I ran the numbers on my old HP inkjet (PSC 1410, which also scans and copies and probably has sufficiently clever firmware to make the tea) and was alarmed to note that it costs somewhere around 12p per page. Yes, the consumables aren't expensive, so you don't notice them as much, but they don't last long (~150pages per cartridge in my case).
I bought a Brother HL-4040CN networked colour laser earlier this year. IIRC the consumables amortise to something like 6p/page. Windows, Mac, Ubuntu, no problem - there's a handy .deb which installs the right magic for CUPS to DTRT. Documents print very well. While it's not a photo printer, you can plug a USB camera into it; I tried once, on plain paper, and confirmed that the quality is OK but not stellar. The capital cost isn't bad, and was helped by a £100 cashback offer. (In fact it seems the promo is still going: http://www.brother.co.uk/g3.cfm/s_page/87000 .)
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Date: 2008-10-15 08:31 am (UTC)I bought a Brother HL-4040CN networked colour laser earlier this year. IIRC the consumables amortise to something like 6p/page. Windows, Mac, Ubuntu, no problem - there's a handy .deb which installs the right magic for CUPS to DTRT. Documents print very well. While it's not a photo printer, you can plug a USB camera into it; I tried once, on plain paper, and confirmed that the quality is OK but not stellar. The capital cost isn't bad, and was helped by a £100 cashback offer. (In fact it seems the promo is still going: http://www.brother.co.uk/g3.cfm/s_page/87000 .)