Time for 2025 printer research!
Have been stalling getting a new printer since this HP has been doing me fine since way back. But of course we need to prepare for the inevitable firmware updates and subscription raises that will lock us in.
What I’ve heard is best:
- Laser Printers
- Brother branded
Recently though, Brother started doing the funky like all other printer companies. This stopped me last time when I was about to buy one.
I won’t get into the details as to where I’ve found and read this information because it’s in the back of my mind.
And since I’m really just here to ask: WHAT KIND OF PRINTER YOU GOT, LINUX USERS?
Preferably under $200.
EDIT: Scanning + Printer + Copier combo is the ultimate goal, but whatever else works too. Preferably wifi connected. But I can make some Ethernet cables.
BTW the Brother scare about them adding DRM that was in the news a while back turned out to be false, it was just a random guy on Reddit with a bad third-party cartridge, and Brother replied that they do not block third-party cartridges.
That said, I’m not a huge fan of their weird PPD installer on Linux that installs some random, undocumented crap
I’ve had Brother laser printers for over 15 years with my Linux machines and they’ve worked beautifully.
Anything but inkjets, unless you are keen on printing photos. The amount of time I’ve saved on maintenance since I switched to a laser printer is astounding. Currently using an old Brother MFP I bought for $30 at the local thrift store, then $30 for a two-pack of third-party toner on eBay.
As for wireless printing, I set up an old thin client as a discrete print server.
+1 for thrifted laser. Just look for replacement toner before checking out.
I use Brother HLL2350DW Monochrome Compact Laser Printer with Wireless and Duplex Printing. I was pretty nervous about getting a monochrome printer because I thought “what if I need color!”, but I haven’t needed color once.
I’m on Arch btw (aspiring Guix user) and I have to use this printer driver to get the printer working: https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/brother-hll2350dw
It can connect to wifi and supposedly supports driverless printing… but I haven’t been able to get that to work. (I haven’t dug too deeply.)
I don’t mind installing the driver and connecting my laptop to the printer with a USB cable. The rest of the printing experience is great! I bought this thing over 2 years ago and it’s still works like new. Zero maintenance, zero toner “ink” replacements, the printed pages are crisp.
I recently bought my parents HLL3280CDW Color Printer with Laser Quality Output, Duplex and Mobile Printing & Ethernet. Everyone says laser printers suck at printing in color, so I wanted to try one out… and people online are way overexaggerating how bad the color printing quality is. It’s actually pretty damn good. I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between an inkjet and laser color printer. Maybe if they were right next to each other and I was looking for differences, but for most people and most use cases, I don’t think anyone will notice. (Unless you need to print photos? idk.)
I’d say the biggest drawback these Brother laser printers have might be the size. My monochrome printer is not the smallest. And the color scanner/printer/copier printer I got my parents is pretty big. Ink cartridges are tiny compared to the huge toner rolls these printers use. I think the size bothers my parents a little, but I keep telling them to remember the shitty ink cartridges drying out all the time and needing constant maintenance.
I have an Epson EcoTank, and I LOVE IT! The ink bottles are super cheap. I’ve printed a few thousand pages and I’m still on the first bottle.
The printers themselves are quite expensive. I think the lowest price one is around $200. But, they make up for it with how cheap the ink is and how long you can go without needing to buy more ink.
Everything works on Linux. Printing, scanning, all of the different feed options, all the driver options.
Inkjet isn’t appropriate for somebody who prints infrequently, especially refillable inkjets, because they dry out even faster than cartridges. Toner is powder and stays good for basically as long as the printer is functional.
It might depend on climate, because I live somewhere semi-arid, but it’s worth keeping in mind.
I live in a desert, and have had my printer for about four years on the same ink. I haven’t had any issues other than needing to do a few head cleaning cycles now and then.
Brother HL-2270DW, $60 on craigslist, still lots of them out there.
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+1 for used Brother models. Mine is a MFC 27XX YY, which has decent Linux support and accepts third-party toner without complaints.
I have a very similar Brother - HL-L2370DW. Just works with any Linux distro I’ve tried out of the box. Has wifi, USB, and ethernet, black and white laser, duplex printing. No copier functionality. Third party toner cartridges are readily available.
I have an Epson EcoTank ET-4850 and it works really well. And even though that’s not under $200, cheaper ink might make up for it.
Regardless of the model, what you want is a printer that supports CUPS driverless LAN/WiFi printing and the Apple AirScan protocol for scanning (which the model above supports both). If configured right, CUPS will just detect your printer and it will just work, no installing drivers, no choosing models etc., same with SANE for your scanner, without defining backends.
USB-devices are always a gamble where even minor model-number differences might entirely break support. Better make sure to check on the compatibility list and scour the mailing lists and forums for some crumb of information that your specific and exact printer model is supported and someone verifies it’s working. Ideally test before buying, or not rely on USB.
Does AirScan on Linux work to scan-tohcomputer from the device? Or do you have to run [x]sane or some other interactive app on your computer? I’m wanting to use my R Pi as a headless server/backend that a scammer sends to, without having to use any desktop software interactively.
It works via SANE and so should work with all the standard scanning apps in Linux. Personally I prefer GUI apps because they give me lots of additional control (I use KDE’s Skanlite).
However SANE itself ships a command line tool, but that needs to be triggered on the device that uses the scanner. However, I noticed that when the GUI app is active, I can start the scan with the button on the scanner, so there might be something that can be worked out to always have the scanner connected and pressing the button scans into a network share (or something like that), but that’s outside my experience. If it works with any other SANE scanner, it should work with AirScan.
ok, thanks.
As other’s have said Brother. I can honestly say they are one of the few companies which still make Linux drivers for their printers. I’ve been using their monochrome lasers.
They are workhorses as well, I’ve seen several out in the field printing well over 100K pages and still going strong. The best part about Brother I think is they also allow free access to their service manuals which will tell you more than you may ever want to know about your Brother Printer. :) I had an older HL-L2240 (USB Only) I bought about 9 years ago in a thrift shop and it ran faithfully on a network print server at my home until it stopped feeding paper. It probably needed a new pick up roller set, but it was a bit slow and I felt it was time to upgrade, so I now have a Hl_L2420_DW wireless which out of the box on my Fedora linux system installed and runs flawlessly. They are generally under $200 (around $130 at Wal-Mart for example).
They also do not limit you on your laser cartridge if you go that route, in that you can usually buy after market toner and drums without it ever complaining or locking you out.
I’ve run my business for over 25 years, and I haven’t had a printer in over two decades. I have needed to print something less than half a dozen times since making the decision to not replace it. Instead I print to PDF and if I need actual physical paper, I’ve put a PDF on a USB flash drive and taken it to my local office supplies store to print on demand.
I have a scanner, it’s been used perhaps a dozen times in the same period.
In other words, have you considered not buying a printer?
Comments like this are a major reason why the Linux community is so toxic. “Advice on doing A?” “Don’t do A do B instead”
Except that in civil discussion with experts, other ideas are what helps people arrive at a solution suitable for them and their situation.
I’ll also add that I’ve been a Linux user for 25 years and the toxicity you claim in relation to the Linux community is in my experience not evident as a “major reason”, instead I’ve found it to be innovative and flexible with a wide perspective and approach to problem solving.
Are there dickheads in the Linux community? Yes, just like there are everywhere in society.
Another potential route: your public library. Mine prints for 5¢ per page and has a web interface for uploading documents from anywhere and printing them when you go in.
good for you, mine charges 20¢ a page
Good God… I don’t even think there’s a place in my entire town that charges that much. :(
Any printer that supports Mopria or AirPrint will work on Linux without installing any drivers.
I prefer using older Brother laser printers that don’t have any chips in the toner cartridges. I have an HL-4150CDN and a DCP-7065DN.
Brother HL 2030, and the scanner is a Mustek 1248UB, both chosen for their Linux compatibility at the time. And most likely both discontinued.
Mustek 1248UB
I remember buying one of those from ‘Electronics Boutique’ over 20 years ago. Before they nuked all the extra PC peripherals and renamed it ‘EB Games’
Yup, another vote for brother laser printers. If you’re worried about them applying updates that add DRM to toner cartridges, but you still want network printing you can do one of two things:
- Give the printer a static IPv4 address and block egress from your router with a firewall.
- Give it a static IPv4 address but give it a non-functional gateway (e.g. if your gateway is 10.0.0.1, make the printer’s gateway 10.0.0.254)
Heck, do both if you’re paranoid.
Either way it’s not getting updates unless you manually change things or download the firmware updates on your Linux box and apply it that way.
I thought Brother would be better than HP. It wasn’t. I’ve had a lot of success for years with a Canon laser printer/scanner hooked up wired to my router. When I switched to Linux, it was simply detected and works with a lot of programs without even trying to install a Canon driver.
Yeah, I think laser with viable third party cartridges is the actual answer. No matter what brand. Individual model is more important than the brand too, because my Brother was actually still kinda annoying to get working properly.
100% Brother, but shop from their Refurbished Store and save a ton of money. Comes with the same warranty as if it were new, and everything ships with toner included.
Still Brother. Yes they have a subscription option, but only on certain models. Just read the product page to verify.
Usually, retailers carry both, so if you find two almost identical ones, only slight price and model number differences, then you should easily be able to pick the non-subscription one.
