RE: Which laser printer to buy?

barginboyrob

I am looking to buy a laser printer but i'm not really sure what to look for!

I kind of what one with a built in scanner but I think the most important thing is cost per page, how expensive the cartridge is and stuff,

Thanks for any help!

isofa

Probably best you read some comparative reviews first.

The HP OfficeJets are the lasers with built in scanners, but obviously there are other brands which combine the features, including Xerox etc.

Cost per page, certainly of B+W are very low with lasers, and not too bad with colour too, but toner cartridges are pricey usually £50-£75 per colour, but last for thousands of pages. There are other consumables like the drum, but these last for tens if not hundreds of thousands of pages, depending on the brand.

First what do you want to use it for?

Secondly why laser? (Colour inkjets produce better photographic images than lasers, lasers produce faster and crisper text/graphics)

Thirdly are you sure you want one with a built in scanner?

Finally, most lasers emit small amounts of Ozone gas whilst printing, so make sure it's in a ventilated area, the gas rapidly breaks down in a few seconds.

barginboyrob

I could do with just black and white actually, it's just annoying me how much I have to spend on cartridges,

Little_John

When compareing laser and inkjet remember that the toner cost is huge £50+ a cart but inkjet for original carts your looking about £20 each. remember the laser cart will give you 2000 pages the inkjet your looking to get about 200 or 250 pages. That is where the cost saveing is made.

I have a colour laserjet and takeing in to account toner and drum costs of the actuall figures I get not the HP figures are 2p per mono page and 8p per colour page the costs for the drum are minimal compared to the toner 2p per colour page or half a pence per mono.

Personally I would buy a scanner and seperate printer, most scanners have software to let you press a button and it sends the scna direct to the printer so you get the functionality of an all in one anyway.

I have used a few all in ones and some printers with scanners that are designed to work together as an all in one with fixing brackets to hold them together and they worked poorly especially a konica minolta one it was a nightmare.

SomeOne_2

Little_John wrote: »

When compareing laser and inkjet remember that the toner cost is huge £50+ a cart but inkjet for original carts your looking about £20 each. remember the laser cart will give you 2000 pages the inkjet your looking to get about 200 or 250 pages. That is where the cost saveing is made.

I have a colour laserjet and takeing in to account toner and drum costs of the actuall figures I get not the HP figures are 2p per mono page and 8p per colour page the costs for the drum are minimal compared to the toner 2p per colour page or half a pence per mono.

Personally I would buy a scanner and seperate printer, most scanners have software to let you press a button and it sends the scna direct to the printer so you get the functionality of an all in one anyway.

I have used a few all in ones and some printers with scanners that are designed to work together as an all in one with fixing brackets to hold them together and they worked poorly especially a konica minolta one it was a nightmare.

I'd be interested in hearing more about your experiences with your konica minolta printer scanner.
I have a Konica Minolta Magicolor 2300DL connected to an SC-215 scanner.
I've never had any problems using it as a photocopier, the only thing I dislike about it is that there is no power switch on the scanner.

That said, would I buy a combi again? It would have to be quite cheap for me to consider it as if one of the parts fails (i.e. printer or scanner) and needs replacing then the extra cost of combi printer scanner is not worth it.

To the original poster, since switching to laser from an inkjet i've never looked back.
Even if you don't use the printer much it still works out cheaper in the long run as you don't have ink drying issues with toner.

If you don't mind refilling the toner cartridges yourself (can potentially be very messy and hazardous) then it can work out cheaper still.

chunter

SomeOne wrote: »

Even if you don't use the printer much it still works out cheaper in the long run as you don't have ink drying issues with toner.

Very good point and one not mentioned much.
With an inkjet, cartridge will be done in 6 months whether you use it or not.
With laser, the toner can be used very infrequently and prints will still be fine, especially the basic black.

nickj_2

ebay has some laser printers for around £50 some new some factory refurb , if the cost of replacing toners is so high , just get a new printer ,

isofa

chunter wrote: »

Very good point and one not mentioned much.
With an inkjet, cartridge will be done in 6 months whether you use it or not.
With laser, the toner can be used very infrequently and prints will still be fine, especially the basic black.

I've got 2 cartridges in an HP Deskjet, which is only switched on about twice a week to do the odd print, 50% draft, 50% in high quality, the cartridges are over 18 months old, print is perfect still, they'll probably run out by Easter. Used to have problems with Epson printers drying out, but have never experienced it with an HP Deskjet and this is my third over the years.

Many lasers have to go through a calibration routine each time you switch them on, my main colour laser takes about 2-5 minutes to be up and running, depending on the routine required, my inkjet is ready to print in 5 seconds.

If you are printing several copies of the same document a laser will be much faster than an inkjet too. However if you get a four pass colour laser, they can be as slow as a fast inkjet printing in colour.

For heavy usage a laser is obviously the way to go, but if you are mostly printing photos, you'll always get better quality from an inkjet (unless you want to invest in dye-sub).

I always found in the ink from Epson inkjets to produce poor quality text, whereas the DeskJets I've used (mostly top end), are virtually as clear as a laser.

Others to look at are solid ink printers, like the "phasers" by Xerox, they work on a different principle, prints are very vivid and there is no waste at all the "ink" is in clean crayon blocks that are cheap and clean and easy to replace/top up, even when the printer is running.

Little_John

SomeOne wrote: »

I'd be interested in hearing more about your experiences with your konica minolta printer scanner.
I have a Konica Minolta Magicolor 2300DL connected to an SC-215 scanner.
I've never had any problems using it as a photocopier, the only thing I dislike about it is that there is no power switch on the scanner.

It was that same printer/scanner combo. I found the colours were poor especally printing red all blown out and seemd to "run" in to the surrounding colours just like early inkjets with 360 dpi print heads it just looked bad especialy when printing a photo.
The copying side of things was ok once the scanner would wake up it seemed to go to low power mode but wouldnt come back on without cycleying the power which as you said there is no power switch on it is unplug and reconnect. The scanner power problem just made it a PITA to use so it was scrapped. I really liked the idea that it was 2 seperates so if one failed it could be replaced but it just never worked out. It was on a lease so we contacted the company and they replaced it with a toshiba colour digital coppier not ideal as it is huge but it does work.

Jaxer

I just bought a Brother 7030 multi-function laser scanner/copier/printer. I had a look at a couple of HP and Canon models but the running costs/reviews didnt seem to be as good. It was pretty easy to set up and the print quality is good. Its around £100 (inc VAT) at Comet etc but if you google it, you'll see it around £70 from online shops - I got it for £67 delivered. http://www.trustedreviews.com/printers/review/2008/07/14/Brother-DCP-7030-Laser-MFP/p2