We have all wanted to own a printer at some in point, but we never really bothered. We might have used one for a short while, but the exorbitant cost of ink cartridges probably didn’t make sense. Printing this far has been an occasional task, not because we don’t wish to print anything. We would all like to print documents, photographs, assignments, reading material or just records of things we wish to keep. The cost of ink has always been a deterrent, not so much the cost of the printer or paper. Printer manufacturers have come up with a solution and it’s been around a few years now. We’re talking about ink tank printers.
Ink tank printers have refined over the years, and even become more affordable. It appears now is a good time to consider one. It rids of one of the biggest problem, expensive ink. A printout at the local printing shop costs in the range of Rs. 3 to Rs. 40, depending on the quality and size of the print. Large photo printouts can cost much more, even running into several hundreds of rupees.
Some of the things you might want to print out are photos clicked by you, on your smartphone or DSLR. Most smartphones today click quality photos that can be enlarged and printed without much trouble. You could very easily compile a nice photo album. The actual photo album costs very little unlike the prints that cost much more, so when you have an ink tank printer at home, you no longer need to worry about it. One of the fun things you could do is buy a large bundle of quality printing paper which may cost a few hundred rupees, then print out all your favourite photos you’ve clicked. You can also get a few photo frames made at a local store for as little as Rs. 100 a piece. You could replace the photos with freshly printed photos every week or so. It brings a certain joy and colour to your home. It’s one of the things you can do when you have a quality ink tank printer with negligible printing costs.
Ink tank printers are much more expensive than traditional inkjet printers. Prices have fallen and some of the premium models such as the Epson EcoTank L3150, Canon Pixma G3010 and HP 419 cost somewhere around Rs. 13,000. The running cost however is a lot lower than most basic inkjet printers. Ink tank printers have the major advantage of being able to refill the ink using bottles that cost a fraction of the price and contain several times the ink of a typical inkjet cartridge.
If you are looking for more affordable models, they start from around Rs. 8,000. The cheaper ink tank printers may lack the great print quality as well as the scanner component, that is seen on the premium models. The expensive models have features such as wireless connectivity that let you use your smart phone to send print orders to the printer. The wireless feature also means that you don’t need the printer sitting next to your computer, taking up valuable desk space. It can also connect to the router wirelessly or using an Ethernet cable anywhere in your home or office. Some printers let you even connect to them without the need of a Wi-Fi router. They allow 3 to 4 concurrent connections to the printer using Wi-Fi Direct. Some models even let you print to your printer from anywhere in the world over the internet.
The premium models also boast of superior print quality, speed and efficiency. Some brands claim their model use ink bottles that can print up to 7,000 pages. They tend to have high-resolution print capability as much as 4,800 x 1,200 dpi. Most inkjet printers claim to deliver up to 150 to 170 pages at most. You then need to order new cartridges. Some inkjet printers also only use multi-colour cartridges, whereas ink tank printers let you refill specific colour tanks.
The printing costs stated by the manufacturers are also quite impressive. Some of the models claim an ink cost of just Rs. 0.1 for a black and white print, and Rs. 0.18 for a coloured print. Of course, these might be under test conditionsa and approximations, but they’d be impressive even if they many times that. Most ink tank printers use four bottles, one black, the others typically being Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Cyan.
If you choose a multifunction printer, it’s worth paying attention to the scanner as well. The scanning resolution and the ability to send scanned documents back to the PC, smartphone, or a connected pen drive is quite handy. Making copies of documents and photos is another useful feature. The wireless models let you do all these operations remotely from a smart phone. Some manufacturers also let you check the ink tank levels and supplies remotely from a phone or tablet. Another great feature of ink tank printer is being able to see the actual amount of ink, something traditional ink cartridges didn’t let you. Refilling the ink into the tanks is also very easy and externally done, in most printer models.
If you’re wondering if you should consider an inkjet printer over an ink tank, you should check out our guide on the subject. We also have a guide on how to make the most of your printer and get the best print results, especially with photos.
You can find a wide range of inkjet printers on reliancedigital.in and a selection of ink tank printers. You can order one right away and it will be home delivered to you in no time at all. You could also walk down to your nearest Reliance Digital store to check out some of the models out for yourself. Our digital experts will be able to guide you with one that’s best suited for your needs.
