For years I've had a very low-end Lexmark InkJet printer, the kind that sells for $39.95, which is just a shade more than what they charge per ink cartridge. In retrospect, I really should have ditched it earlier. It was painfully slow in printing and I was unable to share it on the network, meaning that if my wife wanted to print something she'd have to copy the file(s) to my computer and I'd print them. And did I mention it was slow? But if you don't work in an office where they have sleak, ultra-fast, network-shared printers, you don't know what you're missing. So I was content with my little Lexmark and my wife, after coming home from an office full of high-end laser printers had to copy anything she needed to print to my machine and then wait several minutes as the printer caughed them out.
Finally we decided enough was enough and went looking for an All-In-One option to replace our printer and fax machine and to add scanning and copying capabilities. We ended up settling on the HP LaserJet 3050 All-In-One (shown on the right), which retails for $299.
Not counting furniture moving, installation and setup was a breeze. Just plugged in the various cords, plugged in the printer to my machine via the USB cable, and we were off and running. Faxing, copying, scanning, and printing are all very straightforward, simple, and FAST. In the time it would take the ol' Lexmark to churn out a single page, this puppy can put out reems of paper. It just sucks in the paper and spits it out, taking a second or two. Yeah, yeah, this is probably no big deal to those of you who haven't been living with outdated technology, but for yours truly, this alone has made the purchase more than worthwhile.
There are a couple of things that are less than ideal regarding the 3050:
- No USB-to-printer cable included. I don't know if any printer manufacturer includes this anymore. I used my old one from the Lexmark printer (which I had to buy separately back in the day). In any event, I think most people would rather HP (or Lexmark or whomever) would charge $5 or $10 more and just include the damn cable rather than having you get home, get to setting it up, and then realizing, “Cripes, it's back to the store for me.“
- No direct connection to network. The only way to hook up the 3050 model is through a USB cable, which is no biggie since it's hooked up to my always-on computer. But in a more traditional network setting, it's obviously ideal to have the printer hooked up to the network rather than a computer. To get the network hookup, you have to upgrade to the 3052 model, which is $100 more. $100 more also buys you a flatbed scanner/copier, which is nicer than the sheet feed option on the 3050. And I was just about ready to pony up the extra $100 for the 3052 and then found out that the 3052 doesn't include fax capabilities! If you want to fax and have a network jack and a flatbed scanner then you need the 3055, which is yet another $100. A 66% increase in the base price for a network jack and a flatbed scanner seemed a little too steep for this ol' cheapskate.
In any event, I really have liked the 3050 and am sure the 3052 and 3055 are just as good models. Highly recommended!