cheap color laser printers?

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Joe

How good are these new relatively new and inexpensive color laser printers?
How much do you need to spend to get a decent one?

How fast are they compared to an average inkjet? When I print a full color
image on my old DeskJet 970 Cse, it takes several minutes. How long will it
take to print an 8.5 X 11" sized full color image on one of these color
lasers?

How do the costs for ink and paper compare to inkjet printers?

I think the cheapest HP color laser is under $400. Is it decent or junk?

Joe
 
Joe said:
How good are these new relatively new and inexpensive color laser printers?
How much do you need to spend to get a decent one?

How fast are they compared to an average inkjet? When I print a full color
image on my old DeskJet 970 Cse, it takes several minutes. How long will it
take to print an 8.5 X 11" sized full color image on one of these color
lasers?

How do the costs for ink and paper compare to inkjet printers?

I think the cheapest HP color laser is under $400. Is it decent or junk?

Joe
Click to expand...

I'd like to move to a color laser too Joe, but for that kind of money I
can buy lots of ink. I'm waiting for the price to come way down or to
find a used one to experiment on refilling. If you have a lot of down
time, the big advantage is that of not clogging.
 
The low priced color laser printers are not poor quality in terms of
build or output. Also output is relatively fast, especially after the
first print is downloaded into the printer's memory.

The problem is that these laser printers use the same business model as
Inkjet printers. The cost of the toner cartridges comes to as much or
more than replacing the printer, the printer usually comes with
partially filled cartridges, the toner cartridges are usually rigged to
"self destruct" one or more chips so if it is refilled it will either
not work or will work much more slowly.

In some cases specialized memory is required that can be costly to
expand the buffer memory. There are usually several consumables,
besides the toner cartridges, such as the transfer belt and fuser oil.

These printers are good value if you are doing spot color or small color
areas, as they are quick, do not clog when left unused, and the output
is waterproof and quite fade resistant. For photographic use, the
quality is not as good as quality inkjet, they are faster if you are
printing numerous copies, they do not require specialty paper (although
there are specialized papers made for them, which are usually less
costly than similar inkjet products).

With some models (HP lower end are a good example) by moving one model
up from the bottom economy model will mean paying $50-75 more, but will
give you a more ruggedly built model, with built in ethernet AND, full
toner cartridges containing double the amount of toner. It is often
false economy to buy the very lowest priced model.

BTW, here in Canada, color laser printers start at $250-300 CAN
(Konica-Minolta, on sale), so I imagine they are even less cost in the US.
 
How good are these new relatively new and inexpensive color laser printers?
How much do you need to spend to get a decent one?

How fast are they compared to an average inkjet? When I print a full color
image on my old DeskJet 970 Cse, it takes several minutes. How long will it
take to print an 8.5 X 11" sized full color image on one of these color
lasers?

How do the costs for ink and paper compare to inkjet printers?

I think the cheapest HP color laser is under $400. Is it decent or junk?

Joe
Click to expand...

For what it is worth, I have an HP Color Laserjet 4500 (4550 is almost the
exact same model, only tells you exactly how much toner you have left).
It is not the speed demon like some of the newer printers, but I purchased
it for under $100 on eBay. It had roughly 45,000 prints on it (and only
3,000 of them color). The consumables for this printer are relatively
cheap when you look on eBay. If you decide to get aftermarket compatible
toner, you can save even more. I like it because of the reliability of
this printer. We have these all over our building at work and have some
with upwards of 250,000 prints on them that are still used every day.
(Don't even get me started on the 1.6million plus prints on the 5MXI's!
LOL).

I personally would recommend something like that because the consumables
are not overly expensive, and parts are readily available. However, I'm
sure all our opinions differ, and perhaps you need something faster then
4PPM in color. ;-)

Cheers ~
 
BTW, what amazes me is that most decent laser printers can print so many
pages before they're worn out. I had an old HP 4p laser that I used almost
daily for 14 years. I didn't count the pages but I was always amazed that it
kept running- until the pick up wheel wore out.

Joe
 
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