Best Place To Print: At The Copy Shop, At Work Or At Home?

By Author: scottcarlos18
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Lots of people have likely had some variation of the following experience.

Whether preparing for a school year or gearing up to do some writing or simply restocking their home office, peoples sometimes plunk down 50 or 100 bucks on a sleek printer, black and a whole bevy of different color ink cartridges, and a few reams of paper.

The intentions are good, of course. But then for whatever reason, these people have neglected to do the majority or all of their printings at home, letting it sit fallow and unused, perhaps dusty on some closet shelf. When the printer is finally pulled out, six or nine months or whenever later, the ink has dried and rendered the purchase pointless. And there's always the risk the cycle will be repeated in the future. It can be tough to get full use out of a printer.

So the question becomes: Is it more cost-effective to forgo having a personal printer and simply do all printing at a copy shop or work? There are different benefits and risks to each option.

Home: Having a good working printer is certainly convenient for anyone who can get regular use out of it or afford ...
... the costs. Being able to print at home is quick, saves a trip out, and, provided it's used enough can be the most affordable route with printing.

So how often is regular use? For Canon toner cartridges to not dry out, they should generally be used at least once a month and kept in a temperate, cool area in the interim. Ideally for economic purposes, there should probably be a higher volume of printing. If this isn't possible, it may be wise to consider the other options.

Work: Lots of offices have freely available printers that can be used to print things off the Internet or work computers. The benefit is that it's usually free. The key is to determine a company's policy on personal printing. Many if not most places are fine with their employees printing personal items, provided they don't make a regular habit of it, though other companies may consider this a form of theft. It's better to clarify any ethics rules before risking one's job.

Copy shop: For people who don't have a personal printer or toner cartridge and can't or don't want to do their printing on the job, the remaining option is visiting a copy shop or Internet cafe. It can be inconvenient and printing charges can quickly add up, so it probably isn't the best option for anyone doing a heavy volume of printing, but for people who do it infrequently, maybe once or twice in a busy month, it can be the most affordable option.

Of course, there's also the option of doing printing through all three of the methods listed above. After all, the name of the game is convenience. There's nothing wrong with trying any of the above and seeing, over time, what works best.

Phil Cambridge is the author of this article on printing options, toner cartridges, and makes his living delivering Canon toner cartridges.