Help with evaluating used printer

  • Thread starter Thread starter tempgal
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tempgal

Hi --

I'm considering buying a used color laser printer on ebay. There is one
that looks appealing but the current owner acquired it through his asset
recovery business and knows almost nothing about it. The specs as he posted
them are exactly what I'm looking for.

He says that if I will telephone him, he will put the printer through
whatever tests that I specify, but I don't know what to ask him to do other
than print a test page. (The test page on that particular model is quite
informative.)

Can someone offer suggestions, please. The printer is a QMS 6100.

Thanks.
 
tempgal said:
Hi --

I'm considering buying a used color laser printer on ebay. There is one
that looks appealing but the current owner acquired it through his asset
recovery business and knows almost nothing about it. The specs as he posted
them are exactly what I'm looking for.

He says that if I will telephone him, he will put the printer through
whatever tests that I specify, but I don't know what to ask him to do other
than print a test page. (The test page on that particular model is quite
informative.)

Can someone offer suggestions, please. The printer is a QMS 6100.
Click to expand...

Well, you could ask him to print a 10 page document while holding the
phone near it so you can hear if it jams. Ask him to fax or scan the
test page and send to you.
 
Personally I wouldn't buy a 6100 because of it's poor performance. I'd go
for a phaser 780 or a qms 330 but that's just me.

Here are some common failures/defects for the minolta-qms 6100/6110

-oil spilling inside the printer as a result of not taking precautions
before moving it - look for drops of oil on the drum surface and the bottom
of the fuser compartiment.
-defective main gear unit's (worn out bearings of the cleaning drive axis) -
not easy to detect without opening it up, if it's gone you'll hear a
rattling noise and will see residual image
-worn out transfer drum - this is visible on the surface of the drum and
noticable on the printout as lighter streaks the test page 1
(administration/special pages/testpage 1)
-dirty scanner unit - symptom are pretty much the same as with a worn out
transfer drum
-worn out pick up roller - paper jams
-worn out fuser - bad fusing with thicker stocks, wrinkeling of paper near
the center, oil drops on the first printouts
-worn out waste feeders and drum cleaner (ticking sound, residual image on
the printout)
-drum jams - minolta-qms provided a sollution for this in the form of larger
drum seperators, but you will be unable to print full bleed 13x19.


I'd advise you the following
- have a look inside the printer
- listen to it printing (ticking/ratling etc)
- print an advanced status page, calibration page, registration page, test
page 1 and 2 (offline ->menu -> administration/special pages/.........)
- have a look at the pagecount



Hope this helps
Jeff
 
Thanks, Folks. Both of these postings are extremely helpful.

Zan
Hi --

I'm considering buying a used color laser printer on ebay. There is one
that looks appealing but the current owner acquired it through his asset
recovery business and knows almost nothing about it. The specs as he posted
them are exactly what I'm looking for.

He says that if I will telephone him, he will put the printer through
whatever tests that I specify, but I don't know what to ask him to do other
than print a test page. (The test page on that particular model is quite
informative.)

Can someone offer suggestions, please. The printer is a QMS 6100.

Thanks.
 
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