B&W prints from regular inkjet printers

[anerjee]

I'm in the market for a printer -- but only one can be placed on my desk. I live in Singapore, so space is at a premium.

This means the printer needs to be able to do scanning as well (documents), and preferably with wi-fi.

My primary use will be printing -- b&w scans, as well as color digital. I cannot seem to find anything that ticks all the boxes -- good printer, but also with other functions.

Hence my question: for regular home use, how usable are the prints from the inkjet AIO printers (like the Canon/Epson variety)? Are color casts in b&w prints inevitable?

I do use external printing services when I want to print a book, or a large print.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

The printers with built-in scanners are usually not the best printers for photos, especially black and white. Good BW printers have three black inks: black, light black (gray), and light-light black (light gray). None of the all-in-one printer-scanner models offers that.

 

[yanchep_mike]

Maybe have a look into "QuadToneRIP" a special printer driver to print B&W on various Epson Printers. I use it with good results.

 

[Dogman]

Another problem with "all-in-one" printers is the limitation on types of paper you can use. You may be limited to standard RC photo paper which is not the best looking paper in the world.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

My Epson 88+C is small printer, does 8.5x11, letter size prints, both bw and color. For bw here is grey mode, if selected, no color casts. It is well known printer for photo prints. Does it with archival, pigment inks.
For documents they sell tiny, bar like scanners.

 

[lamefrog]

You could use an app like Google PhotoScan for scanning. You'd then have better options for the printer.

 

[x-ray]

As mentioned there's a lack of color profiles for these printers. The profile tells the system how much of what ink to apply to achieve a correct color print that matches what you see on your calibrated screen. Each model printer and each kind of paper have distinctly different characteristics and require profiles to print correctly. My wife uses an Epson workforce 545 AIO and it's nothing special. Scanning is good for documents and printing for the same. It's marginal for photos.

If you're going to print you must have a calbrated monitor too. Otherwise you'll be wasting a lot of paper because prints on an unprofiled printer will never match an unprofiled monitor. Everything has to be calibrated to print correctly.

Yes you'll most likely have a color cast in your B&W. I use Quad Tone Rip but it only supports a few professional Epson machines not the AIO.

Sadly it's not as simple as buy a printer, plug it in and make beautiful prints. It's a complex process to do properly.