All in ones, for a very small business...

Santilli

Santilli

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Jan 27, 2002
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Hi
I have a friend that needs fax, printing, probably usb, since he's using a HP 1.4 ghz laptop, and copying.

He might ship 3 times a week, so, Laserprinting is a question.
Still, he likes to read hard copies of everything, so the copying , and printing might require laser quality.

Any suggestions? Common approach is by seperates, but, I thought I'd brave the flames and see if anyone has worked with a combination that worked well, and, worked with XP home.

Thanks

Greg
 
I have yet to meet an all-in-one that wouldn't bring an HP 1.4GHz system to its knees. Some of the more recent ones are acceptable on a decent system - let's say Sempron 2800, Athlon XP 2500, 512MB RAM and a reasonably crap-free Windows install (i.e., not something you ever see on HP units), but on slow machines, especially slow machines with not enough ram, especially especially on slow HP machines with not enough ram and intel cpus which multi-task like a slug on valium, they ain't a practical option.

For that machine, there is really only one sensible answer: buy a smal Canon printer - an IP1600 would do - and a small Canon scanner. Or, if you absolutely positively must buy an all-in-one, buy something decent - Canon or possibly Epson (though I haven't tried the Epsons lately) and absolutely, positively not HP. And we won't even mention Lexmark. And plan on upgrading the computer shortly afterwards - all-in-ones suck CPU power and RAM like there is no tommow.
 
Sorry. Didn't realise it was a laptop. I was thinking a Celeron 1.4 or (much worse) one of those terrible 1st-gen Pentium 4s. OK, ther is a Canon unit that sells for about $AU 400 or so. It's good. I have details at work if you want them.

PS: it doesn't do fax. Nothing that actually works in an all-in-one does fax. Fact of life. Get used to it.
 
I have a Brother 7820N that I like. USB or Ethernet interface (useful if you have more than one computer). Nice laser printer, good scanner with ADF, and simple fax with a few autodial slots. Software isn't too troublesome, though it is a memory hog.
 
I've had good success with the Dell 1600n. Laser printer, fax, scanner/copier. No color printing, but no biggie. Got it on sale for $200, dunno how much it goes for normally.
 
Thanks for the suggestions. I've got a scanner, cheap, and, a laptop protable printer, or, a Samsung Laser printer, but, I think that might be overkill for his uses. Also. Copying, he could copy, using photoshop, and then print, but, I think that might be more work then he wants, don't know.

Guess I can dig them out, and give it a try.

Would you folks be nice enough to look at Costco's offerings, and see if you see anything that is a good value?

http://www.costco.com/Common/Category.aspx?whse=BC&Ne=4000000&N=4015982&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&cat=54023&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&topnav=&mc=84



Thanks

Greg

PS
The fax thing does have me a bit concerned...
 
And Tannin, you nailed the big problem: 384 mb of ram, with XP home. I did strip it down, as much as I dared...

Greg
 
While I'm at it, looks like the USB port is going to need an external hub, compatible with HP stuff. Anyone have a preference? Sold both of mine...

Santilli
 
Let me take a moment to echo other sentiments: All in Ones end up being either very expensive printers, or very expensive fax machines. Maybe the scanner/copier function works, but most likely one or more of the four functions won't. They are not worth the money and they are not worth the time.

I didn't come to this opinion overnight. Neither did Tannin, I'm sure.
 
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