Question Seeking recommendation - borderless printing & varying paper sizes

[FrGuidoSarducci]

Hi,
I'm looking for a color printer that can give me borderless printing amongst different paper sizes. Sometimes I'm printing a postcard (5x7/4x6), sometimes it's a greeting card and sometimes it's a flier or mini poster on 8 1/2 x 11. I currently have a Canon TR8520 that allows these two options, but not at the same time. If I select borderless printing, I cannot use a custom paper size and must select from a limited set of options. I'm hoping to keep my cost below $350.

 

[Ralston18]

This:

" I currently have a Canon TR8520 that allows these two options, but not at the same time."

My underline...

Unless the printer has multiple paper trays it may be difficult to meet the requirement.

Most printing apps and/or printers allow the end user to simply select the desired paper size being printed to or select the paper tray holding the paper.

The printer must be provided the necessary configuration settings for colors, fonts, borders, paper size, etc.

You may be able to set the default configuration to whatever print mode you use most and then change the configuration as applicable to other documents. Perhaps part of some "print job" configuration.

If the printer can do two things at the same time - that would be good.

However, the printer still needs to be told (configured) which thing to do at any given time.

Which paper tray to use as a starting point with respect to the print job.

Just my thoughts on the matter.

 

[FrGuidoSarducci]

"Unless the printer has multiple paper trays it may be difficult to meet the requirement."

Instead of using the paper trays, I am using the sheet feeder, which has physical guides that allow me to use different paper sizes.

"Most printing apps and/or printers allow the end user to simply select the desired paper size being printed to or select the paper tray holding the paper."

I don't know if this is applicable to all printers, but my Canon allows me to select a "custom" size paper width. Unfortunately, when I choose borderless printing, the "custom" option is no longer available. I'm looking for a printer that 1. allows borderless printing AND 2. allows for customized paper widths AND 3. has a sheet feeder instead of a paper tray.

"Just my thoughts on the matter."

...and they are greatly appreciated.

 

[Paperdoc]

It would be VERY difficult to set up a printer to print ink JUST to the EDGES of a specified sheet size. From your post it seems that printer CAN do that for a very few sheet sizes. NOTE that this ALSO means the feeding of the sheet from the tray MUST be extremely precise so the edges are exactly where they are supposed to be.

There are two alternatives to this:
1. The common commercial printing technique is to use a sheet that is slightly too big and print your image in the desired size. Then you simply trim off the excess paper around it. In fact, for commercial printing that would be trimming hundreds of printed sheets in a stack, the image is printed slightly too large with non-essential detail at the edges. Then the trimming actually removes all the white edges PLUS a tiny sliver of inked image at each edge. This can be done for ANY image size up to the limits of your paper handling system.
2. I have an Epson printer that does this differently, but that is because it is ONLY for printing 4" x 6" photos. It has small sponges positioned under the edges of the paper travel path, so the ink jets head actually "prints" slightly beyond the edges and that ink is trapped in the sponge. Obviously the design works only with one paper size. If you tried to adapt that to many sizes, you would end up with paper moving over already-inked "dirty" sponges and getting really messy. This MAY be the strategy of the printer you have, but limited to only a few paper sizes.