I’m about to pick up the fourth new 100-ish dollar printer for my family in just six years. Printers are actually fairly complex devices, but manufacturers set the prices low with the intention of recouping the costs through proprietary ink and toner - and the fact you’ll need a new one in a few years anyway.Īnd you know what? They’re right. In a time when we have tech to help blind people see, computers so small you can swallow them and speakers that answer our questions, why can’t we get a freaking printer to work? According to the experts, All-In-One (AIO) home office printers that print, copy, and scan - are often built cheap, sold even cheaper, and not really meant to last that long. Sound familiar? According to a Consumer Reports survey published in March of this year, people ditch 75% of home printers within a few years of purchasing them, “because they had stopped working well or stopped working altogether.”

I was almost scammed by an online service that looked like legit tech support.

Trying to get customer support help was an exercise in frustration too.

Cryptic messages on the tiny printer touchscreen made it nearly impossible to troubleshoot.

No local stores sell “the right” ink cartridges anymore.

Speaking of ink, those auto ink refills were hit or miss - rarely here when we really needed them - though the monthly charges to our credit card were like clockwork.

It ran out of ink all the time - usually when something super important was due.

The wireless networking rarely connected without a fuss.

In the time since I first bought it and now: Watching it smash on the bricks below - a spray of glass, pop of plastic, and jerky bounce of mangled metal - was the most satisfying part of ever owning that stupid thing.

I just chucked a two-year-old printer out a third story window.

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