If there's one truth about every printer I've ever owned, it's that I've dreamed of pulling an Initech: Taking each one into an empty field somewhere and beating it into pieces with a baseball bat. If you don't identify with this sentiment, chances are you've never owned a low-end consumer inkjet printer. I've had several over the years (I won't name and shame the specific brands), and end up stuck in the same unpleasant cycle every time.

First, I'm lured in by a low starting price, usually under $80 or so, but the setup is a pain, the printer only sees my laptop over Wi-Fi when it's in the mood, and output ranges from fine to spotty, with colors and tones all over the place. Of course, the ink runs out shockingly soon, and sometimes my expensive replacement inkjet cartridges aren't recognized or fail to initialize properly. Take too many trips down that troubleshooting rabbit hole and you'll be ready to go back to legal pads and No. 2 pencils.

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If any of the above sounds familiar, you'll understand why I set out to find a half-decent printer that didn't cost too much, was easy to use, and -- most importantly -- actually worked at least most of the time. My biggest benchmark was this: I'd consider it a success if I didn't want to throw the printer out of a window after a week.

I consulted some of my CNET colleagues who have faced similar frustrations, looked up different models with widely varying lists of features, and searched for reports of problems from purchasers. The price, both upfront and ongoing, was also a major factor.

Eventually, I landed on the Brother HL-L2395DW. It has almost 2,000 customer reviews on Amazon, nearly all positive, and it's a favorite over at Gizmodo, too. It's a monochrome laser printer that includes a scanner (printer people call this a "multifunction" printer), and it's the sequel to the Brother HL2380DW, which has been employed in the CNET Labs for months, faithfully printing shipping labels without skipping a beat.   

But here's the key part: While the official price is $169, it's on sale on Amazon at least once per quarter for $99, or AU$199 in Australia. Wait for it to go on sale and you'll feel like it's $99 well spent (it's semi discounted right now, at $129 on Amazon). Brother doesn't offer this exact printer in the UK, but comparable models start at £142.

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It's important to note that I didn't set up and formally test multiple similar products, like we do for reviews of laptops, TVs, phones and so on. Instead, this was a personal quest where I picked the model that looked like it had the best reputation from consumers at the price I was looking for. There are other laser printers that can get down to around $99 during sales, and many of them are probably just as good, so don't @ me with your favorite. (Actually, please do.)

Setup of the HL-L2395DW was easy, and the only assembly required was pulling off several strips of tape holding all the doors and panels closed, and inserting the drum-plus-toner package. The hardest part was the thin instruction sheet with less-than-detailed illustrations, but I was able to intuit the correct way to insert the toner. Brother says the "starter" black toner that comes with the system should be good for 700 printed pages, and a 1,200-page replacement costs $44 from Amazon.

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Wi-Fi setup was also painless, but it helped that there were relatively few options on the on-screen menu. The small color touchscreen was responsive enough that I was able to tap in my Wi-Fi password on the first attempt.

A bigger time sink was setting up to print via Google Cloud Print, a system I've always found to be inscrutable. Simply adding a networked local printer via Windows 10 or MacOS is also not the one-button task it should be, but I got that sorted out after a few minutes as well.