apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

We have the perfect setup to test a wireless printer! We have one desktop in the "office" connected to a B&W non-wireless printer, but I also keep my laptop in the family room to catch up on e-mail or research things while watching tv and hanging out with the dogs. Usually, if I want to print things, I print them all to .pdf, combine them into 1 file, then walk my laptop to the office (on the other side of the house - I could totally tell you how good the wireless printer signal is going through walls or if you need a "line of sight") to disconnect it from the desktop and plug in my laptop. It's a pain.

Sometimes, we both sit on a laptop in the family room researching vacations and flights. So, I could tell you how well the Lexmark deals with 2 wireless connections trying to print to it (can it even do that?). Or review how easy it is to scan something at the Lexmark and have it sent to the laptop (as opposed to the desktop)! I wonder if I could plug my memory card into the laptop and have the Lexmark still print photos without having to stick the memory card physically in the Lexmark.

Conversely, if using this all-in-one Lexmark is more of a pain than my current printing/copying setup, I would definitely let you know that, too!

Okay, waaaay back in the summer of 2006, my partner and I made a cross-country move to get her to Boston for graduate school. We weren't exactly rolling in the dough in Chicago, but lived at our means and never felt "without." With my partner heading into a high-cost grad school for three years and me on the job market, however, we both felt like we were were staring down the veritable barrel. Before the squeeze and stress of draining our modest-to-meager savings could get to us--and as a "back to school" gift--I secretly ordered an HP printer at a *total steal* from Amazon, to be delivered to our new address. It became clear in the following months what happens when you catch Amazon with their pricing pants down: they simply delay, delay, and delay shipping until your order times out and you, hopefully, forget about the promised price on the promised item and order it at full.

I had ordered in July for August shipping--"ships in 4/6 weeks!" By the time we hit October and I discovered the item would never ship and had never been intended to ship, we were both out of money, I was still out of work, my partner did not like her program, we hated our apartment, we hated Boston, and what i had wanted to serve as a sweet gesture and helpful grad school accessory had bombed. It seemed emblematic of the entire move.

Things are better now--apartment, neighborhood, program, job--but we *still* don't have a printer. At my partner's school, they are alotted a very small set number of free copies, after which the charges rack up at an alarming rate. The free copies? Yeah, not even enough to print the "suggested" (ha!) reading for one class, for one semester. We need a home printer like a dog needs a bone, like I needed a job last year, like the city of Boston needed to redeem itself for those first six months of hell.

(Also, as a moderate tech-mind, I'm the perfect reviewer: enough knowledge to know how to use the thing but not so much that I won't appreciate troubles that others might have.)

OOOHH please pick me, If I don't get picked, I'll have flashbacks of grade school dodge ball. I would be the perfect person to take this printer for a spin. I'm totally techno-deficient. I'd be able to tell you if it was user friendly for a novice like myself. I bought my husband a digital Leica for his birthday last year, it's one of those gifts you get that's really for yourself, but that's besides the point. I can test it's photo printing friendliness as well.

OK, here's my pitch:

I'm a freelance journalist who works from home, and I currently have no printer at all. It's not a good thing. First I'll tell you why I have no printer, and then I'll tell you how I deal with this ridiculous problem.

About a year-and-a-half ago I lived in a great loft in not-so-great Downtown Brooklyn. The space: Great. The leaky windows: Very, very bad. When the rain and the wind were at the right angle, our entire place would flood. Our landlords, nice as they were, didn't really tell us about this lilttle problem before we moved in. And that's why we didn't move our huge, fancy, expensive printer from the floor where it was waiting to be set up. You can imagine how this scenario ended up.

Now, I live in a lovely studio in Brooklyn Heights. It doesn't flood. But I also haven't gotten a printer because I have been waiting to move to the one-bedroom I recently scored so I can get a nice, big, fancy one again. One just like the Lexmark.

Please, please do my friends and family a favor and let me test-drive this baby. Currently, when I need something printed, I send it to either my friend in the neighborhood (where I schlep 10 blocks to pick it up and annoy her in the process) or I haul to Kinkos. In the most ridiculous instance involving a printer, I recently emailed a bunch of stuff to my parents' house in Maryland to be printed there because I was going home for a weekend visit. That's just sad.

After reading Nora's post I couldn't possible ask for this printer/scanner/photoprinter/copier/diceomatic.
However, this is exactly what I need. I work freelance and often from my home. I drag my printer to and from offices and setting up in each new office is a drag, especially when you "forget" the cables at some long lost space. Now if only they could figure out a way to go wireless for electricity.

Oh, and also: I'm a writer so I'll give you a well-written, grammatically correct review. I even have a spare package of photo paper for a printer. Biggest 'pro' in terms of me? I like to test stuff!

Randi in BK: This place is full of us--writers, I mean! I share your love of well-constructed marketing prose. May the best freelancer/tester/needy person win.

I'm a (sorta) newlywed and who has more reason to print pictures than a newlywed? My husband and I have a completely networked house, but our Epson printer just doesn't seem to want to work with us. We'd love to test out a new printer. From car comparisons to weird articles to printing new pictures from our wedding, we're always trying to get something to print. To make it all wireless would be great.

I was all set to plead my case...until I read Nora's post.

Good luck Nora. I hope you win :-)

My fiance and I have been looking for the perfect wireless set up for awhile now. We both have laptops and our "nerve center" is in our work room. We spend the majority of our computing time out on the living room couch so that we can study, work and get a little quality TV time in at the same time. With the volume of color printing I do for crafting and BW printing he does with graduate schoolwork, we'd love to be your guinea pigs. We have a wide variety of printing needs, especially since we just moved to Chicago a little over a year ago and we are crazy to take pictures. Plus, we wouldn't have to hound you for an engagement gift.

Well I think I am a good candidate for the printer as I already have Lexmark ink, though probably not the one needed for this printer but here is my pitch anyway:

Six months ago my boyfriend's father thought he would solve our printer-less woes by giving us a perfectly good (previously enjoyed) Versajette printer he had gotten from his work. The thing was a bit bulky especially for it's limited function of printing but beggars can't be choosers can they?

The real problem was the none of the office supply stores I called or visited carried any Versajette ink. I would have to order it online which I didn't really care for as shipping the ink is nowhere near as eco-friendly as the short walk to the specialty store next to the blockbuster we visit on a weekly basis that sells and refills a wide range of cartridges.

Looking through the papers that came with the printer I stumbled up a list of printers that were compatible with Versajette ink cartridges that I needed. I figured, if those printers could use Versajette ink, then I could use their ink cartridges in my Versajette printer. Lexmark was on the list and I was thrilled as the ink cartridges I need from them were far cheaper those from Versajette, (something of a $30 savings when you factor in back and color cartridges) plus it wouldn't have to be shipped. I bought the ink, pop it in the printer, it fit perfectly all I could think was win-win-win.

Then came my disappointment, a pop-up screen on my window confirmed the printer knew it was not Versajette ink and a link to a website where I could buy Versajette ink. Since that incident I have not been particularly motivated to spend money on their ink or give this company a dime. Thus, we are starting up year too as a printer-less household, emailing files and printing them up after work hours.

I would love to have a wireless printer as well so I wouldn't have to stuff this one in our bedroom closet so it hooks up to my PC. I would love a scanner so I can recycle old magazines and college notebooks while saving parts I want to keep in .pdf files. I would absolutely love to be able to print my pictures, most recently the ones I took when I tagged along on a business trip my boyfriend took in Montreal. I am not sure I am the most deserving of this printer but our household would be extremely grateful to be able to test out this printer and the all of the printers functions would get good use.

We would LOVE "cut the cords" and review this product.
This is EXACTLY what our household needs.

My wife and I have a six month old baby girl.
So right now, our life is all about cleaning, poopy diapers, feedings, baths and (of course) taking lots of pictures.
Anything that can help reduce clutter and make our lives easier would be fantastic.

Between my wife's schoolwork (she's a teacher), my own projects, and the non-digital prints that my mother-in-law takes of our daughter, we have a lot of stuff to scan, photocopy and print.

I have my PC and my wife has hers, so we are constantly having to move cables around to allow one of us to be able to use the scanner or color printer. I also have a laptop for work that I will occasionally need to print things (in color) as well.

For some reason the color EPSON printer we have doesn't like to play nice with any print server I've tried (it could definitely use a timeout). The Lexmark X4550 looks to be the perfect solution. This one device could replace our existing color printer, scanner and small personal copier. Not only would it allow us to easily share these devices amongst our PCs, but the wireless all-in-one setup would help eliminate a lot of clutter in our (already-cluttered) office. Not to mention this would also use up less electricity.

Please allow us to review this product for you and see if it will help simplify our (now somewhat chaotic) lives.

Thank you for your consideration.

-The Nolan Family

Also wanted to add, that we have a PC and an iMac so we'd be able to test how the printer functioned on both those machines.

My husband and I bought this exact model a week ago. I spent the next day trying to get the wifi to work on it with our new imac. No go. I spent the next day on the phone with lexmark tech support still trying to get it to work. No go. They've escalated the call twice and now I'm still waiting to hear back from them. In the meantime, we're using the printer with a usb cable hooked up to the mac. It works great other than not being able to print wirelessly....the reason we bought it. I'll report back once I speak to lexmark again.

Here's the short pitch:

I love to test things out and am good at product reviews, I print everything from Word documents to high-res photos, and the printer I used all through college just broke 3 weeks ago. Perfect timing!

Here's the sympathy pitch:

I'm currently going through a grueling, rejection-filled job search and am making frequent trips to Kinko's (to print resume copies, etc). Winning this printer would definitely be the nicest thing to happen to me in 3 months.

Thanks,
Lucy

We definitely need the wireless printer. Our "office"(read--hub) is in the closet in our soon to be baby #2's bedroom. While I, the mommy and behavior therapist do all of my computing from the comfort of the sofa, daddy the high school teacher is usually busy somewhere else in the house pecking away at his laptop. Only when we print do our happy wireless selves have to open the closet door and witness the snake pit of wires that controls our seemingly perfect wireless universe. Please help us keep the illusion alive. Give us a wireless printer that we can safely plug into an outlet so that save a cable issue, we will never ever have to gaze upon the hideous wire nest again.

I would love to, but I'm pretty sure Nora or Randi BK deserve it.

I print... A LOT! Between my home business and the kids schoolwork, the printer is always running. In fact, we have four computers in the house and use all of them to print with. As you can imagine, we have cables EVERYWHERE! For the printer, for the network and the internet...and so on.

It is my dream to, one day, get -everything- set up with wireless. We live in a msall apartment with limited floor space and cables take up a lot of room. Trying to squreeze everything in AND run the cords is rough business :)

The printer I have currently can't print pictures or read cards. It would be so wonderful to finally be able to print all the pictures I have on my hard drive. :)

If I won this printer, it would change our lives! And it would definately be put to good use. :)

My husband and I would be the perfect team to test the printer. He is really smart and a geek (I am also smart, but not at all a geek...and he is proud of being a geek). So he could give you the "engineering" review for it. I on the other hand, being not gifted in the tech department, but still being smart can give you the "smart-pretty not geeky girl" review. We do have a really nice digital cam that we recently used to take pictures of fall foliage...and would love to see how they would come out. The wireless feature would be nice to test because our college student neighbors don't have a printer and winter is coming up and I hate for them to go to the computer center at night, and it would be so much easier for them to print from upstairs and just come pick it up than saving it in the flash drive and come down here turn on my computer....you get the point. Please pick us :)

Lexmark X4550 Wireless Printer has my name
written all over it.

Lex = name of my dog

mark = my middle name

X = my shirt size

4550 = my age range (45-50)

Wireless = my phone company

Printer = my job

I would love a go at testing this printer out. I'm a big tech "geek" so you know you'd get a very thorough review from that end and I also figure I'll uninstall it all and have my wife try it out and see if somewhat not so technically inclined can get it all working.

We've got a cheaper point and shoot camera to test on it as well as a canon digital rebel xt from work. I can test it on PC, mac, and even a mac running windows so that compatability won't be an issue.

I know a thing or two about printers as well, which I think would help. I ran a HP 42" wide plotter for a year during school and managed to keep my cheap printer from 5 years ago still working great until about a month ago, and now it's a doorstop. How many average consumers can say they used one printer for 5 years... I doubt many.

Plus, the last point I'll make at trying to get a free printer. I'm the kind of shopper that spends a month online researching something and finding the best price. So I would be there to tell the readers if this is a good deal at all or just another shot at trying to sell a product with tech hype and ripping people off with things they don't need or things that don't work.

Our current printer makes the sound of a lonely horny penguin every time it pulls a page.

The thing is making some sort of mating call of which both the paper and the neighbors are getting a little weary. We've just moved to a new apartment in the midst of working from home, saving the world, and running a wayward penguin adoption agency - so please consider us as contenders.

We're also nearly as clumsy as the penguin is noisy so to lose the cable impedements would be a blessed relief to us and our flippered roomie.

ps have pc mac digi camera with a hair-trigger finger...penguin pics to follow.

As a first year medical student, I always have documents that need to be printed. At this very moment I wish that I could print my epidemiology homework for tomorrow, my gross anatomy lab schedule for next week, and the biochemistry study guide a friend just emailed to me. Unfortunately, my previously trusty Epson printer didn't survive the move from Massachusetts to New Jersey this summer. Without a printer in my one bedroom apartment, all printing must be done at the computer lab at school. Only a couple of months into the fall semester, I've almost printed all of the 800 pages allocated to me for the year.

Not being able to print documents for school has been a pain, but not being able to print photos has been even irksome. Last winter, my sister's boyfriend generously gave me a hand-me-down digital SLR. I've been snapping pics at a record pace since then. Through winter, spring, and summer my Epson churned out photos of Cape Cod beaches in deep freeze, Arizona "sky harbors", and New Hampshire waterfalls. Photography has become something of a stress-reliever for me since starting medical school, but without a printer I haven't printed a photo in months.

When I moved in, I bought four Ikea cork boards. I spraypainted the frames white and covered the cork with fabric cut from an Ikea bedspread. I hung all four in row above my desk. I had grand plans to pin up photos that I would take this autumn. Unfortunately, the boards are still bare. A new wireless printer would have me printing photos again in no time. And printing my homework for tomorrow would be nice, too! Thank you for considering me.

Our reason is simple. We are the proud parents of an 8-month old who just got accepted by a modeling agency (I know, we're total yuppies).

Within 30 days we have to take a gazillion photos, print them, print labels, adhere labels and send. We have a digital camera but no printer. If we could test drive this printer it will definitely be getting a lot of use!

I'm not going to tug any heartstrings. I don't exactly need a new printer. Here's why my apartment would be a good testing lab for this all-in-one wireless printer.

My apartment has one desktop iMac, three (sometimes 4) Mac laptops, and one PC laptop in regular use. All connect to each other and the internet wirelessly. We have an HP all-in-one printer/scanner that makes very nice prints, but which we don't like for two reasons: (1) it's an ink guzzler and (2) it's wired, which means we have it connected directly to the iMac via a USB cable. Printing from the iMac is no problem; printing from the laptops is a crap shoot. The Mac laptops can only print when the iMac is powered on and printer sharing is activated. I can't get the PC laptop to communicate with the iMac's printer sharing, so it just plain doesn't print at all.

If I got this Lexmark wifi printer, I could compare the quality of its print output with the high quality of the HP (something Lexmark isn't exactly known for, so people will probably be wondering about this). I could also see how it works on a wireless network that serves both macs and PCs, and see if it is a better solution that "printer sharing." I'm a pretty competent techie, so if setup was complicated, I would be able to understand and accurately relate the hoops I had to jump through. I hate reviews that make technology seem either more complicated or simpler than it really is.

And I could earn green points by being able to shut down the iMac when not in use, since it won't have to be on all the time as a print server.

S & T, self-declared "total yuppies" planning to make money off your 8-month-old child: please go buy yourself a printer.

My partner Eric and I would like to review the Lexmark X4550 together. We have been shopping for a color printer recently and are familiar with the specs of many comparable models. For that reason alone, we believe we could provide you with a comprehensive review.

Here's how we intend to test the printer:

Eric is a digital photographer and a metadata librarian at a university library. He manages all sorts of spatial information and we have been discussing recently how we can utilize his skill set and celebrate his interests (digital photography, photoshop, GIS map-making technology) as we decorate our new Brooklyn apartment.

Currently, we are under the thrall of a collection of NYC subways maps that emphasize strong colors and minimalist design (see kickmap.com). These maps never caught on in NYC, but we wanted to pay homage to them by printing them out on sturdy paper and featuring them as a motif in our home. We will definitely print out copies and frame them (possibly in antique frames that serve as a juxtaposition to the modern design). We were also considering using a decollatage technique highlighted on this site recently (remember the Andy Warhol posters) to cover our kitchen cabinets. We would like to try printing these maps in a variety of paper weights and finishes. We excited about gettin' creative with these images. This would be a substantial portion of our review.

Additionally, we have been taking pictures of racehorses recently and would like to print and frame these photos for our bedroom. Again, we'd like to experiment a bit and investigate a variety of paper weights and finishes.

We have a Nikon D-70 and would be happy to provide you photo documentation of our Lexmark-reviewing journey.

I am perfectly suited to test and review this printer. I am a systems administrator with a full test network at home. I have 4 different operating systems (Windows XP, 2003, Vista, and 2 Linux distros) that I can use for the review. Because of my experince supporting non-technical people, I know what things frusterate the normal home user, but I also have the technical knowledge to work around those problems and write out great "how to avoid this" directions. I have online examples of my technical directions here: http://www.totalnetsolutions.net/2007/07/29/howto-change-a-domain-controller-ip-address/ and of my abilities to review and sell a product here: http://www.totalnetsolutions.net/2007/09/08/software-discovery-centrify-directcontrol/ and here: http://www.totalnetsolutions.net/2007/07/03/sprint-ppc-6700-op-ed/

Combined with this, we have 1.2 GB of photos from a recent vacation that need to be printed and distributed to friends and family, and my wife's volunteer tutoring requires her to print tons of worksheets and handouts.

Not only can we test the printer fully and completely, but we have the skills to tell the world about it.

Two small but relevant changes in our house this week:

One, my digital camera is newly full.

Two, every plug in the house has been unplugged.

Common denominator? We just adopted a puppy.

Wireless printing -- say, of new-puppy photos, and of various writerly projects -- would be immediately and thoroughly tested in our house.

We'd be pleased to adopt this printer: so far so good with the pup.

In an effort to avoid any more additional wires around my already cluttered desk, I'm gone ahead and moved my wired printer on top of the fridge in the kitchen, located NO WHERE NEAR MY OFFICE. I'm currently running wires through three walls of my rented apartment and am already sweating over how much spackling I'm going to have to do before I can give the place up.

To make matters worse, I rely on my Bengal kitten to turn on the printer so I can actually use it with my Mac Book Pro. "Go, Lops," I yell, and she runs into the kitchen, jumps on top of the fridge and turns on the printer. This usually never happens, but I like to wish it could.

I'd love to review the printer, and promise no kitten fur in return.

I'm a freelance writer (i love reviewing products) and college english teacher (large state institution, ehem, budget cuts) living in a tiny apartment in southwest virginia. We have one desk and my husband is preparing for law school. in order to preserve our marriage, we live our our wireless network. alas, we don’t have a wireless printer and could sincerely benefit in a multitude of ways.

As a journalist with a penchant for technology and cool gadgets, I am the ideal candidate to review this printer. For one, our apartment in Brooklyn is spread out over two levels with my wife's PC laptop in our living room/office and my MacBook upstairs in our bedroom/office. The AirPort wireless router hides behind the TV. We often work from home (printerless), resigned to printing documents during trips to the office or pictures at overpriced FedEx Kinko's. In the review process I could test for, among other things, compatibility with Mac and PC, range (how well will the printer will respond to the signal carried across the duplex), and picture quality with our nifty new digital camera. Moreover, I am accustomed to writing technology reviews having written several for a various print and online magazines.

I was wondering, until I stumbled upon this post, why every night this week, voices have been telling me:

"Lexmark. Lexmark."

So, really, the relief in knowing that there was some rhyme and reason to that otherwise disconcerting experience is reward enough.

That aside, an actual WiFi printer would be quite a lovely bonus. And you know what? I'm the perfect guy to review this piece of modern technology. Not only am I officially a Computer Guy, I'm also sitting in a household with Macs, PCs and even a Linux system, and have spent far too much time in the past year trying to get wireless printing to work flawlessly in exactly the way I want.

I've tried cheap print servers connected to my router (flaky at best). I've tried a USB network sharing device (no dice on the mac). I've tried the new Apple AirPort Extreme router with built-in print serving (works great, but confuses my PC into thinking the printer's unavailable for 5 seconds, popping up an error window, before realizing everything is OK).

And to top it all off, the printer is a good 5 years old and is seriously in need of replacing.

So not only am I still seeking the perfect WiFi printing solution, I can actually tell you how it compares to other options that are out there. How sweet is that?!

I would be a great person to test this printer. Why? Mostly because I have to do alot of printing, use both mac and PCs, and not having the best of luck with the wireless printing via the Aiport and still being able to keep good wireless protection.

I print pictures from digital cameras (usually of my animals, dog, cats, guinea pig) but I also print from super high quality cameras that take pictures from microscopes (I am working on my dissertation right now). I have issues with most printers because what I see on the screen never gets reflected on my proofs because of saturation of ink.

I am a mac girl at heart, but am also the tech support person for my lab that is exclusively windows (except for my powerbook).

I would be willing to test this printer at both my lab and home to give benchmarks. Home is an older building, which means everything would have to be wireless because there is no running of cat5's through the walls. Work is a lab in a university setting, with 4 or so users that would be willing to test the printer.

Seriously: Me=poor grad student writing her dissertation, and I can't print anything at home, and the printer at work is substandard. ISO cool printer to print my work out so that I don't have to try to work on a laptop during my commute.

we'd love to test it... my girlfriend is a photographer and i am a art director/designer. we also just moved into our new apartment and were going to run wires everywhere for our epson 1280, but a wireless printer would be perfect. we have a pretty long apartment with a loft so we could also test it's range through the apartment. oh we also use both macs and pcs!

I'd love to try this, I am constantly taking pcitures of my children, plus my mother in law is a kindergarten teacher and needs to copy and do tons of stuff with her printer. I am sure as a teacher we would put this thing to good use

I am a puppeteer/prop designer and I build huge halloween costumes that require really nice graphics on regular paper or on laminate paper for back lighting ( all sort of projects like fake board games, shadow boxes, toy packaging, costumes, etc...) . I recently build a HUGE Halloween costume for the Greenwhich Village Halloween Parade and won the whole parade's "Best Costume Prize," which was a real honor - for this project, as with many of my other projects, I have to print really nice graphics and I currently do not have a quality color printer to do this on. THe one I have at home only prints in black and white (color broke a few years back) and half of its features are broken (scanner, fax, color printing, etc...). I have to design my stuff at home, print it on my printer in black and white to check the dimensions, and then I head over to my friend's house to print the final product at her house. Since I usually finish my products late nights, this can pose a serious problem if I am working down to the wire.
I would very much LOVE to win this printer. My work would thrive from the ease of perfecting the final "look" of my products in my own home...

Below is a link to the Halloween Parade site where I am posted as the winner of this year's costume contest, as well as a link to a highly entertaining documentary film my friend made of my costume building/parade walking experience.

Thanks for your consideration!
Serra

http://www.halloween-nyc.com/contest.php

http://theclawmovie.blogspot.com/

Yeah...I realized right after I hit "send" that I was entering month after the giveaway ended....oops. Thanks for reading. Hope whoever got it is thrilled with it :)

I don't want the printer, but I've got something for the baby! A new company has all natural baby wipes. They have nothing harmful whatsoever, and are so natural that they are actually safe for consumption!