Please help - Printers??

tra300

I am not sure that this is the right place for this post - but here it goes...
We are looking to a reasonably priced printer that is only for black & white printing. We have a quality photo printer that we use mostly but are using it increasingly for printing letters, colouring in pictures etc. This is getting more & more expensive especially running costs (ie. cartridges etc). So the new printer needs to be -

1. Reasonable purchase & running costs
2. Relatively realizable
3. Reasonable print quality
4. Preferably on the small side as we have limited space

Please help...

Thanks

Red_Rose_Exile

If you are using it primarily for text etc, then I would really recommend a B&W laser printer, such as this Samsung ML2010R from Ebuyer for £45.00 + P&P or from Play.com at £49.99 delivered

The toner cartridges don't appear to be cheap on the face of it at £23.50 + £3.95 P&P from here for a re-gen cartridge, but as you get a 3,000 page yield, that works out about 0.9 pence per sheet, and to be fair the cartridge that comes with the printer should last quite a while anyway

dkpoole

Great advice
Laser is the way to go
I bought a Kyocera laser on Ebay for £20 including delivery
Ex office machine with low page count & enough toner left for 2000 pages
Kyocera printers only need replacement toner & not drums which are very expensive

tra300

Thanks All

I didn't realise that laser printers were available so reasonably... Thought that they would be the best part of £100+

Cheers again

pennymakespounds

tra300

i'll add another recommendation for laser printer .... i use an hp 1200 , i think replaced now by the hp 1018? .. again not very expensive .. c £50 ? not sure .

i'd also say .. do check the various good sights for replacement laser cartridges ..compatible... prices vary dramatically .. sometimes fill level differs.

also suggest .. i think most you can change the settings on the printer .. and use "draft" .. uses a lot less ink ... i always use and have no problem with quality.
My print costs miles below 1p a page.

petertwisty

11-05-2005, 5:09 PM #12
TEssery
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Beware - cheap lasers can cost you more!
First I must declare an interest - I work for a laser printer manufacturer, Kyocera. We use a totally different technology to all other laser printer manufacturers, whereby the drum and developer are permanent components so all that has to be replaced regularly is the toner, which significantly reduces running costs. Our technology is 13 years old and I've been here for 12 years, so I've made a long-term study of the comparative costs of running laser printers and the strategies of our competitors.

The reason that laser printers have become so cheap is that most manufacturers loss-lead with the printer to obtain new customers for their more profitable cartridges. An example of how one manufacturer, HP, uses revenue and profit from supplies (cartridges) to prop up less profitable divisions can be found at the end of this post. However, this strategy falls down if the customer then buys "look-alike" cartridges, so many manufacturers are introducing "killer chips" which mean that compatible cartridges just won't work, or will invalidate your warranty if you haven't used original manufacturer supplies. You need to be aware of this before you buy. Plus, the quality of "look-alike" cartridges is highly variable - some are very good, but others contain much less toner or ink than the original brand or have other quality issues. It's therefore wise to choose a supplier based on personal recommendation and not necessarily to go for the cheapest "look-alike" around.

My top tips for economical printing are:

Before you buy, work out how much you are likely to print and calculate the total cost including both buying and running the device over its lifetime. You can discount things like electricity and paper as they won't vary significantly, but include the cost of the printer itself, all consumables (some models require separate drum replacements at relatively short intervals which won't necessarily by widely publicised) and any extended warranty contract you may want.

Be very wary about buying an extended warranty contract or support pack if you intend to buy "look-alike" cartridges, as it will almost certainly be invalid.

If you expect to print more than 50 or so pages per month, it is almost always more economical to buy a laser printer rather than an inkjet. Inkjets, especially those with more than four coloured inks, are great for printing your digital photos and the odd letter, but cost several times as much to run as lasers and are generally much slower.

If you are buying for a business (even a small one) bear in mind that print volumes are generally increasing, so be careful to buy a printer which has spare capacity in terms of its maximum monthly print volume and which offers the potential to expand in future with network connection, extra paper cassettes etc.

For business use, consider printers which can print double-sided automatically, it can save you a fortune in paper and postage costs.

Apologies for the long post, but as I say this is what I do for a living! Here's the link to the HP article:

http://www.businessweekasia.com/tech...7221_tc024.htm