My name is Justin, I’m a South African writer and entrepreneur who recently ordered Print Peak’s handheld inkjet printer online and wanted to share my experience.
In Search of a Handheld Printer
I love reading books, but I loathe lending them out. I own a lodge just outside of Cape Town and we encourage our guests to read our books in the lounge (or in bed, or by the fire) after a day spent hiking or exploring our river and surrounds. What often ends up happening is that guests get so engrossed in our books that they pop them in their luggage when they leave and forget to return them!
So I was looking for a way to label my books as my own without getting carpal tunnel syndrome from scribbling my name on the inside cover of hundreds of books! I also have a modest kombucha business with my wife and we are often getting confused about which batch is the most recent.
Often we’ll hear an explosion coming from our kitchen that sounds like gunfire and it’s the fizzy kombucha bottles that we left fermenting in the corner for too long, just letting us know that they’ve past their sell-by date by exploding all over the kitchen floor!
I knew that some kind of handheld printing device must exist… I just didn’t know what it was, or where to look. Duh, the internet. With some luck, I came across Print Peak and reached out to them about their handheld inkjet printer as a solution to my 'lending-my-books-out' woes.
And then I got to thinking that I could print expiry dates on my kombucha bottles. And perhaps even label some of my boxes in storage. Seasonal stuff like heaters and blankets and the Xmas tree decorations that my wife and I end up boxing up in the New Year and then forget about until the day before Xmas Eve when it’s time to whip out the Xmas tree, decorate the hell out of it, and forget all the year’s troubles. Who can relate?
For $140 I thought it was worth taking a risk on the product as I’ve grown tired of trying to size multiple documents on my basic Hewlett Packard printer. I thought to myself, hey, if this works, the whole family could score from the deal!
The Arrival of My Handheld Inkjet Printer
I placed my order and in under a week I got a text message from the South African Postal Service telling me that I had a package waiting for me. In a country where our postal system has practically collapsed, I was pleasantly surprised. Print Peak had given me a tracking number and all was in order when I went to collect my parcel.
The printer reminded me of a box tape gun. I used to own a clothing business making and selling T shirts, and the box tape gun was one of my favourite and most regularly used possessions. How I wish I still had my clothing business to be able to label my purchase order boxes!
Anyway, it weighs about the same as a box tape gun, but it has a super smart LCD screen and it’s obviously not nearly as rudimentary.
The handle that you grip is sturdy and the balance is evenly weighted. This is important because effectively what you have to do – when you end up inputting your text or logo – is swiping the device along the surface that you are printing on. Allow me to explain…
The Features of My Handheld Inkjet Printer
There are small rubber ‘rollers’ on either side of the ink cartridge that allow you to swipe, or scroll across the surface. Picture those rollers that help shoot your paper out of a ‘normal’ desktop printer and you’re on the right track of what they look like.
As for the ink cartridge itself, if you’ve ever removed an ink cartridge from a printer and rubbed your finger over the surface where you suspect the ink comes out (and probably gotten ink all over yourself), then you’ve also got an idea of what the contact point looks like, i.e. where your handheld printer makes contact with the surface. ‘Where the rubber meets the road’ as they say in motoring jargon.
There’s a clearly defined space for you to type your message – be it FRAGILE, XMAS DECORATIONS, or EXPIRES 12/24 – and you can even whack in a USB drive that supports .png files if you’re wanting to get creative and add a logo or graphic element.
There’s a red button for on/off and there’s a separate red button that acts like a trigger for when you are ready to start printing. The handheld inkjet printer beeps when it’s supposed to (basically to tell you when to start printing) and it leaves you alone otherwise.
For those technophobes out there, or at least folk like me who are averse to white noise and your device trying to have a conversation with you all day long (yes, I know I left my coffee in the microwave!) this is a big win. The device is very easy to use and there’s also a very practical YouTube video that is only five minutes long and explains everything you need to know.
Handheld Printing: What’s Next?
This really is a great toy that is undoubtedly going to be a useful tool for me in my life going forward. I say ‘toy’ because myself, my wife, and the kids have all had so much fun playing with it so far! It can be used for art projects and organizing, so it’s got this wonderful balance of being practical and also filled with possibilities!
The ink quality is great and it comes out in a very consistent ‘flow’. There’s no residue on the paper to speak of, and it takes up so little space that we could just pack it up when we were done. This is a product that I would HIGHLY RECOMMEND for the modern family. Or even if you’re just someone like me who wants to label their books as ‘MINE!’
