Any Good Laser Printers for Linux Systems?

Hardware
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Hi all, :waving_hand:

I´d like to ask you a few questions about getting a printer that works well with Linux systems, particularly on my Linux Lite system.

First of all let me tell you that I already have a printer-and-scanner unit in action.

It´s an “HP Deskjet 3050A J611” and it works wirelessly via wifi. It works well, but the thing is: I have very few printing jobs in general. As the HP is an ink-cartridge printer I often run into difficulties as the the ink dries out and the printig heads seem to get clogged. :neutral_face:

Currently printing isn´t as good as it used to be.

1. I was thinking: if I bought a laser printer (which uses toner instead of ink): I guess this would eliminate the problem.

2. I´d be happy with black-and-white printing only. It should be good enough for me, as I mostly print documents and other sorts of text. Double-sided won´t be necessary either.

3. As for scanning, I think this feature wouldn´t be necessary. My present HP printer sports this feature and I guess I could use 2 printers at the same time with Linux.

4. Wifi would be imperative. I really need that.

5. Due to the fact that I rather seldom have to print something the price of the laser printer shouldn´t be extraordinarily high.

What printer do you use or suggest? This time I´m intersted in monochrome laser printers only to keep the price down.

Thanks a lot in advance.

Many greetings from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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I had a laser printer a few decades ago but have used one similar to yours for the past 10 years or so. An HP Officejet Pro 8720. Looks like that was first produced in 2016, so probably since then.

One problem my mom has, and I’ve heard others complain about, is ink cartridges seeming to dry up. I haven’t had that issue. I rarely print anything, but maybe someone in the house prints something once or twice a month. Maybe that’s enough to keep it from drying up.

Also, it’s common for people to leave the default printer settings alone and waste ink. I think the print quality when using the “Draft” setting is perfectly fine. Maybe that would both save ink and prevent clogging of the cartridges.

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Hi @pdecker , :waving_hand:

thank you very much for your reply.

Yes, that´s the reason why I´d like to make the switch to a laser printer.

I tend to forget about “wastefully” printing some random file once a month or once every two months. When I finally need the printer I´m confronted with the problem of dried ink.

In the past I managed to get the catridges going again by carefully applying a wet sponge to them but in the end the printouts were smeared and unsightly. Even with new cartridges this remains to be the case. Seems I´d need to employ a laser printer after all.

O.K., thanks for providing your thoughts on the matter.

Many greetings from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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For 15 years or so I used inkjet printers, different models from Canon.
When my printing needs dropped to 1% of original level, I faced the same problems with clogging. Not using the printer for 3 weeks will cause that.
I need to admit, that I did not use original Canon provided inks.

I looked for a laser printer. My considerations were:
-color, because I occasionally want color print
-must work with my Linux ecosystem
-I want replacement toner for dirt cheap
-the device itself must not be expensive either
-possibly be multifunctional, so act as scanner too.

You can guess, it wasn’t like I went into the shop and purchased a random printer off the shelf :slight_smile:

After some hunting I found Samsung C480W which fulfills all of my criteria.

If I were you, I’d look for a printer that is on the market since a while, so Linux compatibility is more probable. Or the vendor itself provides drivers for Linux.
Additionally I’d check how much is a complete refill. Buying another 3 printers on every refill would be a dealbreaker for me.

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I did a google search

Best laser printer for home use……

But did not like the answers as it went brother, canon , hp

Perhaps I should have asked best Epson laser.

Its a big market, but the suggestion is that the tower cartridges are expensive to buy and they give off smells which are bad for the health.

Its years since I used one professionnel but a which guide for your area may suggest a good buy

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The truth is that the (color-)lasers are rather cheap to buy, but the toner cartridges are very costly. But as a home user with rare printing jobs this doesn’t really matter; one set of cartridges may last for several years. Without any trouble, BTW.

My printer history: Brother-Mono-Laser, Brother Inkjet MFC, HP Color Laserjet. Fully satisfied

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I need a laser (B/W) printer for my company. I need to have some papers which are stored for years. Last time I bought a new one (the old one died) I only had one option. Remember that time after covid when all components were just not available. So I bought the only laser printer I found in our capital city’s electric shop. A bit LOL :joy:! It’s Pantum and it still works, never heard of that company. I still use it with my Linux laptop and my Android phone. The trick with it is that it has a wifi network which is only local, not connected to internet. So when ever I need to print anything I need to connect to it’s wifi to print. A bit annoying but it just works and for business it’s enough.

Laser is great, just buy something people recommends for Linux

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Rosika, I’ve been using my HP Envy 4520 for about 6 years. The Envy models park the jets in a sealed area when not in use, so I’ve been using the same cartridges until they empty rather than until they dry out. Also, a friend gave me a Canon Image Class MF 4450 when her company obsoleted them and gave her a new one. That was four years ago and it has been printing steadily since then. I replaced the toner cartridge (Amazon, about $10) once.

Both printers work flawlessly with most Linux distros. The HP is usually recognized immediately and set up as the default printer. Canon supplies Linux software from its website; I just run the .deb file or the .rpm file in the x64 folder of the download and the distro picks it right up. The newer ones even have US localization so I don’t have to mess with the weird A4 setting.

Laser printers are wonderful if you go to Amazon and find the third party toner cartridges. Best of luck!

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Hi Rosika,

I use an OKI Microline laser printer. It is a postscript printer, so it is easy to configure for Linux. It has ethernet….. wireless did not exist when I bought it 25 years ago.

I guess you want wireless to avoid cables. Any modern printer should have wireless

You are right, laser printers avoid ink drying problems.

Regards

Neville

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I have a 9 year old Brother MFC - works flawlessly in Linux… CUPs just finds it on my network…

It is both wired, and wireless…

It’s an MFC - but when I scan - I either scan to an FTP folder on my NAS file server - or - straight to a USB thumb drive inserted into the printer… I’ve never setup or tried scanning from computers or tablets…

I’ve had HP (Laser) and Samsung (Laser) printers before - would never recommend them again…

I’ve had 3 Brother lasers… ALL worked very well… The first one (black and white - non networked - but I used an Intel network print server device with it) only failed when my missus was studying and put some non-photocopier friendly overhead transparencies in it… The 2nd one we stopped using when we got the Samsung colour laser… when that ran out of toner - it proved to be more expensive than the actual printer - and Samsung shipped it with 1/3 full toner cartridge - that’s extortion…

The HP colour laserjet was network ready (but not wifi) - however - HP stopped making drivers for 64 bit windows before Windows 7! So it was pretty useless on Windows - I can’t remember what workaround we used… it worked better on Linux and MacOs than Windows anyway…

But this Brother MFC (MFC-9335CDW) has been the best of all the printers I’ve ever had… Something went wrong with the paper feeding mechanism inside it - so I took it to a local Brother repairer - and $200 later (they had to replace some controller board in the innards - beyond my expertise to fix) - it was fixed - like a brand new printer again… Sure - for $4-500 could have got a new printer - but $200 was well spent to stop adding to landfill…

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My Brother MFC640CW is an inkjet, but I agree, brother printers are rugged….. and they have Linux drivers.

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Isn’t the better solution to that to store those documents in the cloud somewhere (having scanned them in)? If the y need to be re-printed at some time in the future, they can be easily resurrected from the cloud and reprinted at will.

France, where we live, has a legal requirement to keep documents for specific periods of time (some, for ever!) and we routinely scan documents using our HP Colour Laserjet MFP M281fdw, wirelessly connected and SimpleScan Document scanner s/w on Linux. Saves toner (and the environment) although in practice, the first toner cartridges we got with the printer lasted about 6 months (we had a lot that needed printing for residency cards purposes) which we then replaced with the larger capacity ones which have so far lasted over a year with 20% of capacity still to go. We have restocked now (in anticipation of requiring replacement sometime soon) but the shelf life of the new stock unopened will be considerable. The printer is robust, works well with Linux and has been a really good investment.

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We have a law that we need to store one document per client (which client needs to fill with pen and sign) as long as I do my business. After quitting my business I need to take all these files to a government’s agency where they destroy them in front of me. Silly if you as me but it’s the law. That’s the reason I need a laser printer. I don’t want to scan these docs to cloud because there’s social security number and all that kind of information and there’s always a possibility someone breaks to your system. Better have them in a locked cabin.

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[quote=“Neville Jackson, post:11, topic:14691, username:nevj”]

brother printers are rugged….. and they have Linux drivers.

[/quote]

Thought most now used cups drivers. And that CUPS will drop drivers in favour of IPP (Internet Printing Protocol

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Yes, but all models dont make it into CUPS.

I doubt if they will ever do it. There would be mountains of complaints, and people would hang onto old CUPS versions just to keep their printer going, and if the newer Linuxes did not support old CUPS versions, people would hang onto older Linuxes as well. A really retrograde business. Backward compatability is a necessity.

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Hi all, :waving_hand:

thank you so much for providing such a wealth of replies. :heart:

@kovacslt :

Oh dear. I´d certainly forget about printing every 3 weeks if I don´t have a print job to attend to. I will have to go for a laser printer after all.

I took a look at some pictures of the Samsung C480W. It surely is a beast of a printer :wink: . I mean that in a very positive sense, of course.

I´d be perfectly O.K. with the humble specs I described. Thanks all the same, László.

Good suggestions. Thanks a lot.

@callpaul.eu :

Thanks for the effort. Of course, I also looked around but still wanted to see what you knowledgeable people have to say. Experience matters.

Right. I think I arrived at the same results.

@abu :

Right. But I guess it´s something similar with ink cartridges. I think I already spent a small fortune on them. :neutral_face:

Thanks a lot for the suggestions, Alfred.

@ihasama :

Yes, a simple laser (B/W) printer is what I´m looking for as well. No need for the scanning facility. Just WLAN or Wifi, as it has to work wirelessly.

I found some Pantum laser printers on amazon. Prices vary of course, but I found one costing “just” 85 €. Others may cost more, e.g. 130 €. I haven´t checked them for Linux compatibility but will do so in due course.

Thanks for the suggestion

@berninghausen :

So HP and Canon are in the race, too. Thanks, Bill.

Yes, I can confirm that. My present ink-cartridge printer (HP) was recognized in a jiffy. No problems there.

Thanks for your help.

@nevj :

I found some OKI printers on amazon: from 168 € upwards. I´ll look into them. Thanks a lot, Neville.

Yes, it´s a critical point to me.

@daniel.m.tripp :

Oh dear. I was half-considering HP. Perhaps brother then. :thinking:

O.K. Brother seems to be #1 on my list for now.

Thanks also for your captivating account of what you experienced.

@GrahamLees :

Thanks for your report as well.

I see. Well, brother, HP, OKI… I ´ll look into all of them.

Thanks again to all of you for your valuable input and reports. :heart:

I´ll do a thorough research on all of your suggestions and then I will hopefully come up with a well-founded decision/proposition.

Many greetings from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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I have just been given a new Epson printer which uses ink bottles rather than cartridges not sure if that is a better option or not to laser.

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Maybe add a CRON job or something like that to print a small page of text on the first of each month or something like that. I’m not sure a CRON job runs if the computer is not up and running when the trigger time comes though. That’s a question for your favorite AI maybe.

I asked Copilot. It suggested using anacron.

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You can use `anacron` for that . It will run next time you boot.

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Hi all, :waving_hand:

thanks for your replies.

@callpaul.eu :

I see. Well, I´d rather stick to a laser printer, now that I´ve made up my mind. Dealing with clogged up printing heads and the like gives me the creeps.

@pdecker :

Right. That page of text should appear as e.g. a pdf file on my desktop. Because the printer isn´t switched on by default.

Yes, anachron would do the job as soon as the PC is on again.

@nevj :

Thanks for the confirmation, Neville. That´s my understanding as well.

@all:

Looking around for a suitable candidate (laser printer, B/W, WiFi) I found this one:

Brother HL-L2400DW

Seems good enough for me, but any comments are welcome.

Many greetings from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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