Laser printer or inkjet for home office??

blade12

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 29, 2005
Messages
346
Hello.

I am thinking of building a home office. Now I was wondering what sort of printer would be best for printing ~400-450 pages per month black&white? I also will need to print color occasionally for personal stuff. Currently, I have some old breaking-down monochrome printer and another regular color inkjet but neither have wireless wifi + buying separate toner/ink for each is costly.

-I need wifi on it for printing from another rooms/laptops
-must be able to scan & copy. Fax is irrelevant to my needs as I scan+email stuff
-makes no difference if it has duplex printing or not
-speed is not an important factor but it is worth considering (for my range, I am not expecting very fast printing.. 15-20 ppm for black&white is fine)
-$200 (+- $50) is my budget. I know there are some awesome office printers for $400-500 but beyond my budget
-ink and/or toner has to be affordable. I saw toners that lexmark sells - cost for those is just insane
-cost per page is a factor that MANY reviews do not even mention. I don't know how to consider this factor if it is not listed anywhere

Ones I looked at so far:
Epson WorkForce WF-3620 - http://www.amazon.com/Epson-WorkFor...=undefined&sr=1-1&keywords=all+in+one+printer -- inkjet
Brother Printer Work Smart MFCJ870DW - http://www.amazon.com/Brother-Print...TF8&qid=1410657265&sr=1-1&keywords=MFC-J870DW -- inkjet
Brother Printer MFC-J6520DW - http://www.amazon.com/Brother-Print...00EPY0JAI/ref=psdc14_t3_B00EANUUDK_B00EPY0JAI -- inkjet
Canon PIXMA MX922 - http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00IKTA6OI/ref=twister_B00MW6YQJG -- inkjet

Any decent color lasers around $250?

Any suggestions? Recommendations? Ideas? Thanks!
 
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The laser printers will have lower operating costs, but are not suitable for photo quality color output.
I have the HP LaserJet Pro 200 at home, and various Canon MFC 8300 series printers at work. They have all been very reliable. The Canons(duplex) had paper jam maybe once every 6000 to 7000 pages.
 
The laser printers will have lower operating costs, but are not suitable for photo quality color output.
I have the HP LaserJet Pro 200 at home, and various Canon MFC 8300 series printers at work. They have all been very reliable. The Canons(duplex) had paper jam maybe once every 6000 to 7000 pages.

For HP LaserJet Pro 200, how much do the toners cost & where do you buy them from? I like the idea of getting a color laser if the operating costs are less overall.

As far as color printing goes, I won't be printing photos. Maybe color text, some color backgrounds. I don't really need super high quality color output.
 
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I use genuine HP black cartridges and generic color cartridges(eBay), since I don't use color often. If I need photos, I go to Costco. The generic black toners lack the crispness and darkness of the real stuff. Also, the Pro 200 is a big printer and has a larger than average footprint.
 
How many color pages a month?
Basically a $60-80 Canon Inkjet works for me. Buy XL cartridges about once a year.
I've owned a couple Brother B&W Lazer printers, using aftermarket toner and drums.
Do research on latest articles/cost per page, cost per page.
Amazon is a good source for sales, and "owner" reviews, usually aftermarket ink/toner shows up to check price, availability, and how well it works.

For a 2014 "compare" the last color Laser printer "winner" was a Dell.

I've been impressed with Canon Inkjet, my not wifi Pixma from Walmart ($20 on sale, cartridges [2XL black and color] $45, singles around $20 Black, $30 color.

http://www.amazon.com/Canon-MG5520-...F8&qid=1410815100&sr=8-2&keywords=canon+pixma
This one uses multiple color cartridges, research as some require "all" replace when one is empty. Lots of models, just this one easy find.

definitely use aftermarket toner.
http://www.amazon.com/Brother-HL-22...&qid=1410815235&sr=8-1&keywords=laser+printer

http://www.amazon.com/Canon-imageCL...&qid=1410815284&sr=8-3&keywords=laser+printer

http://www.amazon.com/Hewlett-Packa...&qid=1410815284&sr=8-5&keywords=laser+printer

http://www.amazon.com/C1660W-LED-Pr...1410815668&sr=8-2&keywords=dell+laser+printer
 
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Maybe 50 color pages a month (and 450 b&w). Not much color.

I saw you recommended a couple monochrome printer. To be honest, I prefer getting one printer for entire household instead of one color printer and one monochrome so I really don't want to consider a monochrome. 2 printers on 1 network just seems messy

On a color laserjet printer, I might need to replace color toners once every 2-2.5 years and b&w every year. I think it can work out in one color laser.

Do inkjet printers truly cost more in the long-term over color laser for regular printing? That is the understanding I got from the couple guides I read. If it's true then I might eliminate inkjet printers
 
I just realized neither of the laser printers I put up in OP can scan or copy so I removed them. Amazon showed them under all-in-one filter but I didn't double-check further. Stupid me lol :eek:

Looks like all-in-one wireless color laser printer for under 250 with copy/scan & AutoDocumentFeeder may be a fruitless endeavor.. I looked on amazon&newegg&staples. No luck :(
 
For the cannon, one thing to note is that the drums have a chip in them that counts pages and it will disable the unit after x pages. You can get a new chip to override this as well as aftermarket toner fillers to lower the operating cost significantly, very messy though ;)
 
That's a monochrome printer... are you forgoing your color laser requirement?
 
Well, what I could do is buy a cheap 70$ inket AND a $200 monochrome laserjet printer. Only thing is that I would have to switch back&forth whenever I print and buy separate ink/toner. It would also require more space on desk.

Would that be smarter than buying a $250 colorlaser? I also have an amazon giftcard so I can raise my budget up to $300 at the most if that means toner will be cheaper in long run.


I saw this - I can bring it down to $240 with giftcard:
http://www.amazon.com/Brother-Print...=UTF8&qid=1410981827&sr=1-1&keywords=mfc-9130
 
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-$200 (+- $50) is my budget. I know there are some awesome office printers for $400-500 but beyond my budget

This is the wrong way of looking at your requirements. As you state, the cost of printing needs to be factored in. You need to budget the total cost of printing over the required lifespan. For instance, compare a $400 printer which prints at 1c per page with a $100 printer that prints at 5c per page. You're printing 400 pages per month, so the former printer will cost you $4 per month and the latter $20 per month. So it will take less than two years for the initially more expensive printer to actually be cheaper.

You can calculate the running costs yourself. For inkjet printers it's relatively easy: just divide the cost of the ink by the number of pages printed and allow a fudge factor for cleaning. For laser printers you need to consider the toner, the drum, and the fuser. The first two often come together; the fuser often lasts 50K copies - 10 years of printing for you - so in your case could be ignored.
 
This is the wrong way of looking at your requirements. As you state, the cost of printing needs to be factored in. You need to budget the total cost of printing over the required lifespan. For instance, compare a $400 printer which prints at 1c per page with a $100 printer that prints at 5c per page. You're printing 400 pages per month, so the former printer will cost you $4 per month and the latter $20 per month. So it will take less than two years for the initially more expensive printer to actually be cheaper.

You can calculate the running costs yourself. For inkjet printers it's relatively easy: just divide the cost of the ink by the number of pages printed and allow a fudge factor for cleaning. For laser printers you need to consider the toner, the drum, and the fuser. The first two often come together; the fuser often lasts 50K copies - 10 years of printing for you - so in your case could be ignored.

You make a very good point.

Unfortunately, most printers I have seen so far do not openly show cost per page.

http://www.amazon.com/Brother-Print...827&sr=1-1&keywords=mfc-9130&tag=hardfocom-20
http://www.4inkjets.com/TN221BKCTS-Brother-Laser-Toner-Black-Compatible?printer=8546
cpp: 1.4 cent

http://www.amazon.com/HP-CF385A-BGJ-LaserJet-Multifunction/dp/B00IAUZVFQ
http://www.4inkjets.com/CF380XRTA-HP-Laser-Toner-HY-Black-Compatible?printer=9183
cpp: 0.91 cent

So I guess the hp has better value of the 2. I am currently leaning towards that.
 
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Well, what I could do is buy a cheap 70$ inket AND a $200 monochrome laserjet printer. Only thing is that I would have to switch back&forth whenever I print and buy separate ink/toner. It would also require more space on desk.
There are pros and cons to this approach

pros:
photos generally come out better on an inkjet than on a laser
monochrome lasers have a lot less to go wrong than color ones
you won't waste color toner on the little bits of unimportant color found on many documents.

cons:
inkjet printouts are usually not waterproof. This is annoying when you've printed out a map of a place you are going on foot/by public transport and it's raining.
inkjets don't like sporadic use. if you have long gaps when you do no color printing you can expect to have problems with clogging.
takes up more space
 
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