Will a laserjet serve me better than an inkjet?

[bupkus]

My Epson Stylus 740 is suggesting it's not gonna last much longer so I'm thinking of a new printer.

I usually don't care about color so I'm considering my first laserjet. Here's my printing patterns.
I don't print often and when I do it's usually a small job. With my Epson more often than not it starts by going thru a self cleaning cycle.
Does a laser printer gum up if not used for a week at a time? What's the downside for the laser other than my interest in a black ink only unit?

As for brands, I'm thinking of either the HP 1012 or getting a Samsung on rebate.

 

[DaveSimmons]

Lasers don't need a cleaning cycle even after sitting idle for weeks, and toner carts stay good for literally years. Remember when pricing the printer that you'll save a ton on not buying $40 ink carts so you can spend a little more on the printer itself.

The little Samsung lasers have gotten good reviews, though they are a bit slow since they make the computer do more of the page rendering work and send mass quantities of raw data instead of high-level commands.

The $99 refurb Brother HL-5040 deal that was in Hot Deals a week or two ago is worth checking to see if it's still on, or the $170 new price is also worth considering. This is the printer I've had for almost a year, and compared to the Samsungs it's:
- faster: faster CPU, and does more of the work in the printer instead of in Windows
- better paper handling
- bigger toner cartridge
- can get toner carts for Brother models at all the Office stores just like HP, Samsung is harder to find

I like HP higher-end lasers ($500-600 and up) and my HP 4ML lasted a decade, but their cheap ones seem shoddy and have gotten only fair reviews.

www.PCWorld.com and Amazon are two good sources of printer reviews.

 

[Texun]

I had the same question a while back. I bought a used HP Laserjet off of Ebay for $85 and it hammers out pages like a new one even with the old cartridge. For straight on B&W printing, like school papers and work from the office, they are way cheaper in the long run to operate. I take a can of air and blow it out now and then, but other than that it stays on 24\7. The power save mode kicks in after a few minutes of idle time.

I could be wrong but I think the average life of a toner cartridge is somewhere between 2500 and 3500 pages.

I also have one of these and it does as good if not better than the HP for light use (6PPM). It's old, but I've never had a jam and the print is very clean. Toner is dirt cheap as well. Less than 30 minutes left and it's $31 now.

 

[imported_Bunter]

I have an OLD HP Series II that keeps chugging. Sometimes it is used every day, sometimes not for weeks. Either way, turn it on and it starts printing. If what you want is black or grayscale printing, lasers are a lot cheaper per page and require less maintenance. I think the thing has printed around 12-15,000 pages in about 18 years or so.

I have both a laser and an inkjet. I consider the laser to be a "permanent" printer and the inkjets items to be replaced every few years.

Toner can hurt when it finally needs to be replaced. Depending on the printer, cartridges are usually somewhere between $50 and $200, but as Texun said, they last a few thousand pages. My experience is that they last longer than advertised if you are printing mostly text. And, if you start getting streaks like your toner is low, shake the cartridge up and it will probably last a few hundred more pages. I've had mixed luck with recycled cartridges. Routine maintenance is usually running a vacuum to suck out paper and toner specks, but that can probably be done when you change toner cartridges.

 

[0roo0roo]

yes. color is overrated. if u really need color, kinkos or professional photo places will beat your cheap home printer anyways. laser = crisp on any paper. inkjet = fuzzy text on even the most expensive paper, and really bad on cheap. what most people need is text. and cost per page for text is cheap on laser, quiet to boot. only way to get decent photo prints out of an inkjet is to pay for all the expensive supplies, not worth it for most.

toner costs.. when calculated to per page, beat inkjet.

inkjets = cheaper initial cost + easy for sales/marketing to sell and rake in loads from all the expensive supplies.

 

[dullard]

Yep a laser sounds like exactly what you need. Others above me are 100% correct.

Let me add my thoughts. In 10 years I've had 2 lasers. The first laser (Epson 1100) I still use on occasion for printing drafts, but the toner needs replacing and I just don't want to put $50 into it. The second laser (HP 1200) works beautifully - fast, cheap, and great looking output.

One key thing to look at is memory. Lasers need to fit a full page into memory all at once in order to print. The more complex the page, the more memory needed. I personally cannot use a laser with under 4 MB memory since my printouts won't print (and occasionally I need 8 MB). Look at the math for printing at the highest quality setting (1200 * 1200 dpi) for a full page (1 inch margins):

1200 * 1200 * 7.5 * 10 = 108 million dots
8 dots = 1 byte (black and white do each dot is one bit)
108 million / 8 = 13.5 million bytes = 12.9 MB

Of course there is compression technology to allow you to print with less memory. However you can see that many pages might not print if you are short on memory. What happens? About half will print on one paper and the other half on a second paper - an unacceptable result.

Many of the cheapest lasers come with 2 MB. If you buy one be certain that (a) you don't want to print at the highest quality setting, (b) you will only print simple stuff, or (c) the memory is expandable.

 

[Yanagi]

Or you could Buy a Xerox one. Awesome machines. BUt a tad out of your budget pherhaps

 

[Yanagi]

But the new Phaser 6100 is pretty alright though. Might wanna check that one out. Just give it a shot. And ask me question in PM if you want more info on that printer. (you can tell Im a xerox employee right? )

(sorry for Doublepost)

 

[Snooper]

I bought an HP 1200 LaserJet after dealing with an Epson 800 inkjet printer for a couple of years. I jot completely fed up with the start print->notice missing lines (when the page FINALLY came out)->clean printer-print again->clean again->etc. etc. etc. cycle. I figured out that about 80% of my ink was going into the little foam pad the 800 had to clean the print heads against.

My LaserJet is a DREAM by comparison. It never needs cleaning and it will have the first page in the try within 10 seconds of clicking print from dead cold. Within about 5 seconds if it is warmed up. It prints a lot crisper than any inkjet can (Kind of hard to keep the paper crisp and flat when you are spraying it with wafer or alcohol). When the first toner cartridge went belly up, I checked it's page count: It had printed 2459 pagers against a rating of 2500 pages. I can live with that. I think the 500 pager ink cartridges were printing at most 100 pages before they were dead. Let's see, 100 pages for $30 or 2459 for $80....

You won't be disappointed with a good LaserJet.

 

[Yanagi]

Usually companies says 2500 pages @ 5% coverage or there alikes. That means if you're doing alot of graphic intense printing it wont be 2500 pages. Also the fuser gets worned out faster. So there are alot of things to consider when looking at the numbers.

 

[Nebor]

The thing is inkjets just paint on what you're printing so it could potentially flake or fall off. A laser printer actually burns your printing onto the paper, that's why it comes out warm!

(Read the computer salesmen thread, in case you haven't)

 

[Cerb]

Been using a Lexmark E210 (Samsung L210, IIRC). For B&W, it looks fantastic, and just keeps on printing. No more than 10-15 seconds to start up from idle, and with pump 3000+ pages (text mostly) before it needs a new toner cartridge. It's expensive, between $50 and $100 for the cheaper printers (look into this before you buy one!), but it lasts practically forever in comparison to ink.

If you can stand not having color at your fingertips, a $100-$200 B&W laser will serve you well.

 

[dgseik]

laserjet serve you faster

 

[wseyller]

I am an expert in the electrophotographic process is laser cartridges. I would go with HP Laserjet. The HP 1012 cartridge has an anticipated yield of 2000 pages @ 5%. Be carefull of other manufactures as sometimes they don't rate their cartridge at 5%, instead maybe 3% which makes them look better. HP will always use 5%, except one case with a newer color printer that uses 6%.

Toner does not last for years literally. It has a shelf life of one year although it can sometimes last longer than that. If you live in a low humidity area you could see some problems such as defects in the print due to toner any other laser cartridge components charges affected by static electricity. Also in a dry, low humidity area, it is quite common that the PCR (primary charge roller) inside the laser cartridge will degrade. This component charges the drum to negative 600vdc and also remove electrostatic image from drum. The PCR has a chemical called plasticizers. This chemical keeps the PCR plyable. With the heat and low humidity the chemical with evaporate to the surface of the PCR and dry it out causing it to crack and the chemical with ruin the drum causing crystalization. Its kinda like a vinyl dashboard in a car that dries out and cracks in these conditions.

Laser printer does need maintence every so often, the mantenaince cycle is a different pages used for different printers. Sometimes 50,000/100,000/350,000 pages depending on printer. You should clean the printer about twice a year. Do not use any vacuum cleaner to do this. It takes special filter to clean up toner. Toner will flow right past your standard filter. Toner filters are normally rated at .3 microns. Black toner is normally about .8 or .9 microns with color toner at about .5 or .6 microns.

The quality of recycled laser cartridges just depends on the company that makes them. Some do a really bad job and are called Drill and Fill by the industry applying that they only replace the toner with who knows what kind of toner. Then you got some that do change all the components with new or recoated products but don't chose a good combination. Cartridge components have to be compatible. It they use a bad combination its probably because they don't run ASTM (standardized test methods) which you have to get certified. There are only about 150 companys in the International Technology Council that are certified and trying to get more. Most remanufacturers are apart of ITC but do not get certified. The ones that do this testing know what they are doing. They know what their average densities are (how dark the prints are basically), the estimated yield, and many others facts that most consumers don't care about such as transfer efficiency, background, and standard deivation of densities. All they test are benchmarked to an OEM ran on the same printer.

If you want to see if a remanufacture produces high quality cartridge, make sure that they test using ASTM 1856(Toner Usage) and ASTM 2036(Density requirements). Test should have a recent test done with your cartridge model. Not one that was done 2 years ago as the test is required to be dated. The test should show what components they used, what their page yield was based on a standard 5% coverage and density at the least.

 

[0roo0roo]

interesting stuff

gah, i have like a 2 yr old toner cart in the closet hope its still good.

but yea a good thing about lasers is lots of the parts that wear are replaced with the cart. the other parts can be found online it seems, esp for hp with repair kits.

so these certifications will be on the box?

 

[wseyller]

Probably not on the box yet. You would just need to ask them if you can see their testing. If they are certified they should be happy to show you. These test are designed to be repeatable. A benchmarked OEM should be done on the same printer, due to the fact that not all printers print exactly the same, but should be close. As certifications on the box. The STMC comittee is designing a logo to use for a seal to be placed on the cartridge box by certified remanufacturers. This testing standard was designed to help keep the OEM from bashing remanufactures. They are bad remanufactures that hurt this industry, and the industry decided to work together to help each so part of it was designing a standardize test. Actually many government agencies require this standard and will become more popular once it is found and understood by others. This means the remanufacturer will either comply with the standard or go out of business. I'm not implying that because a company is certified that they make bad product, but it helps in determining which ones likely do.


List of Certified Companies

 

[Budmantom]

You could just buy a Canon.



Tom

 

[jm0ris0n]

I have a minolta 1250w laser that I picked up for ~$100 after mail-in-rebate. This printer is great. I wouldn't go back to inkjet for anything. Its faster, crisper, and waaaaaayyyy cheaper per page to print than any inkjet. I am a college student and this printer had some very irregular usage, but it still prints great, even after not printing for weeks at a time. Go personal laser, you will thank me later !

 

[Macro2]

Get a Canon i560 inkjet.

$79 at Sams or Costco w/USB cable.

 

[wseyller]

Actually canon design most of the engines used in HP laser printer originating from the HP series II using Canon SX engine.

 

[bupkus]

Originally posted by: wseyller
Actually canon design most of the engines used in HP laser printer originating from the HP series II using Canon SX engine.

I live in Phoenix so it probably doesn't get much drier than here. My guess is my inkjets dry out too but could you say that inkjets have an advantage in a dry climate? Still with the humidity issue, does my climate call for a warrenty upgrade?

I'm going to keep an eye peeled for a good deal on a personal laser printer. Do you have any personal preferences for an inexpensive brand/model?

 

[wseyller]

I am not an expert on inkjet formulation so my advice is limited in that area as I stay busy dealing with laser technology. Yes phoenix is a typical problem area when it comes to lasers. I suggest keeping the laser printer in an air conditioned room if possible. Hp says its products will work good with a humidity level of 10% to 90%, but I've seen relative humidity defects happen below 30%. 40 to 60 percent relative humidity is the best. You may want to find a cheap humidistat to get an idea where you are at with RH%.

For laser printers used in the home I would suggest the HP1012, Hp1150, HP1000, Hp1200, or HP1300 which are practical.

 

[bupkus]

"I pity the fool who doesn't have AC in Phoenix." Mr. T

Yes, I have AC. And perhaps a humidifier would be an excellent idea as it's too dry for me as well.

 

[0roo0roo]

Originally posted by: wseyller
Actually canon design most of the engines used in HP laser printer originating from the HP series II using Canon SX engine.

heh i guess, my canon does use hp carts it seems. hp does have overall better build/product quality from what i've seen though.

 

[wseyller]

As I said before, Canon designed most of the engines in HP laserjet printers. For example the HP Laserjet 5 uses Canon's EX engine. HP's Cartridge part# is 92298A. Canon's Part# is EP-E which stands for Electrophotographic Process-E for EX. HP Laserjet 5SI uses Canons' WX engine. HP's Part # is C3909A. Canon's part# is EP-W.

Canon's version and HP's version of these cartridges use the same components and are the same. The only difference is the cartridge label basically.

Zerox and Lexmark have a version of these cartridge to work in the HP and Canon sister printers. These cartridge are call Compatible cartridge which means that they are remanufactured and use new and recycled components. These cartridge are horrible in quality from what I have seen, especially the Zerox.

As far as the getting better quality from either the Canon or Hp's product, one reason is that it is probably in your head. Other reasons are that the usage may have been different than the other which can affect components. Instead of typing a book, I post to another thread that happens to make this point.

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.cfm?catid=30&threadid=1334069&enterthread=y