders a year, and once in a while, I order a special pack of just three of the large blacks. I do print in black and white when I can, but this time of year, I'm printing thousands of pages because I use a lot of PDF stuff too.

 

And for paper, I either buy the boxes from Walmart that are $10 for three reams, or I get deals from Staples. Last summer or sometime, they had a hugely good deal. After a rebate, I got something like 20 reams of paper for $22 shipped right to my house.

 

If you use PDF curricula (and I find that for multiple kids, it IS super helpful, plus it's nice to just print another map if one gets messed up or something), just make sure you have them organized on your computer somehow. I keep them in a folder called Education, with subfolders by subject, like History -- World and History -- US. Also, back them up! If it's something I can't just download again easily, I keep them on my Dropbox account and on a backup hard drive.

[gypsymama]

I also have a b&w Brother laser printer and love it! I buy toner from Amazon for about $13 and the boxes of paper from Walmart for about the same price. I can print at least 2000 pages for $30 or less this way. For book binding I've been taking mine to Office Depot and it's 2.99 for about 100 pg or less or 3.49 for a larger book (I just bound one that was over 200 pg for that price... it's over an inch thick!). I add an additional 1.25 or so to that cost for each book getting the black plastic back and the clear plastic front cover. I've been very happy with this. I print our ebook/pdf file curricula out and bind it then I use a plastic report cover slipped over the edge of the page to make it dry/wet erase surface. The kids fill in their answers there (unless it's something they copy onto notebook paper) and I can just take off the report cover to have the book still clean and ready for the next kid.

 

I have also managed to make it with little to no color printing but agree that it's easy to upload it to a print place or go to the library if I need it. 

[happypamama]

Oh, and for binding, I love my ProClick!  It's especially nice for my little lefty guy, because I can bind his stuff on the opposite side, and then he isn't writing over the spiral.

[paulasue]

Cheap ink was a must for me, and I get compatible cartridges from Blake Printing Supply on Amazon, and they're super cheap, three of each color (cyan, magenta, yellow, black, and a large black) shipped via Prime for $23.00. I print a lot of color stuff, so I go through a couple of those orders a year, and once in a while, I order a special pack of just three of the large blacks. I do print in black and white when I can, but this time of year, I'm printing thousands of pages because I use a lot of PDF stuff too.

 

Have you thought about refillable cartridges for your printer?  Instead of buying new cartridges, buy a set of refillable cartridges when empty buy a bottle of ink and just pour it in.  You could get it down from $23 a couple of times a year to about $20 every other year.  Once you buy the cartridges, a bottle of ink is sooo cheap.  Most cartridges hold about 15ml, so a 100ml is about worth about 4 cartridges. 

 

http://www.printpayless.com/for-pgi250-251/

Edited May 24, 2016 by paulasue

[happypamama]

Have you thought about refillable cartridges for your printer?  Instead of buying new cartridges, buy a set of refillable cartridges when empty buy a bottle of ink and just pour it in.  You could get it down from $23 a couple of times a year to about $20 every other year.  Once you buy the cartridges, a bottle of ink is sooo cheap.  Most cartridges hold about 15ml, so a 100ml is about worth about 4 cartridges. 

 

http://www.printpayless.com/for-pgi250-251/

I hadn't considered it, but that actually would save me money because I definitely don't go through the small black one as fast as the others, so they pile up when I have to buy the multi-pack.  I will definitely have to consider that.  Thanks!

[Hobbes]

We use an inkjet with cartridges that we refill at Costco, which is relatively cheap. It's worked well for our general needs and I haven't wanted to pay to replace the printer with a laser, but I don't like to print huge files with it. For bigger stuff, I upload PDFs to our local print shop and have them print and spiral bind them. I've done it for Math Mammoth, SOTW, and Laying Down the Rails, etc. It is fairly inexpensive and very easy - still keeps the total cost of a reusable curriculum quite affordable. Might be an option if you are also looking to save time.

Edited May 24, 2016 by indigoellen@gmail.com

[Sunshine89]

I looked at my numbers, I only have 1 kid, but DH works from home.  Everything is sent to him electronically.  I bought a case of paper on 1/14 and 6/15, I've also bought a couple of reams here and there, so it looks like we go through about 300+ pages a month.  We don't use any of the ink saving settings.  DH doesn't want any problems when he's printing.  He has lots of deadlines with work and gets cranky if the printers don't work 100% perfect every time. 

 

I bought my laser printer on 1/14, and cartridges on 4/14 and 5/15 and the stupid thing needs another one.  We only used the laser printer for duplex printing up until last month. 

 

I bought the cartridges and ink for our old Brother on 10/11, back then it was about $10.  I don't think I put them in till 2012.  I bought a bottle of black ink 8/14 about $10.  Then on 10/14 I bought a 4 bottle set of each of the colors for about $25.   I still have about 1/2 of each of the bottles left.  I did go through 1 bottle of black and the other 100ml I used about 1/2 in 4 years. 

 

We just bought another Brother color inkjet last month and have been using it for everything, since it prints on both sides.  When looking for our new printer, I looked for ones that would use the refillable cartridges.  So I am on my 2nd printer that works fine with refillable cartridges.  I love not having to buy all those cartridges. 

 

Just be really careful when you are filling the cartridges.  My first set of cartridges had the holes on the top, very easy to get the ink in.  This new set the hole is on the side towards the top.  If you move the cartridge around too much the ink will come out..

 

Hope this helps... sometimes it's hard to believe how little I've paid for ink.  Refillable cartridges or the CISS systems are the way to go for cheap printing.

 

Let me know if you have any more questions....

 

Thanks so much for giving all this detail. I'm leaning towards this option since it seem insanely cheap and easy. 

[Guest]

It might depend on whether you want color or not. People say that a laser is more economical, but I think that's only true if you buy a black and white laser. I paid $100 for my Canon MX920 ink jet, but I wanted it to do color in addition black and white, scan/copy, automatic duplex printing, and automatic document feeder for scanning/copying multiple pages, and I wanted it to be wireless/use AirPrint. To get all of those things in a laser would be cost prohibitive, and I really didn't want to take up space with two printers (the ink jet for color and the laser for black and white), so that's what I got, and I've been very pleased with it.

 

Cheap ink was a must for me, and I get compatible cartridges from Blake Printing Supply on Amazon, and they're super cheap, three of each color (cyan, magenta, yellow, black, and a large black) shipped via Prime for $23.00. I print a lot of color stuff, so I go through a couple of those orders a year, and once in a while, I order a special pack of just three of the large blacks. I do print in black and white when I can, but this time of year, I'm printing thousands of pages because I use a lot of PDF stuff too.

 

And for paper, I either buy the boxes from Walmart that are $10 for three reams, or I get deals from Staples. Last summer or sometime, they had a hugely good deal. After a rebate, I got something like 20 reams of paper for $22 shipped right to my house.

 

If you use PDF curricula (and I find that for multiple kids, it IS super helpful, plus it's nice to just print another map if one gets messed up or something), just make sure you have them organized on your computer somehow. I keep them in a folder called Education, with subfolders by subject, like History -- World and History -- US. Also, back them up! If it's something I can't just download again easily, I keep them on my Dropbox account and on a backup hard drive.

Mine does everything you listed. It was a steal at $199. The price on good lasers has dropped significantly over the last year it seems.

[scbusf]

I use a laser B&W printer for most printing. If I absolutely need color printing, I have a color inkjet. But really, I use the B&W one for 99% of my printing. My laser printer is also WAY faster than the inkjet.

 

And I also use a Proclick for binding.  LOVE it!

[lmrich]

I print a lot for the classes that I teach and LOVE my Brother laser printer (the one mentioned above - I snagged mine for $69 Gold Box Deal); I kept my color printer for when I need it, but man that ink is so expensive!  I could just about promise you will save money with buying the new printer and the laser cartridges from Amazon for $13 over the course of a year or two. 

[Emba]

We have a samsung scx-4200 laser printer (B&W) that we got a long time ago.  I love it, just because it is so cheap to print with.  We either get the toner cartridges refilled at a place here that does that, for about $30, or buy cartridges online for about $25.

 

I have no suggestion for binding.  My binding method of choice right now is a three hole punch and those 88 cent three-ring binders from Wal-Mart.

[happypamama]

Mine does everything you listed. It was a steal at $199. The price on good lasers has dropped significantly over the last year it seems.

Yeah, if/when mine dies (it's only two years old, and my previous Canon ink jet lasted about eight), I am hoping to find a laser, but at the time, $199 is still twice as much as I paid, so I'm happy. :)  But I am very glad to hear they have come down a lot in price!