<p>Personally, I don't want to buy a printer for school next year. Right now, I generally save anything I need to print on a USB stick, and print it at school, but I heard that Cornell charges you for using their printers? Is this true and how much do they charge? Are there color printers available? Also, are there "community" printers available in the Residence Halls or Community Centers?</p>
<p>And last but not least, what is everyone else doing about this? Are you buying a printer / waiting to see if roommate is getting one / something else?</p>
<p>I hear cornell charges a few cents a page to use community printers which are in the residence halls. same deal for the ones in the library.</p>
<p>I'm just going to buy my own printer. It'll be much easier to print a draft in my room then down the hallway. You have a good point about the roomate though. I'll wait till I find out if I have a roomie to buy a printer and then communicate w/ him about it. One less item to have 2 of...</p>
<p>Thanks guys, I guess I'll wait to talk to my roomie about printers. Norcalguy, is the fax machine thing a problem? I rarely fax anything at home, and I never even thought of needing a fax machine at college.</p>
<p>same with me in my high school, I kindly asks the principal's secretary to fax something for me. my hs is too cheap to have fax machines for every department, but hey it doesn't cost a cent. I can print pretty much anything i want to, even though our library starts to charge 10 cents a page now since i've been on a printing frenzy for three years. I still manage to print something and the librarian doesn't charge me b/c he says he understands if it is for school, unlike some kids here who print entire comic books/ illegal photos etc.</p>
<p>I'll be bringing a printer, it's so much cheaper and more convinient. I'll either bring my little HP all-in-one. . . .or invest in a cheap black and white laser printer ($120 at STAPLES).</p>
<p>Fax: It's been two years since I transferred out of Cornell but in the basement of Olin Library is an office that can fax documents for you, and I don't recall the charge being anywhere near $3. I used the office several times.
This is off topic but robinage mentioned USB drive. Two years ago those weren't very popular among my enginereing classmates. I don't know about Cornell now since I transferred but at my current school USB drives have revolutionized the way we do our work.</p>
<p>I'd recommend a cheap b&w laser printer if anything, because you're going to print a lot of text-based documents. Color lasers are also available in labs and libraries for 25 cents per page, but I rarely have to use them. Lasers are much more cost effective, as the single toner that comes with the printer is likely to last you the entire year or longer.</p>
<p>Despite the cost per page, the system Cornell uses is pretty cool. No need to pay a consultant or insert change into a machine. When you need to print all you do is type in your netid and password and it immediately prints. You are billed on your bursar account. </p>
<p>An increasing trend I've noticed is that classes are starting to give printing credits to your bursar account if they require you to print off a lot of material. I hope they continue this.</p>
<p>My advice...bring a printer. Not having one this summer was a total disaster. </p>
<p>With your own PC and printer, there's no need to deal with the extremely crowded computer labs...plus you don't have to pull losers off of machines that are using them to play halo.</p>
<p>wow thanks for the feedback everyone! :) i think i'll definitely bring a printer next year, unless my roomie is already bringing one, in which case I think I'll offer to share in ink/paper expenses and use hers. :)</p>
<p>"pull losers off of machines that are using them to play halo" it's nice to know there are such fellow losers at cornell:) I like to play small computer games for fun (nothing like video games), but I guess I'll have to ditch the habit and pursue more constructive stress relievers. I will likely bring my own printer or share one with a roommate.
My printer is a cheap inkjet printer, not a laser one </p>
<p>What is so good about laser printers? I know they finish print a page much faster than inkjets and are thus very effecient. but are they much more expensive?</p>
<p>i had one, and over winter break, i guess the ink froze or something and it no longer prints, but because was an all in one, i would just scan my friend's notes and other scanning stuff. I work in an office and my boss is usually really nice about faxing and printing papers and other materials as long as we don't abuse it. Just today I had to fax a contract for a summer job, and my boss was really cool about it. I wouldn't get a printer unless you were planning on printing a lot (more than the cost of the printer itself and the ink/toner). You can do netprint from your own computer so if you were to have a laptop/desktop, you can ask your computer to print to a certain printer closest to you, and just go pick it up. That not only makes it easier if you forgot your paper in your room or needed something printed but North Campus is too far, but just faster.</p>