So you're thinking about buying a new HP printer....

[Anastasius]

Nothing at all wrong with the printers and our HP1200 Laserjet has been going for donkeys years (15yrs+ IIRC).

The issue comes downline buying replacement cartridges. Here's the nitty-gritty....

1) When you are setting it up for the first time, do NOT opt for HP+ despite all the seemingly great and free features. If you do, it locks your printer into only using HP cartridges forever. You cannot reverse this option.

2) Disable auto-updates of the firmware.

That's it.

[Dave2002]

Nothing at all wrong with the printers and our HP1200 Laserjet has been going for donkeys years (15yrs+ IIRC).

The issue comes downline buying replacement cartridges. Here's the nitty-gritty....

1) When you are setting it up for the first time, do NOT opt for HP+ despite all the seemingly great and free features. If you do, it locks your printer into only using HP cartridges forever. You cannot reverse this option.

2) Disable auto-updates of the firmware.

That's it.

Wow.

I'm not necessarily surprised.

I recently bought a new Brother monochrome laser printer - to replace one we acquired for not a lot - and apart from not printing in colours, it is fine. It will also scan in colour too, so it is possible to make colour copies if one has a colour printer.

One problem though is that if one's colour printer is put to one side and not used much, the jets may get clogged up, so they end up on the dump anyway - not good news. It is sometimes possible to use various cleaning kits to unclog them, but it's tricky, messy, and like other bad things, may return some while later.

[teamsaint]

I bought a new HP and went for HP + rather against my judgement, but have found it very good TBH . I'm on £2.99 a month for 50 pages a month, which is the cost of about 1 colour cartridge.
Not a huge fan of the desktop app, but it works ok.

[Anastasius]

Which printer did you get, TS ? Does it support Airprint ? I have a newish iPad and printing from it using our two existing HP laser printers is (a) impossible on the HP 1200 and (b) laughable results using the Laserjet 100 Color.

[oddoneout]

Last year I did quite a bit of information searching about printers as the excellent printshop in town was closing(combination of retirement and lease coming to an end, not lack of business - far from it) so I was considering getting a home solution again. The HP bar on generic refills was beginning to cause issues when I stopped using my home printer, so seeing that they have really tightened up on that didn't come as a surprise. The monthly refill subscription arrangement not only seemed a matter of luck as to whether it worked or not but didn't seem suitable for my needs Other makes of printer all had their pros and(often quite major) cons. My eventual conclusion was that it wasn't something I wanted to take on. I did see a neat summing up of the "cheap printer/expensive refills" model that they all seem to work to now as that buying the printer is a downpayment on a leasing arrangement, where having to use the brand refills is where the company makes the money. It's a very wasteful model, with the printers being seen as disposable bits of kit, and one hopes that in due course an alternative will become available, as used to be the case many years ago when I could get the cartridges re-filled locally and was able to use the printer for many years.
I still have the printer occupying space beside my desk as it was an all in one model and, although the printer and thus photocopy functions can't be used, the scanner still works, and has its uses.

[teamsaint]

Which printer did you get, TS ? Does it support Airprint ? I have a newish iPad and printing from it using our two existing HP laser printers is (a) impossible on the HP 1200 and (b) laughable results using the Laserjet 100 Color.

It is a 4100e, cheap and cheerful . Prints fine from my 4/5 YO ipad and everything else I have tried. Can’t vouch for print quality, as I only use it for functional stuff.
Linking it to our router has certainly been the biggest problem, but just needed a bit of patience.

[gradus]

Re HP printers, my several years old Office Jet Pro 8500 has been reared on HP cartridges but recently I changed to cheaper versions and couldn't get the printer to stop trying to align them and failing to print properly. On Googling I found a solution involving pressing certain keys and accessing a hidden menu that immediately fixed the problem although you will find no mention of the solution in any official HP guidance.

[Globaltruth]

Nothing at all wrong with the printers and our HP1200 Laserjet has been going for donkeys years (15yrs+ IIRC).

The issue comes downline buying replacement cartridges. Here's the nitty-gritty....

1) When you are setting it up for the first time, do NOT opt for HP+ despite all the seemingly great and free features. If you do, it locks your printer into only using HP cartridges forever. You cannot reverse this option.

2) Disable auto-updates of the firmware.

That's it.

I agree with this. Currently trapped in the Instant Ink scam - my printing went up from an average 50 sheets a month to 500 a month for 2 months as I was printing catalogues for someone. Sadly the cartridge supply did not match the demand causing a delay of about 10 days. When you change your plan back down they also limit your rollover pages. I can see why but it doesnt make for a happy end user. The printer is fine and the cartridges via Instant Ink are much bigger than the legit ones you buy so the deal kind of makes sense, but it's a drag having to upgrade and downgrade plans and pay 10p a sheet when printing using an external HP cartridge I was forced to buy. Having looked around it seems the quality of the non-OM cartridges has improved dramatically and that's what I will opt for next time.
This HP Envy Photo 7830 has some miles left on the clock though...but yeah. It's a scam. They're trying to sell me their printing paper now.

[teamsaint]

I agree with this. Currently trapped in the Instant Ink scam - my printing went up from an average 50 sheets a month to 500 a month for 2 months as I was printing catalogues for someone. Sadly the cartridge supply did not match the demand causing a delay of about 10 days. When you change your plan back down they also limit your rollover pages. I can see why but it doesnt make for a happy end user. The printer is fine and the cartridges via Instant Ink are much bigger than the legit ones you buy so the deal kind of makes sense, but it's a drag having to upgrade and downgrade plans and pay 10p a sheet when printing using an external HP cartridge I was forced to buy. Having looked around it seems the quality of the non-OM cartridges has improved dramatically and that's what I will opt for next time.
This HP Envy Photo 7830 has some miles left on the clock though...but yeah. It's a scam. They're trying to sell me their printing paper now.

Yep, the cheaper plans and cartridge replacement timing really don’t seem to allow for erratic use or a sudden surge in level of use. I wonder if there is a way to deal with this if one knows of an upcoming heavy workload ?

[Globaltruth]

Doesn't seem to be. I contacted them (both via the useless chatbot and email) as soon as levels were flagged up as low. No response. Only when the levels hit very low did the automated sending happen. Oddly though since I further complained they have sent another pair of cartridges (in 2 seperate parcels) which mean I now have reserves I didn't have before - handy as I still have more to do.

So much simpler to use a decent non-HP cartridge and just buy them as you need them. I can't always predict the surge of printing...

[Anastasius]

I happened to do a test printout from our elderly HP1200 which we've had from new. 37,000 pages

[Dave2002]

As mentioned earlier the Brother monochrome lasers seem to work out well. How well do colour lasers do? Perhaps they don’t have the problems of “going off’ if left idle for a month or two …. Do they?