With laptops becoming more and more invaluable to the average working Joe, portable printers for laptops are also rising in value for many kinds of jobs. But the portability of compact printers for laptops comes at a not insignificant cost, and getting a printer that doesn’t meet your needs could be a waste of hundreds of dollars. A little looking into on the basic pros and cons of the various major types of portable laptop printers is necessary if you want to get the most out of your money, and really empower yourself to work more efficiently wherever you happen to be.

A portable laptop printer can come in two different major varieties. The first possible type is the wireless model, and the second is simply a very scaled-down version of an ordinary printer, that is connected to your laptop like any other printer would be. Ironically, the more convenient wireless versions, which do not require connecting physically to a computer to print, are actually less expensive than the other kind. However, if your laptop doesn’t have a wireless router and ethernet port, you’ll be stuck throwing down more green for the expensive models. It’s a sad necessity of the technology, as collapsing printers into portable structures is not yet the easiest thing in the world.

Let’s say you do a simple search for ‘portable printer for laptop’ in your favorite search engine. You’ll most likely be bombarded by model prices with differences of hundreds of dollars between individual types! The cheapest models tend to be the most narrowly specialized, which is why it pays to figure out exactly what you need to print on a regular basis before you go out and buy a portable printer. Some portable computer printers will only print photos, for instance, and they occupy the cheap end of the spectrum. By way of contrast, portable printers capable of printing anything a non-portable unit would handle will range four hundred or more dollars, easily. Further increases in portability can also be had for a higher price tag, as there are even models to fit inside a large pocket or a purse. However, these extra tiny models tend to be able to print like the cheaper printers rather than equal to their similarly-priced bulkier kin…

That’s the price you pay, quite literally, for portability. There are also middle-ranged units with the ability to print large objects, but only in gray scale. There are other limitations and benefits that vary with each particular brand and model. So, as you can see, no one product can do it all, but every kind of portable printer out there has a niche. You just have to figure out what your niche is before you buy, so you won’t regret the purchase!