Hello all. I have to research and purchase a new laser printer for my office. The one we have now requires too many expensive consumables (besides toner) and we are looking for a less expensive solution. My question is, do all laser printers require replacement fusers, waste cartridges, rollers, etc., or so some only need new toner cartridges? I am fairly certain they are all the same, but I thought I’d ask first. We are looking at the Dell 3110cn right now. TIA!
–FCOD
All laser printers require those parts to be replaced. Some have a much longer cycle than others - Often, the fuser will last the life of the printer, if you don’t print huge quantities. Some printers give you a new drum when you replace the toner, most don’t. It’s hard to compare different brands, but some review sites try to do a life-cycle cost analysis.
FWIW, I use a Brother HL1850, and I’ve been very happy with it, but i only print a few pages per day on average.
We have used an HP Laserjet 1012 for a few years now. AFAIK it has needed only new toner cartridges. They aint cheap, but as far as the other consumables you mention, I’ve never heard of them.
They all need these parts. Most just lump more of them together into one cartridge. I haven’t seen a separate waste toner collector in a laser printer in years - about 20 years ago, Canon did a pretty good job of putting most of the short-lived consumables into one cartridge, freeing people from having to empty waste toner cups, refill toner and change developers or drums.
Usually, you don’t need to worry about fusers or rollers for tens of thousands of pages - the LaserJet next to me has a typical service life of 150,000 - 200,000 pages before it needs a new fuser and rollers, usually packaged together as a “maintenance kit.”
I actually came pretty close to buying a Dell 3100cn a couple years ago, but went with a LaserJet 2605dn instead. It was cheaper to buy the 2605dn, with a built-in duplexer, than it was to buy a replacement duplexer for our older color printer. Being faster, better and half the size were added benefits.
At this price level, it’s more cost-effective to plan on replacing the entire printer, rather than changing a fuser. It’s almost cheaper to buy a new printer than it is to buy a new set of toner cartridges - the set of cartridges for this printer sell for about $720, compared to $550 for the whole printer. One note though - the printer ships with half-filled “starter” cartridges.
In other words, at this price level, don’t sweat the repair costs - just plan on replacing the entire unit when it needs anything more expensive than refilling the paper tray.
They all have the same consumables internally. Some last longer before needing replacement; some bundle them into cartridges so that it’s more convenient for you.
There are only about 3 or 4 manufacturers who make the actual print ‘engine’ that is the guts of these printers, most brands just put their covers around it, their programming in the electronics, and their brand name on the outside. (That’s why the same toner cartridge will often work in several machines, even different brands.)
I avoid Dell printers because they have snuck a gotcha into them: you can buy the consumables ONLY from Dell (and only at their prices). On a HP or Canon printer, if I run out of toner, I can run to the nearest office supply store and buy a toner cartridge (at a fairly high price). Or I can plan ahead, and buy them online at a better price, or buy compatible generic ones at an even cheaper price. But with Dell, the have prohibited price competition, and prohibited local suppliers.
How much do you plan on printing? Is the printer just for you or for you and your colleagues. Colour or black & white?
If you want to print colour, get two printers: one for colour, and one for black & white: many printers (HP, I’m looking at you) use colour toner to improve the black & white page. This is expensive.
With regard to cheaper HP printers, do be aware that they do two sorts of toner cartridge: high capacity (X at the end) and low capacity (A at the end). Of course, all low-end printers ship with the A cartridges. I must admit to a fondness for the HP 1320 and their replacement, the HP 2010 printers. The inbuilt duplexer is very convenient. But get your additional memory elsewhere.
Thanks for all of your responses. I actually spoke to a Dell agent today. The Dell printer only consumes toner cartridges and the fuser, but the fuser is covered under their warranty! Since a 5 year warranty is $300 (new fuser is about $200), I’m getting a Dell, dude!
–FCOD
HP has page yield figures on their web site HP. The tests are supposed to conform to ISO standards, so you ought to be able to compare to other manufacturers if they make the data available.
PC Mag did abbreviated tests using the ISO methods and they found that the manufacturers seemed to be pretty honest in their figures.
Combine this with the cost of cartridges and you can calculate a cost per page for different models to help decide whether to get a more expensive printer that uses more economical cartridges (and probably also holds more paper, prints faster, quicker warmup and more memory).