I won't bore you with the details, but at one point in time I found myself needing to purchase a second printer with scanning capabilities in order to submit some signed documents by email. I shopped around for quite a while and finally decided on the wireless Canon Pixma MP495. You don't need anything that powerful for printing coupons, but the wireless function is great if you have multiple devices from which to print. I see that Amazon now offers the wireless Canon Pixma MG3220 for about half the price of the one I bought. (Disclaimer: these models state that they can be used to print from mobile devices but I have not tried this function. You'll want to research and read reviews on this point.) The last time I checked, laser printers actually work out better for costs in the long-run, but I tend to be hard on technology (read: I break things a lot) so the smaller investment for an inkjet was right for me.
Some tips I wish I'd known from starting out:
- As soon as you have all your devices connected, the first thing you should do is adjust your default settings. Switch from 'high quality' to 'fastest' and from 'color' to 'grayscale' in order to conserve ink. Stores accept black and white coupons and there's no reason to waste color ink when you print. You can always go back and override your default settings if you have a special project to print.
- Before ordering anything from Amazon, you should see if you're eligible for a free Prime account. If you're a student with an .edu email address, they'll give you six months of free two-day shipping. Once the six months is up, you can renew at half price ($39 for a year instead of $79) and can continue to renew at that rate for up to four years. Once you upgrade (and you don't have to wait for the free trial to expire to do so), you'll get free shipping and loads of free streaming video choices and access to their lending library for Kindle. (If you don't own a Kindle, you can download a free Kindle Reader for PC to read books from your computer.) While I highly advocate keeping shopping dollars local, there are some items that just aren't offered from Mom & Pop stores in town; for these items, I love Amazon.
- Frequent-shopper cards aren't limited to groceries and pharmacies. Check out reward programs like MaxPerks and sign up using your dedicated email account for their email promos. I watch for 'Free shipping when you purchase $20 or more' promos and then order my ink cartridges or paper. I also keep an eye out for the bonus reward items (this is how I got four boxes of ink pens for free to use on campus, because freshmen were walking off with my good pens! lol). If you are an educator -- including homeschoolers -- the program for teachers works out better than a standard account. Remember to hang on to your spent cartridges to recycle with them, because you'll earn rewards for that, too. I put mine in a plastic zipper bag so they don't leak until I can get to the store. Also, read the fine print for emailed offers, because certain items or brands will sometimes be excluded from rewards.
- Speaking of ink... whichever brand of printer you decide to purchase, research your options for standard versus high-capacity cartridges. For my printer, the PG-210 cartridge should print about 200 pages, but the PG-210XL should print about 400 pages (these are manufacturer estimates, but I know that a 1/3-page coupon doesn't take as much ink as a regular one-page document, so they actually last longer). The extended cartridge only costs a few dollars more, or can be found on sale for less than the standard cartridge, and I don't have to change it out as often. Also, bear in mind that store-brand or refurbished cartridges may technically work with your printer, but you may have to fiddle with your sensor settings for each computer and/or manually override warnings each time you print because your printer is a genius that can't communicate with these sorts of cartridges and will tell you that you're out of ink when you're not.
- Finally, don't go for quality paper for couponing. There's no reason to invest in heavy stock paper for this purpose. I keep a case of cheap copier paper for everyday use and couponing, and then just a ream of the good stuff for other projects.
I think that's it. I'm sure I've missed some aspect of printers and printing, but these are the things that come to mind immediately. If you have any specific questions, drop me a line and I'll do my best to find the answer for you!
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