When To Use Your Own Printer Instead Of A Printing Company

When should you go to a printing company? It depends on the level of importance of the document, how important a factor money is, and what kind of options you have for printing at home. Your home printer is probably up to the task using HP printer ink.

It’s important in any case to consider the costs involved. Printing at home will save you money, especially if you’re using HP printer ink. But if the job is too large, or the work needs to be specially bound - such as for important reports or master thesis papers - you should consider having the job professionally printed.

Keep your goals in mind as well. What’s more important to you? Quality or quantity? In which areas can you save money and where must you splurge a little to achieve best results?

Need 500 Copies?

If you have a high-performance printer at home, it might print like a champ but take forever to do it. By the same token, your home printer might be fast but the output is of relatively low quality. The assumption here is that the printer was chosen for these qualities. However, if you find yourself needing higher-quality output for a job that would take forever and taker tons of ink, outsourcing to a printing shop might be the right move.

When considering color, remember that inkjet color printers usually incorporate the standard Cyan Magenta Yellow-BlacK color array, which will work for print jobs that contain simple color charts and graphs. When the printing of 1,000 high-resolution photographs comes into play, however, it’s best to seek out the assistance of professionals.

Of course, if you have a photo printer at home, like the HP Photosmart, all you need is photo paper and HP printer ink to make fantastic looking images. Products like these are getting more affordable all the time.

Many people opt for inkjet printers for home use simply because of their lower price point. If you find yourself in this category, keep in mind that you will be able to print the majority of jobs at home. But for higher-end needs, a printing company may be the better bet.

You do have the alternative of printing the pages that you can print at home, and selecting those with color photographs or charts to be printed by a printing company. This saves you quite a bit of money, even considering the extra hassle.

You can select the paper stock yourself in this case, which is cheaper because you can order it without having to go through a middle man. Then you can have the printing company use the same stock to print their portion of the work, or even supply them the paper yourself. Of course, not every printing company will be happy to print your job using paper you supply. In that case, it’s a good idea to call the printing company beforehand and check with them.

Printing on paper stock that they don’t even carry might be against company policy for larger firms, but more often than not with smaller mom-and-pop type places, the staff will agree to accommodate you and negotiate a reasonable price. If the company cannot accommodate you in your request, your choices are to either do the printing yourself at home, have all the printing done by the company, or find another business to take the project.

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The History Of Printers

Whether you are printing out documents or photos of Justin Bieber (we hope it’s the former) have you ever actually wondered when the very first printer was invented? Well, wonder no more as we take you on a whistle-stop tour of the history of the computer printer!

Way back in 1953 the very first computer printer was born, developed by Remington-Rand for use solely with the Univac computer. Some years later, in 1957, IBM invented the first dot matrix printer that printed by impact, similar to a typewriter. The 1970 Daisy Wheel printer used similar technology to print, using a hammer to strike a wheel with characters on each ‘petal’.

In 1938 Chester Carlson invented a type of dry printing press initially called electrophotography that was later renamed xerography. This invention became the basis for the technology we now know as the laser printer. In 1975 we were given the IBM 3800, the very first laser printer that allowed users to print text and graphics onto paper. Thanks to its laser beam technology the laser printer produced incredibly high quality copies that made it a popular choice.

1976 marked the invention of the inkjet printer – by propelling droplets of ink the inkjet printer creates digital images and is still, to this day, the most popular type of printer. Although it was invented in 1976 the inkjet printer was not marketed until 1988, although it came at a whopping price of $1000!!

2012 saw the invention of the 3D chocolate printer which, controlled via computer instructions, allows users to create their very own 3D treat!

Modern day computer Dell printers now offer a plethora of functions including scanning and copying capabilities and have truly become multifunctional machines. Thanks to developments in technology manufacturers were also able to offer printers at extremely reasonable prices. With development continuing, who knows, in a few more years our computer printers might even be able to offer us a cup of coffee with our copy.

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The Magicard Printer

Technology has made it possible for anybody to own any device that can do a lot of things. Printing ID cards, you need an ID card printer and Magicard’s ID card printers are one of the industry’s best. With these, you can print full color secure photo ID badges, membership cards, smart cards and even access control badges.

What makes them unique from the rest of their competitors is that their access control feature is made possible through the use of their patented HoloKote anti-counterfeiting visual security feature which prints standard or custom watermark security and this comes as no cost to you because it is already part of the printer’s capabilities.

I find this very impressive. The custom image which is printer onto the card is encrypted and electronically stored on a custom key thereby making duplication impossible. Security will not be compromised in the process. These features plus the fact that the prices are affordable and cost less than what you can find in retail stores make these Magicard printers very appealing.

You can also find some Magicard cartridge, Tango ribbons and Tango manual in the site. When quality and security really matters, Magicard printers are a good alternative in my point of view.

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