Toner Lasts Way Longer Than Ink
While Inkjet printers use ink, laser printers use toner, which consists of a powder mixture mostly made up of plastics that melt when heated up and then bond to the paper. This is why printed documents come out nice and warm on a laser printer.
Ink cartridges dont last very long and have some pretty strict expiration dates. Toner cartridges, on the other hand, can last for several years. Its just plastic dust, after all, so theres nothing inside that is susceptible to drying out quickly and going bad. This also makes laser printers a great option for those who dont print very often.
Furthermore, you can get a ton of mileage out of a single toner cartridge. On the high end, an ink cartridge can print about 300 pages, whereas a toner cartridge can print a few thousand pages before it starts to get low. Thats a huge difference.
Laser Printers Print Way Faster
Speed may not be of the essence for you most of the time, but more often than not, you just want to quickly print off a document and have it ready to go in as little time as possible. This is where laser printers shine.
This HP OfficeJet inkjet printer can print out up to 8.5 pages per minute. On the other hand, the Brother laser printer we linked to above can pump out up to 32 pages per minute. This makes the laser printer almost four times faster than its inkjet brethren.
Excellent Photo Printing Quality
Whether its for professional or personal use, having the ability to print out perfect photos is a big plus point. Thats why its important to look at whether a printer offers high photo quality when printing and can print out color documents without bleeding or other issues.
Its also important to look at color accuracy and color reproduction that printers offer, as some are better than others at producing printed photos with color accuracy. Some printer recommendations for photo printers include the Canon Pixma TS5051 and HP ENVY Photo 7155 All-in-One Printer.
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Tips To Reduce Ink And Toner Usage
At Island Ink-Jet some of our customers ask if there are things that can be done to reduce the amount of ink and toner used in the printer. The answer is Yes, there are!
Here are 3 key tips on how you can reduce the amount of and used, thereby extending the life of your ink and toner cartridges. This will help you put money back in your pocket:
1) Dont Print in Colour When You Dont Need To!
Even if you have a colour printer, many of us dont realize that we can change the settings to only print in black and white. For regular office document printing, most people find they only need to print in monochrome. Colour ink and toner cartridges actually cost more than black. What happens when you want to print black and white in a colour printer? Basically your printer will try and mix the black and colour inks to produce the print. To prevent this, simply tell your printer to print in only black and white. When you click print and the printer window opens up, click on Properties and then Page/layout and you can change the colour to black and white. Doing this conserves your colour cartridge for the time that you need it.
2) Decrease the Output Resolution for Laser Printers
3) Use Draft Mode for Inkjet Printers
What Is The Most Efficient Home Printer
An efficient home printer offers users flexible printing options and controls. Highly efficient printers allow you to change the quality and speed of your printing easily and quickly. With that kind of control, you can make sure that youre using your ink, paper, and energy as efficiently as possible. Efficient home printers have a low running cost.
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Professional Inkjet Photo Printers
Inkjet printers for professional photo printing use up to twelve different inks:
- Canon: photo magenta, photo cyan, yellow, magenta, cyan, red, photo black, matte black, grey, plus either blue, photo gray, and one chroma optimiser for black density and uniform glossiness, or light gray, dark gray and one chroma optimiser, or green, blue, and photo gray. 4 pl thermal.
- Epson : vivid magenta, yellow, cyan, orange, green, vivid light magenta, light cyan, light black, matte black or photo black, plus an irreversible choice of either light light gray or violet . 3.5 pl piezo variable.
- HP: magenta, yellow, red, green, blue, light magenta, light cyan, gray, light gray, matte black, photo black, and one gloss enhancer. 4 pl thermal.
They can print an image of 36 megapixels on A3 borderless photo paper with 444 ppi.
Inkjet Vs Laser: Which Printer Should You Get
It really comes down to what type of printing you’ll be doing.Inkjet printers are more commonly used at home or in small businesses because:
- they’re less expensive
- they don’t need to accommodate large volumes of printing
Laser printers are typically found in office settings:
- they’re fast, which makes them ideal for printing a high volume of text-based documents
- though they’re more expensive, they’re a better long-term investment
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Laser Printer Vs Inkjet: Which Is Better
Albert Bassili is a freelance writer at How-to-Geek with eight years of experience in both commerce and tech writing. He’s been a life-long lover of all sorts of tech and gadgets and has been building his own PCs for just under two decades now and he has more gadgets than he actually needs. He’s written for a variety of sites from SFGate to GameGavel. Read more…
If youve been on the market for a printer recently, choosing between laser and inkjet might be challenging. The solution is pretty clear: It all depends on the type of printing you do. Well explain.
How Many Pages Can You Get Out Of An Inkjet Cartridge
What this means is that a manufacturer might imply that you can print 400 pages from one OEM inkjet cartridge, but in reality its going to be closer to 200 pages because of the intermittent use of our printers.
Consumer Reports also found no correlation between the amount of ink used in maintenance and performance, and no correlation to the price paid for ink and quality. In other words, it isnt really necessary for them to waste that much fuel, or to pay for the high octane.
What can an honest taxpayer do? Well, as far as the government waste, were all stuck, but consider buying generic name brand compatible ink instead. Want to save even more money? Grab a coupon for 4inkjets or 123inkjets and save an extra 10-20%!
Want to save on custom printing online for business cards and more? Check out the latest coupons here.
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Laser Alternatives: Inkjets For The Office
Office-oriented inkjets include the few single-function printers and MFPs designed for relatively heavy-duty printing, as well as those that have office-centric features. For instance, an office MFP can work as a standalone fax machine fax directly from your PC’s hard drive and scan to email easily, using your PC’s email program and automatically adding the scan as an attachment.
Office MFPs also add an automatic document feeder for easy scanning, faxing, and copying of multipage documents. Some ADFs can scan both sides of a page. Of those, duplexing scanners, which scan both sides of a page at once, are much faster than models with duplexing or reversing ADFs , which scan one side, flip the page over, and then scan the other.
Office-design MFPs generally offer paper capacities of 200 sheets or more. Should you want to print two-sided documents, you’ll want a model with an auto-duplexer. Get a model with two paper trays if you want the ability to print with two types or size of paper without having to remove and replace the paper each time you make a switch. A few office inkjets support printing at up to tabloid size, letting you get all those spreadsheet columns onto a single page.
A specialized kind of office inkjet is the mobile inkjet, meant for business travelers that need printing wherever they go. Indeed, inkjets are the only kind of printer with models for mobile use . If you’re looking to print documents while on the road, you’ll definitely want a mobile inkjet.
Best Compatible Monochrome Toner Cartridges
Our Favorite Printer: Brother® MFCL2750DW
Why they are the perfect pair: The TN760 toner series has been a top selling item that consistently provides reliable black and white prints. Brother sells the genuine brand for $76.99. We sell a compatible version at less than half the price for $34.99. Youll save even more when you buy in bulk, our 5 pack option is a great value for high volume users! Our TN760 toner works incredibly well with Brothers MFC-L2750DW multifunction printer, which is designed for the home office or small business customers. Print, fax and scanning options come standard and wireless connectivity makes printing from your smartphone a snap. Use Toner Save Mode for printing less essential documents and automatic duplexing to print on both sides of the page.
LD Compatible Toner Cartridge Series: Compatible HP 26X Black Toner Cartridge
Prints 9,000 pages
Our Favorite Printer: HP® LaserJet Pro M402dn
Why they are the perfect pair:
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Benefits Of Remanufactured Cartridges
There are several benefits to purchasing remanufactured cartridges:
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They tend to be cheaper than OEM cartridges. Per copy, remanufactured cartridges can cost anywhere from 15 to 30 percent less than new cartridges. And the benefits don’t stop thereyou may be able to recycle used remanufactured cartridges back to Quill.
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They’re an environmentally friendlier option because they keep used cartridges from being tossed into landfills. Up to 97 percent of a cartridge’s components can be recycled, so there’s no reason to contribute to landfill waste by purchasing new cartridges every time you run out of ink or toner.
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They’re safe to use. Remanufactured cartridges are thoroughly inspected prior to sale. In the process, any worn or damaged parts are replaced, and the whole cartridge is cleaned before being reassembled. Additionally, it is illegal for a printer’s warranty to be voided by the use of remanufactured cartridges, so there’s no need to worry about missing out on a warranty.
Inkjet Vs Laser Printers: Printer Size
One more differentiating factor that printer shoppers may not consider when comparing printer types is size. Obviously, printers vary in size and design, but on the whole, laser multifunction printers tend to be larger and heavier than their inkjet counterparts. If you’ve got limited space on a desk or shelf, it will be easier to find an inkjet to fit in that smaller space.
Inkjet printers have benefited from some significant advances in miniaturization, with features like print heads built into the ink cartridge. Some, like the HP Tango X are so small as to be portable, measuring just 9.7 x 15 x 3.5 inches and weighing a mere 7.5 pounds.
Laser printers, on the other hand, have to accommodate a larger print drum, laser module and thermal element, which all adds to the bulk. Add multifunction features like scanning and copying to the list, and laser all-in-one printers tend to be pretty bulky.
Takeaway: If space is tight, you might be better off with an inkjet printer.
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Recommended By Our Editors
Still, many inkjet makers don’t publish rated duty cycles, and for those that do, the ratings are generally quite low compared with those of lasers. The maximum paper capacity in inkjets is often as low as 100 sheets, and rarely more than 300, except in the case of certain higher-end office-oriented models. If your printing needs are strictly light-duty, a budget model with a low paper capacity should suffice.
Can Handle Your Monthly Load
Each and every printer comes with a rating for how many pages it can reasonably print per month. This pages-per-month estimate is of particular importance for businesses selecting a workload printer, but it also comes in handy for students and families as well. Sure, youre probably not printing six-thousand pages per month However, you very likely are producing several hundred pages, maybe up to a thousand. Going over your monthly print load overtaxes the mechanics in your printer, and can cause it to break down quicker, which means costly repairs and premature replacement. Monthly load is also a great, low-key metric you can use to suss out how rugged your unit is over time.
Since ink efficiency or a good cost per page is our main indicator of an affordable printer, lets list down some of the ink cartridges that have a low cost per page out in the market today.
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Cheapest Printers For Ink Costs
Over time, you spend more on cartridges than on the machine itself. These ink-thrifty printers will save you money in the long run.
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Consumer Reports’ surveys show that many people are frustrated by how frequently their printer-ink cartridges run out and how expensive they are to replace.
You can take steps to use less ink regardless of what printer you own. But when it’s time for a new machine, it makes sense to buy an efficient model, one that sips ink instead of guzzling it.
Doing that means looking beyond the printer’s sticker price.
Consumer Reports combines the upfront price of a printer with the cost of supplying it with ink or toner to calculate the overall cost of ownership for two to five years. To arrive at those numbers, we use the price of replacement cartridges, ink, or toner data on how much consumers print from our member surveys and measurements of ink consumption from our labs.
The total financial outlay can balloon quickly.
For more information on the replacement ink costs of specific models, along with other test and survey results, members can consult our , which feature more than 200 models.
Uses Compatible Or Aftermarket Ink
When shopping for a new printer, double check to make sure there are lower cost compatible ink replacements available for your printer model from a reputable retailer.
Most original brand cartridges are not cheap. Fortunately, today, there are other options available through several retailers. Third-party aftermarket consumables in the form of compatible and remanufactured ink cartridges offer customers a way to cut their print costs by as much as 50% or more.
Remanufactured cartridges use recycled component pieces, each individually inspected and refilled using the same quality controls as brand name manufacturers. Compatible cartridges are built from scratch to adhere to these same standards, but for a whole lot less.
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Who Has The Cheapest Printer Ink
Cheapest Places to Buy Printer Ink Online499inks claims it has ink cartridges that sell for just $4.99. Amazon, the behemoth of online purchases has an extensive selection of printer inks. Best Buy, offers a wide array of printer ink and accessories from some of the leading brands in the industry.More items
Cost Per Page: Which Is Cheaper To Use
The long-held conceit that laser printing is cheaper keeps hanging on. It can be true, depending on the printers in question, but a business-oriented or “laser alternative” inkjet printer can save you big money on consumables.
True, a set of replacement ink cartridges for a cheap inkjet AIO will likely cost you more than the printer did. But some high-volume inkjet machines are formidable comparisons to like-priced lasers. Take two Editors’ Choice award winners, the Canon imageClass LBP226dw monochrome laser and the Epson WorkForce Pro WF-M5299 . The Canon’s cost per page is a low 1.1 cents, but the Epson’s is an even lower 0.8 cent. Increasingly, in the business-printer market, this is less the exception and more the rule.
Bulk-ink printers are attractive deals, but only if you put out, say, 300 or more pages per monthyou need to print enough to reap the valueand don’t mind that most are relatively low-end home printers. Epson’s new EcoTank Pro line brings the bulk-ink paradigm to the office with units such as the EcoTank Pro ET-5850 that have capacities and features more in line with business needs, including some wide-format models. They’re a little costly up front, but they can satisfy a small office at around 2 cents per page for color or mono. If you put out 500 or more pages per month, especially in color, you can save a bundle versus a color laser AIO.
Epson’s EcoTank Pro inkjets can save you at least a nickel per page versus most color laser printers.
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Hp Officejet Pro 9025e All
The HP ENVY Photo 7155 is a color inkjet printer, copier, flatbed scanner, and fax machine thats another excellent option for business use. It prints fasting, up to 24 papers per minute for black ink and up to 20 papers per minute for color documents, making it an effective solution for offices. The printer can also print and scan two-sided automatically, which can be incredibly convenient and saves time.
The HP Instant Ink option is also available for this model with low ink cost, making it a cost-effective solution since HP ink subscriptions cost $0.99 per month, with recycling and shipping included. The HP OfficeJet Pro 9025e is an inkjet printer that comes with additional features such as scanning to the cloud, email options, as well as document creation from the printer itself.
Pros
- A bulkier option than others
- Paper jams seem to be more common with this model compared to other HP printers.