Laserjets

[frozen.fish 0]

Hello!can anyone tell me what is the difference between laserjets and inkjets? I know laserjets are more cost effective for tons of printing but ink refill here cost really cheap, I'm not very sure with laserJets though if it can be refilled or something?Thank you!

[rvalkass 5]

A LaserJet is a brand of printers made by HP. An inkjet is a generic form of printer.The LaserJet series work in the same way as a photocopier. A drum is charged unformly, then areas of charge altered with the laser. Toner is then applied to the drum, sticking only to certain areas, and is then transferred to the paper, giving you a copy of the doucment (usually in black and white). They use dry toner powder, which needs replacing when used up, and the drums also need replacing every so often.An inkjet uses liquid ink and small nozzles to blast the ink at the page in the right places. This is slower than a laser printer, and often more expensive when doing large print runs.

[frozen.fish 0]

thank you so much for enlightening me. now I know laserjet, I always thought laserjets were the ones used for printing reciepts in mcdonalds. :Pso laserjets, still have far more expensive inks right? vs. those moded continous ink flows or cheapo refillable inks.

[rvalkass 5]

thank you so much for enlightening me. now I know laserjet, I always thought laserjets were the ones used for printing reciepts in mcdonalds.

They're thermal printers (they burn the text onto a special type of paper).

so laserjets, still have far more expensive inks right? vs. those moded continous ink flows or cheapo refillable inks.

The toner cartridge is more expensive, but they last much longer. I think the cost per print from a laser printer is much less than from an inkjet printer.

[k_nitin_r 8]

thank you so much for enlightening me. now I know laserjet, I always thought laserjets were the ones used for printing reciepts in mcdonalds. :XD:
so laserjets, still have far more expensive inks right? vs. those moded continous ink flows or cheapo refillable inks.

Yeah, McDonalds uses thermal printers and not laser printers. Those are less likely to breakdown since the printers are quite simple, and it's easy for them to get the cashier to change the paper - it saves them the cost of hiring tech support for changing printer toner.

The toner of a laser printer costs less than the ink of an inkjet printer because it lasts longer. Besides, the print doesn't come off if you accidentally spill water on it! Color laser printers are quite expensive though, so if you don't print often and you need to print in color, then an inkjet is what you're looking for.

If you choose to go with re-fillable inks, you do sometimes get a pretty good deal with an inkjet too. Ink catridges for some Lexmark and Canon printers costs just about as much as a re-fill so you might want to consider those instead of an HP or an Epson printer.

[Dook-E 0]

ICosts of laserprinters are dropping though and more and more people buy them as they are cheaper in the long run. The big difference is the price of the printer itself, people see a very cheap inkjet, don't want to spend a big amount on it and buy it, later on they have to take a second mortgage to pay off their cartridges. Because that's where most inkjet producing companies get their profits from: the cartridges.

Now, a couple of years ago prices for laserprinters were indeed quite high and thus only considered for small businesses or offices or people who are self employed, etc. This because they really have to print a lot and the costs per printed page are lower with laserprinters.

Other advantages:
- Faster than ink, because it doesnt have to be sprayed line per line but the little granules get 'burned' onto the page
- More precise, thanks to the laser. Inkjet spills tiny drops on the paper which leads to fuzy edges now and then which can be seen on fonts primarly.
- Less replacement. However the cartridges are more expensive, they last A LOT longer so you don't have to run to the store every now and then.
I do have to add the following, for images, inkjets are still seen as having better quality and being more cheap as color laser printers. Check it out for yourself though at the bottom.

Theres also the fact that the range of printers has become so wide nowadays because theres all in one printers, standalones, inkjet, laser, and a couple of weeks ago a new technology was added to that but I forgot the name
I took the liberty of looking up some things on a Belgian computerwebstore called Alternate.com just to give some examples:

On this page you can see the inkjet printers, with resolution, dpi ("quality"), which paper formats it can print on, how it connects to your computer, even the level of sound it makes  , and the price. Click on the arrows arranges all the printers by price (up/down), by resolution (up/down) etc. Unfortunately printing speed is not included here. As you can see these vary a lot and prices for the basic printers range from 70-100 and than a jump to 300 or more. For a multifunction with the same price as a normal inkjet, the resolution will be of course a lot lower. If you click on one of the printers you get the specifications (printing speed is in 'uitgebreide specificaties) and all the equipment (cartridges) that go with it.

I chose this one, just a regular and cheap All in one printer, looks good, and its all in one, its HP so can't be bad, "looks like a mustbuy!".

The black cartridge costs 27 for 600 prints, the colour one 32 for roughly 440 prints.
Lets compare this with a laserprinter. Here you get the ppm instead of the dB, the rest of the specifications are the same. This is because laserprinters are, because of the technology, more quiet than inkjets. Nevertheless, I think this should be added for inkjets as well, but thats not the point atm so lets move on.

I wanted to go for HP but the laserjets they make are, as said here before, usually professional equipent and prices go through the roof there  There are however always one or two models that are 'buyable' (around 300).

If you want to take a color AIO you can pay up to 8000. So either you take a cheap AIO and have only black or you take a cheap color and don't have the AIO solution.

For instance the cheap color laser will cost you 199 and the cartridges are not that expensive either but they only give you up to 1500 pages per cartridge.

If you want to have a cheap printer and cheap printing, I'd go for Brother or Samsung.
Brother offers very cheap printers that go up in price gradually depending on your needs, a simple black laserprinter will cost you a hundred euros, 40 euro toner for 1500 pages.

This one is a color laser and costs u 400. The cartridges? 52 for 2500 pages in black, and per color cartridge you can print 1500 pages for 65. 195 for 4500 coloured pages that is. So in the long run, you save money on the prints and cartridges either way.

As for the rest it all comes down to what you want. I've get a Dell AIO here and if I chose draft quality the pages shoot out, on my HP Photoprinter it takes ages, even with low quality.

Speed is generally better on lasers, but not always, color for pictures is generally better on inkjets, but not always. The only thing that is for sure is that if you print a lot, lasers are the way to go.

In general monochrome printing will cost you about $0.02 per page for a laser printer and $0.15 for an inkjet printer.