The main reason I bought a colour laser printer is the ink (toner) doesn't congeal if you don't use the printer for a few months.
In the Universe of Printers, One Worth Talking About
31–39 of 39 posts
Re: In the Universe of Printers, One Worth Talking About
#32Color laser printers are surprisingly cheap.
The don't make photo-quality prints, but it's good enough for casual pictures (posters, flyer, etc).
Re: In the Universe of Printers, One Worth Talking About
#33The Wirecutter[1] is a site that lists the best technology to buy. Like this article, it answers the question, "What is the best ____?". I wonder how the Hewlett-Packard Pro P1606dn competes with the Brother HL-2270DW[2]. [1]: http://thewirecutter.com/ [2]: http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/brother-hl-2270dw-best-lase...
The HL-2270 was the first printer I had ever felt I needed to evangelize for. It was so good, so cheap, and had just the right features. Printed quick, toner lasted forever, toner was surprisingly cheap ($40 for 4k pages), auto duplex, wireless. Set up and forget about it until you need it.
Brother seems to have picked up where HP left off about a decade ago. I bought my wife one of the low-end lasers when she started law & grad school. She ran through about 10k pages/year (she'd even print front/back/upside down to "save" on paper) which was about 1.5 cartridges. It doesn't jam, it doesn't make noise except when printing, although it does take a few seconds to warm up from sleep.
I think we've been on the same cartridge since she graduated several years ago. I usually two-bag consumables, so there may be a really sludgy unopened cartridge in a closet.
Had it been expensive, I'd say you get what you pay for, but I don't think it was over $300 or $400 at the time.
Re: In the Universe of Printers, One Worth Talking About
#34I have a HP printer in the same series as this one and I can verify that it is rock solid in build-quality, reliability, and in producing fast clean black prints. If you don't print often, or rarely print in color I would strongly recommend a laser printer (and just go to a print shop for the color prints). They are just so much more reliable. http://ask.metafilter.com/78830/Inkjet-or-laser-printer-for-...
I love FedEx/Kinko's printer drivers for color work. Laminate, bind, etc., and have it delivered or pick it up a few blocks away. It's a good half step between "low-fi" and "trade show presentation".
Re: In the Universe of Printers, One Worth Talking About
#35No display - don't buy it. Any network printer without some sort of display royally sucks. You cannot easily diagnose communication errors with a couple blinking lights. Much easier to troubleshoot a complex device if it can actually tell you something. Sometimes trying to coax it to communicate using button gymnastics doesn't work. Other than that, yeah, HP laserjets are pretty rad.
I disagree. Much like my very complex home routers, this printer has an awesome Web UI. Unlike my routers, you can hold the button down and it prints a complete status report, including the IP config.
All I can say is sometimes the printer may not provide enough information via status pages. Had it happen to me where one was was in a bad state and didn't play well with others.
Models that you can configure via on-printer displays are way faster to setup and easier to deal with technicalities in the long run.
Re: In the Universe of Printers, One Worth Talking About
#36The Wirecutter[1] is a site that lists the best technology to buy. Like this article, it answers the question, "What is the best ____?". I wonder how the Hewlett-Packard Pro P1606dn competes with the Brother HL-2270DW[2]. [1]: http://thewirecutter.com/ [2]: http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/brother-hl-2270dw-best-lase...
I bought the HL-2270DW based on the Wirecutter's recommendation. It's fine for the price, but it has a LOT of fan noise, which means it's mostly turned off in my home office. It's also pretty bad at printing dark images (lots of white stripes in the black).
Re: In the Universe of Printers, One Worth Talking About
#37The Wirecutter[1] is a site that lists the best technology to buy. Like this article, it answers the question, "What is the best ____?". I wonder how the Hewlett-Packard Pro P1606dn competes with the Brother HL-2270DW[2]. [1]: http://thewirecutter.com/ [2]: http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/brother-hl-2270dw-best-lase...
Wow, what a great site. Thanks!
Re: In the Universe of Printers, One Worth Talking About
#38The Wirecutter[1] is a site that lists the best technology to buy. Like this article, it answers the question, "What is the best ____?". I wonder how the Hewlett-Packard Pro P1606dn competes with the Brother HL-2270DW[2]. [1]: http://thewirecutter.com/ [2]: http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/brother-hl-2270dw-best-lase...
The HL-2270 was the first printer I had ever felt I needed to evangelize for. It was so good, so cheap, and had just the right features. Printed quick, toner lasted forever, toner was surprisingly cheap ($40 for 4k pages), auto duplex, wireless. Set up and forget about it until you need it.
I bought a Brother HL-5140 back in 2004 which cost me around GBP200.00 including taxes. It's still going strong with 7000 pages printed so far. I managed to squeeze out just under 5k pages on the original toner cartridge with some judicious horizontal shaking despite the lifespan stated in the manual as ~3500 pages.
I've only replaced the toner cartridge once (cost: GBP ~50.00) and the "new" one still has another 2500-3000 impressions left.
The diagnostics report that drum is still good for another 13k pages, the fuser for 73k pages and the and the "PF KIT 1" (I think that's the paper lift foot) for 43k pages.
I would definitely go back and buy another HL series of similar capability, they're damn fine work horses.
Re: In the Universe of Printers, One Worth Talking About
#39I've had this exact printer for 2 years and rave about it, recommending it to everyone.
I was tired of years of clogged inkjets and not doing much actual color printing.