I went for years with just a printer when running the Reign of Winter AP in the Pathfinder era before getting the 4e Monster Vault tokens.
I would get an image of the expected monsters/NPCs off of google searches, copy them onto a word file to fit in a 1" square and have multiple images on on one page, then cut them out to use at the table. They are 2d, lay flat, and black and white but good images of the right size, cheap, easy, and disposable. Usually 1 printout page per weekly game.
It allowed a lot of great custom images for my campaign that I would not have gotten from minis or commercial counters. American Indian centaurs of different varieties. Heat miser images for fey Summer Court agents. Etc.
I thought they looked great and they were very evocative and immersive for me and my players. They each had a mini which made instant differentiation between the PCs and NPCs/monsters easy on the mat.