Zebra ZT231 (Zebra ZT230 Replacement) | Thermal Transfer & Direct Thermal 203 DPI | ZT23142-T01000FZ | USB, Serial, Ethernet, Bluetooth Connectivity, Tear Bar

These are great printers. I have two in my warehouse. They hold up well in a dusty warehouse. Spit out thousands of labels a year. Still going strong

Great product overall, but had to step up to 300 dpi based on our business needs

I've recently gotten back into selling things online, and was previously just using my HP inkjet printer to print labels. Having a nice label printer, however, changes the game dramatically, and, although this Zebra is by far and large a bit overkill for my uses, it's a beast and basically a dream in every way.Zebra has been making thermal printers for ages. I've been in e-commerce for decades, and the shipping departments have always had Zebra printers. They do a great job, and the ZT231 is no different. It is large, but that is to be expected. The overall setup is pretty easy too. Download the driver from their website, install, and you're pretty much in business. I've been using ShipStation via PayPal, eBay labels, and more and this thing has powered through them without issue. I do also like the bluetooth functionality, enabling me to even print to it from my iPhone, which has been pretty slick.The best feature for me, though, is just the time savings it provides by being able to utilize a stack/roll of thermal 4x6 labels. Simply insert them in the back, they feed through, and are easy to break off on the front. While this process is pretty standard with any thermal printer, it's a huge upgrade from inkjet printing as I had been doing. It's great for me to just have it all set, I print to it, and it spits out a nice 4x6 shipping label that I can peel off and apply to my box.It's very well built, which is to be expected for the price point. I see this thing lasting me a good long time.

If you’re serious about printing labels – like for a business, for instance – then this is the machine for you. It’s high-quality, from a great brand, fast, consistent, and professional. It’s reasonably easy to set up, but you do need to read the instructions to understand how to get everything running smoothly. This unit is quite a bit larger than I thought it was, but given how top-notch it is, I can forgive the somewhat larger footprint!

The media could not be loaded. Setup was super easy but you "must" install the printer driver before connecting your printer to your PC or laptop. You can get the driver from the Zebra Website. They have an easy to use support site with a search feature, just put in ZT 231 driver in the search field and its the first item to come up. When you are installing the driver you are also give the option to download the Zebra label printing software, its free and very easy to use. There is also an option to set the ZT 231 as your default printer which I did.As a side note, it was supposed to include the Jetset. I'm not sure what that is, maybe its preloaded on the printer. There were no disks included with the printer or any information on how to download Jetset. I didn't need it because I print my labels from Adobe and barcodes from Excel.Installing the labels/paper and ribbon is very easy, but I would watch the support video first that can easily be found online. The ribbon is not included but they are available on Amazon, and in multiple colors.To me the best feature of the printer is you can use box labels or labels that come on rolls. For the boxed labels there's an opening on the back of the printer that allows you to feed them in. Verses the rolls that are placed in the interior of the printer by lifting the side panel.Printing both with the ribbon and without is flawless. You don't have to lift the cover up, but I like to watch the inner workings of the printer. (big time geek alert). Where I ran into a bit of an issue was when I tried to print from Adobe Acrobat. I got an error message from the Zebra Printer software that basically said: You have chosen to use a format that requires thermal direct, please remove the ribbon before you continue. No big deal, so I removed the ribbon but that didn't clear the message. I tried everything including ending the print que in the task manager, rebooting, even powering down and restarting both my pc and the printer. I went back to the Zebra support site and sure enough they have an easy fix that basically deleted my print que which cleared the issue. I did have to go back into my printer options and re-select the ZT231 as my printer.Bottom line is you have to confirm you have the correct option selected (Thermal Transfer (using the ribbon) or Thermal Direct without a ribbon) set under printer properties and then print options.I have quickly fallen in love with this printer. It is super fast, easy to setup and use right out of the box.