Is it logical for me to buy a 400 laser since im a student?

[Old Smuggler]

Is it logical for me to buy a 400 laser since im a student?

i have a POS HP PSC 1510 that every time i go to use it for a paper for school it's out of ink
i dont print much just papers for school and occasional presentation
the ink costs 35 dollars a cartridge and i am geting sick of buying one after 3months
dell has some good lasers that got rated 9.0 by Cnet and are around 400$
i know that laser cartridges are more expensive but you get 5000 pages off the one it comes pre loaded with and they also have 8000 page cartridges available also
this is a color laser so i can still do everything i was doing just longer and faster

is it logical for a student to buy a color laser printer for school purposes and ditch my inkjet?
how many of you use lasers at home ?
i just want to go an extended period of time without having to replace ink

 

[orangezorki]

Maybe.

However, it seems like colour output is not particularly important all the time (correct me if that's wrong). If so, get a $200 Mono laser printer, and keep the PSC for when you need the odd colour sheet or photo (AFAIK, Color laser printers aren't really that good still for photos) - That's what I did.

Davod

 

[Old Smuggler]

yeah i see where your coming from
the psc 1510 i got is a real piece though, it was meant to just get me by in a pinch
i dont do much color either but it would be nice to have that option if i ever needed it i reall dont have the space for two printers

 

[jessep28]

I would just get the $200 mono laser. I bought one before I started college 4 years ago and it has saved me a ton of money in ink over the long run.

Yeah, color is nice, but unless you are printing photos, when is it really needed?

If you can live w/o color, save some $$.

 

[®îçhå®?]

Get a monochrome one and borrow a friends printer for the colour jobs. I'm sure that they will let you do that.

 

[tipdrill407]

Yea, my son is in college and he has a Samsung ML-1740 monochrome laser printer which he got brand new for $89 and it works great, and the toner can spit out manyyyyy pages so it was a great value. Whenever he needs to print in color he'll just ask a buddy or he'll go to staples and pay a few dollars to get it done.

 

[orangezorki]

Unless things have improved over the past year, colour laserjets are still HUGE! You might not see any less desk space taken by a mono and a bubblejet.

David

 

[notjustjay]

I run a Lexmark c510 color laser at home. So far it has been very good.

For a student though I would recommend going with a cheap monochrome laser ($100-150 easily) and, as others have said, find other ways to print in color -- maybe there's a school color laser you can "find", or go to Staples, or use a friend's, etc. The thing with color lasers is that they are still quite large and heavy, and when it comes time to replace toners you have FOUR toners to replace. Each toner is going to cost you upwards of $100. And, at least with mine, you can't just pretend they're full and live with funny-colored printouts -- when one of my four toners goes empty, the whole printer shuts down until it's replaced.

It's come to the point where even color lasers are disposable in respect to the consumables. I'm actually on my second c510n. I ran the first one through two sets of toners (8 in total) and then realized a problem was developing which was causing funny registration marks to show up on my printouts. Rather than replace the toners and fix the problem, I just donated the whole thing away and bought a new one! It's cheaper that way!

When my toners run out again this time, I might shop around for something else. Having color is nice, but not essential...

 

[rockandrule]

Grab an HP OfficeJet Pro K550: color, inkjet, supplies prices less than most lasers, only $200. This printer is a breakthrough in inkjet technology. I have one and love every last bit of it. It's incredibly economical. Around $35 for a 2500 page black ink cartridge.

 

[MajereXYU]

I've bought many Samsung ML-1610 1710 2010 and i can say they awesome bang for the buck.

The toner cartridge that comes with the printer will last for around 1500 pages and then you buy a new one for around 70$ and it lasts 3000 pages!

Great speed (first 2 digits of model name = number of pages per minute so 1610= 16ppm, 2010=20ppm etc..) and the quality for text is second to none.

Don't waste 400$ on a colour one.

Buy a 2010 for like 100$ and print the hell out of it. For color projects, use your old inkjet or go to Staples.

You will not spend the 300$ difference on Staples prints I can assure you.

With the remaining 300$, buy a new nano!

 

[Old Smuggler]

yeah you are probably right i thought id kill two birds with one stone by getting the dell color laser but how often do i need color ?
mostly papers are text
and i have only printed pictures 8 times in my entire life (probably due to cheap picture quality because of cheap printer) might do more if it was better maybe not

just wanted to know last day of dells sale 150$ instant rebate 374$ out the door 9.0 rating cnet with 5000 page yeild on all toners it comes with

what monochrome lasers do you recomend ? the sammy, HP?
i have heard some bad things about brother printers and the guy at the local office depot said okidata toners are hard to come by in this town

 

[tipdrill407]

I'd recommend a Samsung because the printer itself is cheaper and from my experience the toner is cheaper too and can spit out about 3000-5000 pages depending on how often you use the toner saver features. Also I haven't had any reliability problems with them. Sorry i can't recommend a specific because the one i have is discontinued and i'm downloading something right now so my internet is tied up so i don't really want to search. But anything between 100-250 dollars should do.

 

[jessep28]

yeah you are probably right i thought id kill two birds with one stone by getting the dell color laser but how often do i need color ?
mostly papers are text
and i have only printed pictures 8 times in my entire life (probably due to cheap picture quality because of cheap printer) might do more if it was better maybe not

just wanted to know last day of dells sale 150$ instant rebate 374$ out the door 9.0 rating cnet with 5000 page yeild on all toners it comes with

what monochrome lasers do you recomend ? the sammy, HP?
i have heard some bad things about brother printers and the guy at the local office depot said okidata toners are hard to come by in this town

I have a brother HL-1440 and haven't had any issues with it. However, I would advise against buying them b/c they are hit and miss in terms of reliability. A buddy of mine who had the same model for his business, his crapped out on him in 2 months.

On the other hand, HP lasers are fantastic and faster than my brother. If you have a Sam's membership they are usually pretty competitively priced.

Good luck.