Kodak ESP 5250 All-in-One Printer

I purchased this printer in February 2010 and have used it regularly for about a year. I replaced a Canon Pixma two-sided printer which did a WONDERFUL job of printing high quality photos and documents, but I was being robbed blind by Kodak due to their high ink costs and the fact that the cartridges seemed to last a matter of weeks. I bought this Kodak printer specifically to test Kodak's theory of lowering ink costs.Kodak is telling the truth. This printer will dramatically lower your ink costs.My household includes a wife and two small children, and most of our printing needs consist primarily of:-day to day document printing (quality not really an issue)-kids printing pictures from the internet (heavy ink usage, cheap paper)-occasional photos on glossy kodak paper (perhaps 2 or 3 pics a month)I view this sort of printing as "real" printing, which I bet most families do. For this sort of situation this printer is IDEAL. In the year that I have had this printer, I have replaced the color cartridge once, and the B&W twice. That's at least a third the ink usage of the canon, as well as a fraction of the cost for ink.The quality of the printing is perfectly fine, I have no complaints. Day-to-day printing is flawless. Printing on photo glossy paper is excellent, I would say slightly lower quality than the Canon, but reasonable. I don't print much in the way of archival photos, but if I do I tent to send them to a service for printing.This printer also has a fully functional scanner, which also works quite well. It includes a feature to automatically detect multiple photos placed on the scanner tray. Additionally, being a wireless printer, I can scan or print from any computer in the house.Here are my minor gripes, none of which should stop you from purchasing:1. The power cord is a laptop-style cord with a brick in the middle. The connector end that attaches to the printer is very loose and poorly fitting, and if you move the printer it will likely disconnect on you. I actually contacted Kodak thinking this was a manufacturing problem with this unit. They sent me a new cord but it has the same issue. If it's a manufacturing issue it is with the connector on the printer itself.2. The wireless connection configuration works fine, but it's not obvious that it's case sensitive, and it took me some trial and error and frustration before I realized there was a caps lock button.If you're frustrated by ink costs, get this printer and you will not be sorry.

Last year, my old Canon printer died on me. It was very reliable, and overall, I was pretty satisfied with it. Ink was a bit expensive, but that's to be expected. I bought this one mostly because of its ability to print wirelessly from my laptop and desktop computers and also because of the marketing scheme that some jerkwad came up with about the ink being less expensive. One thing that I liked about my old printer that I don't have about this one was that the color cartridges are all separate. With all kodak printers, the color cartridge is one huge cartridge with subcartridges inside of it. This means that if you're out of blue ink, but you're completely full with the other colors, then you are forced to waste those other colors. There is no way to get around doing that, and it turns out that because of this issue, I have to replace my color ink cartridge almost once a week. That REALLY adds up. If you ask me, this whole ink cost marketing scheme is just to draw in customers who will believe what anyone tells them. Don't believe it. If I wasn't too lazy, I would find all of my receipts from the first year I had my kodak printer and one of the years I had my canon. I'm sure the Kodak ink would sum up to a number at least 10 times as big as the Canon total.

I originally purchased this printer as a replacement for a Lexmark all in one that didn't have wireless capabilities. Scanning, wireless, and cheap ink were at the top of my priority list.Printing Quality:This is not a super photo quality printer, it is a printer more suited for documents and invitations and such. That being said, the photos don't come out horrible, but this is not what you need if you are looking for photo quality super fine prints.Wireless Capability:The setup for wireless is quite simple if you are just a little bit technical savy. The connection never seems to drop out, and I am a good distance from the wireless G router in my house. It is capable of using WPA2 as that is what we run at our house. Not much more to say, the wireless works, and it works well.Scanning:Excellent scanning capability. You do need the software installed to initiate a scan to your computer, but the software is low key and not too annoying like some printer software.Ink Price and Life:Hello.. at the time I bought this, it was the cheapest ink on the market. I do not know if the title still stands, but not only is it cheap for printer ink, it last a good bit of time. I printed 150 4 paged programs on 2 black ink cartridges.**You DO need color ink in order to print black and white. This is unfortunately a common thing among many printers, so I just bought the combo color and black and white ink cartridges when I purchased the printer.Overall:Packaging was simple and not overstated, printer seems to work wonderfully, no complaints after 4 months of use. This is a good deal for a printer at the current price, and I'm sure the price will go down as newer printers come out. If you are looking to print documents, small photos, scan, and need it all done over wireless, then this is a great option for you.

"Ease of Use?" Am having a problem with the WiFi in that the printer seems to go into a "sleep" mode where it can't be awakened with a print command from a computer but only by tapping the on/off button. Often, even then, it doesn't recognize the print command which necessitates a re-boot of the printer. Have read nothing in the initial set-up material that suggests that using both a Mac OS and a Windows 7 should cause such a problem but it occurs with both."Ink Consumption" Seems the black ink cartridge emptied awfully fast. But, since it was the one that came with the new printer, I'm willing to bet that it was a smaller-than-normal size. Have just purchased a new cartridge and hope it will last longer. Was pleased with the low cost of the new cartridge, though!