Printing?

Laser printers don't necessarily mean a lot of money if you go for monochrome. I've found mine to be a lot more cost effective than any inkjet printer I've ever owned! Much much much faster as well.

I bought mine prior to going to uni just around 2 years ago and paid around £40. The ink lasted for a good 3000 pages and I can print a set of 10 pages for a lecture in just under a minute. I had to replace the toner the other week for I think about £17 and that's including delivery from an Amazon trader. That should last me around 4000 pages but based on the last toner ( a sample one, usually 2000 pages) hopefully a bit longer than that. On the price of £17 the cost is roughly half a pence per page. Include price of printer into that and it quickly goes up, but the more you use it the cheaper it gets. Include the price of replacement toner and having not used much of that the price of page is still under 2p which is the cost of a black and white page on a university printer. It pays for itself in convenience.

There's no real need to have colour lecture notes 99% of the time, mono will do. For when colour is needed, head to the university pc clusters. A colour laser printer is going to cost you a lot, probably in excess of £130, but a nice luxury if you're willing to splash out.

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/140044 - Recommended. A bit pricier though than the model I have which they no longer sell

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/148076 - Should be just as good and at a better price. Not used a Samsung before though so not sure what they're like.

If you do get one, ensure you look around and buy a compatible toner as buying the official ones is where it does get expensive.

If you'd read my post properly, you would have understood that I was saying that laser printers are more cost-effective and faster than inkjet printers. However, 90% of printers that students bring to Uni with them will be inkjet because they are the cheaper printer to buy and students will always go for cheap won't they? Hence I said that the OP would be better off just using the laser printers on campus instead of getting ripped off for individual ink cartridges and paper or splashing out on your own printer.

I think that it may be you who needs to follow the example of reading posts again.

If you do, you'll see you never mentioned anything about having your own laser printer other than 'forking out a lot of money for your own'. If you then read my post, you'll notice I disputed that they cost a lot of money. That said, it is a matter of opinion what is a lot of money for a printer. Considering you're looking at £45 for a decent inkjet, £30 for a basic thing, I would say that they are not expensive, particularly when evaluating the long term advantages over inkjets. Regarding students going for cheap, it's not always the student who buys the printer. Often parents will buy that kind of thing as a moving in present - I know plenty of people whose parents did this for them. Furthermore, I actually sold some whilst working at a major electronic chain. Some students have very nice printers indeed! Certainly not the cheapest! I would agree that 90% of students would have an inkjet, I’m probably in a small minority of people who do have laserjets.

I don't recall you mentioning faster? Nor did you argue that laser printers are in general better just that the clusters have laser printers which are cheap to use. Doesn’t mean they don’t cost the university a lot, which is beside my point because they’re definitely a lot cheaper than inkjets would be. On the matter of understanding that you’re saying they’re more cost effective and more efficient – this isn’t strictly true, although if I do understand it’s likely to be because I’ve sold the things and have experience using them myself.
If you read my post again, I argued that in the long run buying a laser printer is roughly the same as using a cluster printer. I didn't mention the convenience factor, but that's another thing to look at. How would the original poster feel about having to walk up to campus every time they print something? Admittedly, I didn't include the cost of a bit of paper in my calculations. 500 pages of Tesco Value paper for just under £2.00. 0.4p per page.

Regarding getting ripped off - that's why I advocated getting a laser rather than an inkjet. That's also why I warned she look for compatible toner rather than original manufacturer toner due to the difference in price - up to 3x as much for original.

All in all, it's a matter of how much you value having your own printer. Having to go to a cluster each time I wanted to print something would drive me mad. That said, I also use my printer for personal stuff, so sometimes I would have a 35 minute round trip to go and print something off. I consider a printer a necessity. Whether the original poster should buy one is reflective of how much they value a printer of their own. My argument was that it isn't necessarily expensive to own a laser printer, and offered a cost breakdown.

I apologise if my posts upset you but I’m merely answering the question as helpfully as I can. I apologise if I’ve repeated anything you’ve said, although personally I would argue I haven’t. Ultimately, it doesn’t really matter because the more this is discussed, the more information the original poster will receive. An example from this post – I picked up on the fact I excluded paper from my calculations.

Because you said I said the same thing as you in a manner I deemed provocative, when I felt I was saying something different. I'm arguing for something slightly different to you - go for a laser printer. You're arguing for no printers at all, I'm saying it doesn't have to be that way because they can be cost effective, and not that expensive either. You're ultimately arguing that they're not, but again as we have both now said many times it's a value judgment, and I'm giving the points for having one.

By basic thing I mean the entry level inkjet is £30. I forgot the price of the entry laser, £45, same as a decent inkjet. I was trying to equate the two as being pretty much similarly priced these days.


As you say, it's down to personal preference, I would feel irked if I had to make special detours to use a cluster printer. Then again, I'm usually at my home on my laptop doing work so it's convenient to be able to print on the word go. I find with my laserjet I have to replace the toner every 2 years, ink isn't a problem for me. My printers have always been paid for by myself, as have the toners at £17 a pop - of which I've only ever needed the one. As for planning ahead, as your second paragraph alluded to, I like the convenience of not having to do so. It's a cost I'm more than willing to pay - but then I'm more prone to wasting money on technological goods than most.


And the person that is asking the question appears to have neither. So I'm half agreeing with you - don't bother with expensive inkjets, but at the same time don't ignore laserjets, they're brilliant! That's what I'm trying to do, your argument takes inkjets, lumps them in with laserjets and targets them at the same time.


Which brings me back to my post number one, my original objective - to challenge that lasers are much more expensive! Only when you look at colour lasers do they become seriously expensive. But again, the value judgment issue comes in here. To me, £15 extra on a printer isn't much more expensive, clearly to you it is.

Wow! this is a pretty intense debate... about printers