For a graduation present, I received a Canon Pixma MX310 All-In-One a few years ago. I would like to share my take on the printer’s quality and features, having owned it myself for a few years now.

As is the standard for All-in-one printers, the MX310 can Print, Scan, Copy and Fax. I have used all the features rather extensively except for the fax component. I will talk about each feature individually and then discuss a few other printer considerations.

The print feature on the MX310 is excellent. The installation software was easy to comprehend and I was able to connect the printer and print a few test documents within minutes of opening the box. Printing is reasonably fast and doesn’t seem as prone to jams as other printers on the market. The ink usage is fairly high, unfortunately, and the cartridges cannot be refilled, but replacement ink is modestly priced and can be found online for as little as $22 at a reputable dealer like 4inkjets. For the tech geeks, it prints up to 600×600 dpi in monochrome at 22 pages/minute and 4800×1200 dpi in color at 17 pages/minute.

Copying is also easy. The Automatic Document Feeder (ADF) is effective and comfortably holds up to thirty pages.. Copies are very crisp and clear, as would be expected from the quality Canon brandname. Copying of photos on photo-quality paper produces products almost impossible to distinguish from professionally developed photos.

The scanner is of similar high quality. My only issue with the printer, it seems, is when it comes to using the scanner feature. I always have trouble shfiting the printer into scanning mode. Often, I have to press the ‘scan’ button several times before the machine moseys into scan mode. After the scanning is complete, the quality, however, is great.

I don’t know much about the fax. From what I’ve seen online, opinions vary. The 20-number phone number storage capacity is appreciated, but the lack of options is picked at. For more precise information about the fax’s capabilities, I frankly suggest you look elsewhere on the web for reviews.

The largest complaint I have with the printer is its awkwardly large size. The printer is gigantic. It extends over most of my desk! I can’t fit my laptop on my desk if the printer is on it. The printer also makes a lot of noise. Also, when the printer indicates it is low on ink, there are actually 30-40 pages left (from my experience). I don’t know if this in intentional on Canon’s part, but it’s not very eco-friendly.

Pros: Good quality, very efficient.

Cons: Ink glutton, can’t refill ink cartridges, large size.

Final verdict: 3/5. Even though the quality and productivity are excellent, the cost to replace the ink and the large physical size is damning. It is a quality printer, but when I buy my next printer model myself, I will be looking for a smaller, quieter and more ink-efficient model.

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These days, as small businesses and offices continue to cut expenses wherever they can, the print and copyroom sometimes seems like it has become an unbearable expense. Some usual strategies include double-sided printing and keycodes to use the printer. Others try more drastic approaches, like trying to impose a paper free office, or giving every employee a flash drive to carry files. Here’s a much simpler solution: change your font and save up to 31% on ink costs. Wow, really??

The most popular font type these days is Arial. A study conducted by blog.printer.com, however, deduces that it’s certainly not the most economical. 10 fonts were used, printing the same text each time in a strict control. The printing habits of both private and business users were simulated, with a Canon Pixma MP210 used for home users and the Brother HL-2140 for business users.

Identical pages were printed in all 10 fonts. The documents were turned into .pdf documents and scanned by the application Apfill, which calculated the total ink coverage of each page.

To establish a winner, each font’s relative ink coverage was evaluated and compared. This reduction is ink usage translates into roughly a $20 savings per year for an average home user printing 25 pages/week versus using Arial. A business user printing around 250 pages a week would actually save as much as $80 in a year.

Keep in mind, many businesses have more than one printer, or print far more than 250 pages/week. For these businesses, the savings could be astronomical.

Now we need to now, which font is the thriftiest?? What text utilized the least ink while maintaining quality readability?

That #1 font is Century Gothic, ladies and gentleman. Verdana and Times New Roman, other popular and common fonts, placed at #5 and #3, respectively. Arial itself was ranked #6 in the list of 10 fonts tested for ink usage.

Perhaps this is a method that would work in your company or small business to lower costs. Just change the font.

Check out the rest of the blog.printer.com article on their website, where you can see numbers and rankings for all ten of the tested fonts.

Try inkcartridges.com for great deals on cheap ink cartridges.

Ink for my Canon MX310 runs around 24 bucks for 13 mL of ink. A little math reveals that each mL costs around 1.80, or an astounding $1,800/liter.

Ink is part a higly lucractive business for the printer manufacturers called captive-product pricing. Companies like HP, Epson and Brother make very small margins on the sale of their printers because they make back their profits selling compatible ink.

Any profitable brand name lures counterfeiters and fakers. Similar to the infamous trickery associated with fake Coach bags and Rolex watches, there’s been a recent assault of fake printer ink cartridges.

These fake ink cartridges are far more insidious than a fake Rolex watch, however, when you consider that these counterfeit ink cartridges are prone to leaking, explosion, illegibly smudged pages and ink jams. This often puts consumers out of not only the cost of the fake ink cartridges, but the cost of a new printer after their old one is ruined.

These fake ink cartridges end up in our stores after being manufactured in China, the Philippines or Malaysia, places with cheap production means. They are generally distributed to midsize ink cartridge dealers who unwittingly sell them to consumers. The use of midsize ink distributors makes the sales very difficult to trace, especially when an individual has trouble with a counterfeit ink cartridge and wants to track down the source.

Relatively infrequent in the United States, authorities in Latin and South America estimate that current counterfeit ink cartridge penetration on the market is around 50%. The values in the US are more along the lines of 5%.

The best way to avoid this plague is to buy from a licensed distributor or a reputable third-party distributor. They usually sell recycled and refilled OEM cartridges. Their margins are lower and aren’t necessarily branded, so the counterfeiters aren’t making fakes for them (not yet at least).

If you got brand name ink at a significant discount, you should check the packaging and ink cartridge itself for anything that looks out of the ordinary like misprinted labels or weak seams.

Try inkcartridges.com for good deals on cheap ink cartridges.

Do you wish you could lower expenses for your small business in the copyroom? This list of cost-saving know-how may be able to help out with that problem.

1. Make sure everyone in the company knows how to use all the different printing settings and features. Ensure they are familiar with how to change font sizes and margins, make double-sided documents and copies, and how to just print a selection or a certain page instead of a full document. When color isn’t necessary for the document’s meaning, encourage and demonstrate use of the ‘print color in black and white’ feature found in the print settings. Color ink is more expensive than black ink.

2. Make sure everyone in the office knows how to use the ‘print preview’ command to ensure there are no errors in the document such as spacing or margins that can be easily fixed without wasting a paper copy.

3. Consider investing in a laser printer instead of an inkjet printer. The laserjet is more cost-effective, printing at 1-3 cents per page, whereas the inkjet can cost 4-12 cents per page. If your company does a lot of printing or copy each day, the savings will add up quickly, even given the higher purchasing cost for a laserjet.

4. Remember and remind your officemates to look for a printer-friendly option on a web page. This often brings the browser to a copy of the page with less pictures so ink use is lower.

5. If your office is using an inkjet printer, you can take advantage of ink refill kits or get cheap ink cartridges on the web from retailers like 4inkjets.

6. Instead of printing a copy of a doument, encourage your office to send electronic copies via email. Instead of printing a hard copy, use a flash drive to store that rough draft until it’s finalized.

Using these tips in your office will probably see slow results at first, but if everyone works together, the cost savings and overall green effect will have a very positive impact.

I like 4inkjets.com. They always have good deals on cheap ink cartridges.

Hewlett-Packard or more commonly known as HP is one of the world famous names when it comes to printers and printer cartridges. The company is manufacturing all kinds of computing items but the printers are the most needed products all over the world. The HP laser printers proffer superior quality of images with a click of a button.

It is highly suggested that you use a HP Ink cartridge in order to get unblemished printouts in the future. Laser toners and hp laser cartridges are efficiently used by many companies. Many brands are mechanized the gigantic range of hp laser cartridge and printer toner cartridges.

The HP Ink cartridges are specially developed after detailed exploration which guarantees finest results. There are a numerous of benefits to purchase HP laser cartridges such as:

The main and most vital thing is that the HP laser cartridges are manufactured by a apparent name which makes the product very much dependable .

• The product that is provided to you has some sought of a guarantee and the company even give quality services at a phone call.

• The cartridges are accessible at a moderately cheap rate which makes it a top buy product .

What superior than purchasing quality HP laser cartridges at a very nominal cost ? You can effortlessly locate these cartridges at a store near your home or you can visit the HP website and order them online. Ordering them is fairly easy and you will receive your product in the least time feasible . While purchasing an HP cartridge you should always confirm that you are buying the cartridge which is specially built for the model of laser printer you own.

Availability of the hp laser cartridge is climbing the market. Many offices and small companies are agreeing to the cheap printer cartridges. They are protected economical and are meant for the robust printers.