All-in-one printers sound a lot like the Pocket Fisherman or a Swiss Army Knife when you read their feature list. And when it comes to common office tasks, they'll do just about everything except make coffee. Standalone devices will often give you better performance, but if your budget and desktop space are limited, an all-in-one printer is a solid solution.
Choose your functions
To qualify as an all-in-one printer, a machine must have a letter-size printer and a scanner. Beyond those basics, you can tailor your all-in-one to the things you frequently do and the type of printing you prefer. The available choices are:
- Inkjet with Fax Capabilities
- Inkjet Photo Printers (no fax capabilities)
- Monochrome Laser with Fax Capabilities
- Color Laser with Fax Capabilities
For a small office, adding a fax to an all-in-one printer's repertoire can save a lot of space, but users will be competing for printer and fax time. Most home users don't need a fax machine, so an all-in-one that creates high-resolution photo prints is preferable. Keep in mind, too, that if you've got a scanner and an Internet connection, you can send and receive faxes online without a separate fax machine.
Inkjet or laser?
Price can be a compelling factor when you're looking at printers in the store, but the true cost of an all-in-one must include replacement inkjet cartridges and toner. Over time, any up-front savings on an inkjet all-in-one could be buried in higher ink costs.
The best way to compare prices is to calculate the cost per page for printing. Simply divide the cost of an inkjet or laser toner cartridge by the number of pages it can print. Comparing this cost among printers will help you find ones that are less expensive to own over time.
In general, laser printers cost more up front but have a lower cost per page than inkjet printers. It's best to avoid inkjet printers that have a single color cartridge. Individual ink colors are seldom used up at the same rate, so you'll wind up throwing out good ink because one of the colors runs dry.
Once you've compared costs, it's time to consider image quality. If you'll be printing photos or detailed illustrations, you want an inkjet printer. Because they use tiny droplets of ink that can blend, inkjet printers can reproduce a larger range of colors than laser printers.
A laser all-in-one is the best choice for high-volume printing and those who primarily print text. Text is often crisper on laser printers, but they aren't quite as good with photos and images as inkjets, because a laser printer lays down layers of color rather than using liquid ink that can blend. Laser printers are also considerably faster than inkjet printers.
Print quality
Printer resolution is measured in dots per inch (dpi). The more dots per inch, the sharper the prints. With a higher dpi, more detail is visible to the naked eye. Monochrome laser printer resolution maxes out at 1200 x 1200 or 600 x 600. These scales are more than adequate for printing text and graphics. Color laser printer resolution can be as high as 2400 x 1200 which enhances the quality of the color print.
The maximum resolution of inkjet printers runs even higher, with 4800 x 1200 dpi common even in inexpensive models, which makes it possible to print high-quality graphics and photos without having to rely on professional printers or photo labs. Finishing options vary among printers, but as a general rule you'll want to use graphics or photo editing software to enhance image quality, rather than relying on a printer to do it for you.
Memory
All-in-one printers store documents in memory as they're sent to the printer and they may also store fonts. More memory allows you to print more complex jobs at higher resolution at faster speeds. If you send a high-resolution job to your printer, but don't have the memory to handle it, the printer automatically adjusts the job's resolution to match the printer's capabilities.
Don't skimp if you'll be doing a lot of faxing or scanning-this is where too little memory is most noticeable. Look for an all-in-one that can accept memory upgrades, especially important if you'll be networking the printer for multiple users in a small office. For home users and small offices, look for models with 8 to 16MB of memory. For larger offices, 32 to 64MB of memory should meet your needs.
Fax, scan and copy
The makers of all-in-one printers don't spend as much time touting the capabilities of their scanners as they do the resolution and color quality of their prints. In part, this is because most of the scanners in all-in-ones are essentially the same, with only minor differences in resolution. Scanners on all-in-ones are good for text documents and most support the resolutions needed for print reproduction. However, if you need to scan photos at high resolutions to increase their size or if you work with finely detailed line art, you'll get much better results from a separate scanner.
The speed of copies and faxes is the same as the print speed. Laser all-in-ones can handle these jobs faster than inkjet models. If you'll be making a lot of copies or you receive a high volume of faxes each day, look for the ability to set the resolution of these prints. This allows for faster printing and conserves ink and toner.
It prints! It copies! It scans! Now how much would you pay?
