Best Office Electronics for Beginners: Easy, Forgiving Picks

If you own one of the popular DeskJet 1255, 2700, 4100 or Envy 6000 and 6400 series printers, this two-pack covers everything in one purchase: one black cartridge and one tri-color cartridge. You don't need to figure out separate colors, since all three color inks live in a single cartridge.

Expect roughly 120 pages from the black and about 100 from the tri-color, which suits light home or school printing. It's the top seller in this list and very well liked by a large number of buyers, and it's eligible for HP's Instant Ink program if you'd rather have ink arrive automatically.

Laminating is about as beginner-friendly as office tasks get: slip the document into the pouch and feed it through your thermal laminator. These 9 x 11.5-inch sheets are built to work with all leading thermal laminators, and you can trim them for smaller items like recipe cards or photos.

Buyers describe them as super easy to use and crystal clear, with teachers especially fond of them for classroom reading and math centers. A 200-pack gives you plenty of room to practice. Some reviewers note occasional adhesion problems, and opinions on the 2.8 mil thickness vary between sturdy enough and on the thin side.

This combo pack is the match for ENVY Photo 6200, 7100 and 7800 models, the ENVY Inspire 7955e and 7958e, and HP Tango printers. Like the HP 67, it pairs one black cartridge with one tri-color, so swapping is straightforward.

Its yield is higher than the HP 67 at about 200 black pages and 165 tri-color pages. Customers praise the print quality, though feedback is mixed on value, and some report a color cartridge that didn't work, so test both soon after they arrive.

Made for the OfficeJet 8122e and OfficeJet Pro 8135e, 8138e and 8139e, this pack includes separate black, cyan, magenta and yellow cartridges. Separate colors mean you only replace the one that runs out rather than a whole tri-color unit.

Yields are the biggest here: about 500 pages black and 400 pages per color. That makes it a sensible pick for someone printing regularly for work or school, and it's very well liked by a large number of buyers.

Once you've used up your first HP 67 pack, this is the natural next step. The XL black cartridge fits the same DeskJet and Envy printers but is rated for about 240 pages, roughly double the standard black's 120.

Customers rate the print quality highly, though opinions differ on whether the higher yield is worth the cost. If you mostly print text like homework, forms or tickets, it means fewer changes.

Shredders can intimidate newcomers, but this one has safeguards built in. It shuts itself off after a 3-minute run to prevent overheating, has a reverse mode for clearing jams, and LED lights tell you when it's powered on, overheated or overloaded.

It takes up to 8 sheets at once, plus staples, small paper clips and plastic credit cards one at a time (not metal cards). The cross-cut P-4 rating means paper ends up in small pieces of roughly 0.2 x 0.7 inches. Reviewers mixed on size and noise, and several report it failing after about a month, so register any warranty right away.