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inkjet is one of the most popular printing technologies today. The relative low cost of the printers and multi-purpose printing abilities make it a good choice for small businesses and home offices.
Inkjets use quick-drying, water-based inks and a printhead with a series of small nozzles that spray ink on the surface of the paper. The printhead assembly is driven by a belt-fed motor that moves the print head across the paper.
Inkjets were originally manufactured to print in monochrome (black and white) only. However, the printhead has since been expanded and the nozzles increased to accommodate cyan, magenta, and yellow. This combination of colors (called CMYK) allows for printing images with nearly the same quality as a photo development lab using certain types of coated paper. When coupled with crisp and highly readable text print quality, inkjet printers are a sound all-in-one choice for monochrome or color printing needs.
Inkjet printers tend to be low-cost and scale slightly upward based on print quality, extra features, and abilities to print on larger formats than the standard legal or letter paper sizes. While the one-time cost of purchasing an inkjet is lower than other printer types, there is the factor of inkjet consumables that must be considered. Because demand for inkjets is large and spans the computing spectrum from home to enterprise, the procurement of consumables can be costly. Note that with most CMYK inkjet printers, separate ink cartridges for each color must be purchased, although some use one cartridge for CMY and another cartridge for K (black).
Some inkjet manufacturers also require you to use specially treated paper for printing high-quality images and documents. Such paper uses a moderate to high gloss coating formulated to absorb colored inks, which prevents clumping (the tendency for water-based inks to collect in certain areas where colors blend, causing muddiness or dried ink blots) or banding (where the print output has striped pattern's of extraneous lines on the printed page. Consult the printer manufacturer manual about recommended papers.