On Sunday 06 May 2001 01:39, Glenn Becker wrote: > Hi, > > I have lived w/o a printer both at home and at work for some time > now. If I need anything printed I've done so from a Mac or Windows > PC. Probably sheer laziness. > > Now, however, I want to do a bit of self-publishing (poetry), and > I'm losing the printer tied to the Mac at home, so I will soon need > to explore printing from my Debian box. > > As you can tell, I'm utterly clueless - what kind of a printer > should I get? I'll be printing mainly formatted text documents > (whether formatted in something like Abiword or something else, I > haven't decided). > > Will any PC-compatible printer do? What are the considerations, > here?
Get a supported inkjet. PS lasers are overkill. AFAIK unless you own one of those really expensive page-crunchers, lasers aren't that much faster. All these guys bitching about the slowness of inkjets are probably talking about those really el cheapo models that spell PROMO. Don't. My Lexmark 7000 can print 300dpi text at 8ppm. Higher quality starts at 4ppm. (Side note: PS was/is intended for graphics work. I don't think poetry qualifies as such.) The durability of laser output is also overrated. Powder-based ink are less resistant to creases and folds than liquid-based ink. Incidentally, if you live in a rainy or leaky place, stay clear of the Epsons. In my experience they produce the least water-resistant output. HP and Lexmark inkjets appear to use pigmented black ink, which make their B&W text output virtually waterproof (unless you have the evil mind to rub your thumb on it before it dries out).
