MidnightShadow
Night Ninja
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This should help: Page Yield - Inkjet & LaserJet Printer Yields | HP® Official Site
Which printer do you suggest?
- Thread starter aimo3
- Start date
@ Midnight
Thanks for the useful link.
I did a comparison between HP Colour LaserJet M476 and HP Officejet Pro X476dw, and their cartridges. My findings show that a page by the ink jet printer costs a good deal less than a page by its counterpart laser jet.
WRT Xerox, the price is 2 high. Some people say it's more robust like Japanese cars in comparison to Chinese, while some people say it's overpriced. I don't know the truth.
Thanks for the useful link.
I did a comparison between HP Colour LaserJet M476 and HP Officejet Pro X476dw, and their cartridges. My findings show that a page by the ink jet printer costs a good deal less than a page by its counterpart laser jet.
WRT Xerox, the price is 2 high. Some people say it's more robust like Japanese cars in comparison to Chinese, while some people say it's overpriced. I don't know the truth.
I bought an Epson WorkForce845 over 2 yeas ago. I nicked named it "Timex"' I used to move around a lot for a company managing hotel properties. It went with me each time.
It's rugged. I still have it and it's coming up on 3 years old. Works great.
When shopping for a printer other than the pages per cart you should be looking at MTBF. You want a printer that can stand up to printing day after day after day. Sure pages per cart is important. But with the cost of an good printer being up there, you want a long time investment. If you buy cheap, you get cheap. You wind up having to replace the printer itself as often as you do carts. That doesn't work for me. I want a long term machine that chugs along and all I do is load paper in it and replace carts when I run them dry.
The WF845 does everything except tuck me in at night. It's been reliable and the pages per ink cart isn't all that bad. I'm sure it's out of production but if its replacement keeps up the tradition of being a solid bang for the buck, then it merits a look.
It's rugged. I still have it and it's coming up on 3 years old. Works great.
When shopping for a printer other than the pages per cart you should be looking at MTBF. You want a printer that can stand up to printing day after day after day. Sure pages per cart is important. But with the cost of an good printer being up there, you want a long time investment. If you buy cheap, you get cheap. You wind up having to replace the printer itself as often as you do carts. That doesn't work for me. I want a long term machine that chugs along and all I do is load paper in it and replace carts when I run them dry.
The WF845 does everything except tuck me in at night. It's been reliable and the pages per ink cart isn't all that bad. I'm sure it's out of production but if its replacement keeps up the tradition of being a solid bang for the buck, then it merits a look.
I've just bought a Xerox Workcenter 6025, (colour laser printer copier scanner combo.)
I did a pretty "detailed" analysis of what my requirements were, what I wanted and what I'd put up with.
To find the cost per page, you must decide how many pages you want to average over, and include that in the costs, most printers come with half sized (standard) cartridge/toner as new. In the case of that HP printer, (which I didn't even look at) the cost per page is roughly the same as the cheapest multifunction laser printer I found.
Cost of unit, sure that HP printer linked can do a cheap cost per page.
but at £320 for the printer, and £60 per cartridge, (sure that's 9000 black pages and 6000 colour) but at £200 a time to replace all four I'd expect nothing less! (if you buy regular capacity its £30 for 3000 pages) (which is the same as my laser printer)
whilst my work centre only get 1500 colour pages and 3000 black, I can replace a whole set of them for £55, so price per page is the same. and the printer only cost £130 (~£200 less!)
For the first 10,500 pages (starter + 1 replacement) the HP costs
£320 (printer cost includes~1500 capacity cartridge) + £60 (9000 page XL cartridge) (£380 (3.6 pence per page ink cost)
Xerox cost £120 (+1500 black) + 3X replacement cartridges (£30) is £210 for 10500 pages (2 pence per page) just over half the cost. (certainly not double the cost that HP claim!)
Sure, if you print 4200 pages a month for 1 year (50400 pages) (the absolute maximum of this printer)
then you'll break even eventually. (looking at slightly less than that.)
£320 (1500) +5 * £60 (45,000) (46,500 sheets) (total cost £320 + £300 = £620 (1.29) pence per page)
120 (1500) + 15 * £30 (3000) (46,500 sheets) (total cost £120 + 450) = £570 (1.22 pence per page) (so the cheapest multifunction colour laser printer is still beating the HP by £50 and an extra ream of paper. (after a year printing flat out!) - colour of the small laser is a bit more expensive, but this post is already getting long!
Of course, most people will never in their lifetime print through 93 reams of paper!
so really whilst the HP inkjet is certainly getting towards what lasers can offer, it's not there yet... (damned impressive though...)
(note that in the spreadsheet I made I only compared 4000 pages, as I'd not expect to exceed that in my lifetime. - because I rarely print anything!)
(that's comparing HP to Xerox) feature wise they are almost the same, with wifi scanners 1200x1200 resolution etc)
The biggest thing that pushed me towards laser over inkjet was the cost of ink with my printing patterns, which is usually I never want to print anything unless I want to print something right now, but the ink is all dried up,
So whilst my old inkjet used to have £15 cartridges that said they lasted 300 pages, since I wasn't printing all the time it was more like a £15 cartridge that lasted 20 pages/cleaning cycles. or less.
Then, (on top of that) there is the added benefit that the ink won't run if my page gets wet!
At an average print "duty" of about 10 - 20 pages a year (most) I'll still be on the original toner when I die! but I'll have had to buy an ink cartridge (or four with all the colours) every year (or more).
The initial investment of laserjet, over inkjet if you're at the cheap of of the market is huge, (you can pick up a cheap inkjet multifunction for £20, multifunction lasers start at £120. once you start to get to the more industrial sized devices they begin to level out.
just remember that HP is an ink company with a sideline selling printers!
I did a pretty "detailed" analysis of what my requirements were, what I wanted and what I'd put up with.
To find the cost per page, you must decide how many pages you want to average over, and include that in the costs, most printers come with half sized (standard) cartridge/toner as new. In the case of that HP printer, (which I didn't even look at) the cost per page is roughly the same as the cheapest multifunction laser printer I found.
Cost of unit, sure that HP printer linked can do a cheap cost per page.
but at £320 for the printer, and £60 per cartridge, (sure that's 9000 black pages and 6000 colour) but at £200 a time to replace all four I'd expect nothing less! (if you buy regular capacity its £30 for 3000 pages) (which is the same as my laser printer)
whilst my work centre only get 1500 colour pages and 3000 black, I can replace a whole set of them for £55, so price per page is the same. and the printer only cost £130 (~£200 less!)
For the first 10,500 pages (starter + 1 replacement) the HP costs
£320 (printer cost includes~1500 capacity cartridge) + £60 (9000 page XL cartridge) (£380 (3.6 pence per page ink cost)
Xerox cost £120 (+1500 black) + 3X replacement cartridges (£30) is £210 for 10500 pages (2 pence per page) just over half the cost. (certainly not double the cost that HP claim!)
Sure, if you print 4200 pages a month for 1 year (50400 pages) (the absolute maximum of this printer)
then you'll break even eventually. (looking at slightly less than that.)
£320 (1500) +5 * £60 (45,000) (46,500 sheets) (total cost £320 + £300 = £620 (1.29) pence per page)
120 (1500) + 15 * £30 (3000) (46,500 sheets) (total cost £120 + 450) = £570 (1.22 pence per page) (so the cheapest multifunction colour laser printer is still beating the HP by £50 and an extra ream of paper. (after a year printing flat out!) - colour of the small laser is a bit more expensive, but this post is already getting long!
Of course, most people will never in their lifetime print through 93 reams of paper!
so really whilst the HP inkjet is certainly getting towards what lasers can offer, it's not there yet... (damned impressive though...)
(note that in the spreadsheet I made I only compared 4000 pages, as I'd not expect to exceed that in my lifetime. - because I rarely print anything!)
(that's comparing HP to Xerox) feature wise they are almost the same, with wifi scanners 1200x1200 resolution etc)
The biggest thing that pushed me towards laser over inkjet was the cost of ink with my printing patterns, which is usually I never want to print anything unless I want to print something right now, but the ink is all dried up,
So whilst my old inkjet used to have £15 cartridges that said they lasted 300 pages, since I wasn't printing all the time it was more like a £15 cartridge that lasted 20 pages/cleaning cycles. or less.
Then, (on top of that) there is the added benefit that the ink won't run if my page gets wet!
At an average print "duty" of about 10 - 20 pages a year (most) I'll still be on the original toner when I die! but I'll have had to buy an ink cartridge (or four with all the colours) every year (or more).
The initial investment of laserjet, over inkjet if you're at the cheap of of the market is huge, (you can pick up a cheap inkjet multifunction for £20, multifunction lasers start at £120. once you start to get to the more industrial sized devices they begin to level out.
just remember that HP is an ink company with a sideline selling printers!
MidnightShadow
Night Ninja
- Messages
- 818
- Location
- USA
If it's a business, they could go through 93 reams of paper each month. That's where durability comes in. HP, Ricoh, and Xerox are pretty popular around my area because of their durability.
Which are both huge advantages of toner over ink.
Let's keep in mind that you could technically say that about ALL of the printer companies. In fact, many of them offer a "rental" of the machine and charge you based on usage. The perk there is that the maintenance of the machine (toner and breakdowns) are taken care of by the company. The downside is it can be expensive if you don't use it much or if you use it too much. All companies are in it to make money.
If you want to cut out all of the hunting for a good printer I can offer a suggestion. Go to a large very busy hotel and ask them what printer is behind the front desk and what printer is in the back office. Hotels are major users of printers and want long term reliability with low operating costs. Explain what you're doing to the manager otherwise they'll think you're nuts.
You can tech talk all day long. Just ask around what people use. You can do better on real world feedback.
You can tech talk all day long. Just ask around what people use. You can do better on real world feedback.
Very unique answer! I like it
I have my way to find out about front desk printer and appear genuine at the same time. But I already know that HP Colour LaserJet M476 does the job.
However while my boss has suspended his plan for the time being, I am taking my time and researching about different advantages and disadvantages. I now know more about printers than I ever did before. Everyone was saying that ink cartridge is more expensive that toner, but I found out it's become the other way round. Isn't it amazing?
MidnightShadow
Night Ninja
- Messages
- 818
- Location
- USA
So, what we work on and see in our jobs doesn't count as real world experience? A hotel is going to want longevity and low cost just as much as anybody else. From somebody who has worked the retail side, consumer side, and government side of the IT world... there is no "one" brand. They all have their pros and cons.
The trouble with this approach is that your answer will only be as good as someone else research. (i.e if they guy at the hotel actually did research then how well did he do it, if they just bought whatever was on sale at the time, then no thought went into it at all!)
then you get the effect of large companies buying from large companies, various issues with tenders etc...
with servers there used to be a saying, "nobody ever got fired for buying IBM." but this somewhat ignores, that proper research isn't just picking the biggest brand name! with printers it's more like nobody ever got fired for buying HP, or Xerox, they are big names, you'll be able to get supplies for many years. it doesn't mean that they are the most cost effective. (though it doesn't matter how reliable and bullet proof or cheap per page your 20 year old small production run Kyocera is if you can't get ink/toner any more!)
Really, which inkjet is cheaper to run than laser? (and over how many sheets?)
As I said, get a spread sheet.
have cost printer in column A
have cost of toner in column B
original sheets (the amount of sheets the starter cartridge can do) in printer in column C
have iso sheets per cartridge in column D
(A+B) / (C+D) is the cost per sheet, and I've (almost never) found any inkjet that beats a laserjet.
