oki color laser

[contaxable]

Hi folks

Can anyone share with me your experience using an oki LED color laser home/office printer?

I am contemplating getting color laser, but budget in sub $500 range for general office printing and maybe, if good enough, some A4 sized pix for fun.

Need to know the following specifically:
1. Compared to inject, is it an economical color printer given it has the cheapest toner catridge refill pricing in town?
2. Is Oki's LED technology reliable?
3. any other good/bad experiences using an oki?

Why color laser? I am tired of having dried up ink wells and clogged inject print heads. My print volume is not heavy in the office usually as i leave commercial printing to a few appointed off set printers for very large volume print runs.

Currently, I heard ishop at cineleisure selling one for $400 and the demo print photo looks decent.

So far, I have owned only HP laser BW printers since 90s. HP hardly fails, but their toner prices are kinda steep. For HP color toner refills, they are quite expensive imo and i cant justify such investment as yet.

Thanks in advance for your feedbacks.

 

[falanks]

Have you considered CISS for inkjets?

 

[contaxable]

Have you considered CISS for inkjets?

Hi Falanks

Sorry for the late reply.

For CISS or CIESS, I will not likely consider. This is an office asset and so I hope to use it for the next 3yrs at least for general ad hoc printing.

I am likely to go for a budget color laser as the toner never really have a problem with clogging or drying up.

i am inclined to think that all the resolution specs are not important as the software that comes with a printer. Interpolation is a powerful tool to transform a 600dpi picture to match its counterpart. I still do not have hard evidence on this, but just heresay.

Cheers!

 

[giantcanopy]

for the usual laser printers, if you are just doing normal daily office prints i think a color laser is great ( not too sure the toner and the drum replacement subsequently will make it worthwhile).

IMHO, they make lousy photo prints ( not talking about lightjet here ) . i have not seen a laser color printout that is anywhere remotely near an inkjet photoprint.

Ryan

 

[Xpose]

For my office, we are using a xerox machine....on lease, if i remember correctly per month you pay about 300++ for the printer and the consumable like ink and paper. Color output from the printer is superb but...lack of the "glossy" and "wet" look of the inkjet. The printer is networkable, come with fax function, copier, color laser, black and white laser, scanner, hardware duplex printing, A3 printing, email pushing. Unless you print frequently if not dun get the xerox machine but overall, just love the machine for it sharpness, color and speed and of coz the no "clog" print head issue. Last time for my company, almost every 6 month we change printer coz of the color printhead clogging problem...

 

[contaxable]

Hi Everyone

Thanks for sharing the valuable info with me wrt your office setup.

I do agree that color lasers pale to injets where picture quality is concerned. The only advantage is the toner catridge does not dry up at all. I had done some comparisons and found that injets and laser color toners are just as costly to operate!

I have recently met a friend who works in HP. From what I needed (occassional print scan copy), he confidently recommended L7380 or L7580. He mentioned that the L series Officejet pro is a scaled down version of professional injets for commercial uses. The ink head is not supposed to dry up easily like its lower end models or other consumer brands. Well, of course, one has to use it often enough to purge the dried ink at the tip of a printhead.

The modern HP injets are designed with a sperate print head just like epson and canon. So clogging will still be a major issue unless one opt for a higher end range like the L7380.

So far, I have quite good experiences with HP from injets to B&W lasers to Color Lasers (other companies i worked for). Looks like i may go back to HP afterall. I will keep you all posted after my purchase (next month).

cheers!

 

[falanks]

Hi TS,

I am curently a user of HP Officejet Pro K550. Like you said, this series is meant for office use but i am using it at home. So far the ink does not clog even though i am a light user. But do note that the photo print of my printer is just ok... not too good... you can check the review on CNET.com.

As for the models of HP you mentioned, i believe it is the same series as mine, just that the L7380 is an AIO.

Regards.

Hi Everyone

Thanks for sharing the valuable info with me wrt your office setup.

I do agree that color lasers pale to injets where picture quality is concerned. The only advantage is the toner catridge does not dry up at all. I had done some comparisons and found that injets and laser color toners are just as costly to operate!

I have recently met a friend who works in HP. From what I needed (occassional print scan copy), he confidently recommended L7380 or L7580. He mentioned that the L series Officejet pro is a scaled down version of professional injets for commercial uses. The ink head is not supposed to dry up easily like its lower end models or other consumer brands. Well, of course, one has to use it often enough to purge the dried ink at the tip of a printhead.

The modern HP injets are designed with a sperate print head just like epson and canon. So clogging will still be a major issue unless one opt for a higher end range like the L7380.

So far, I have quite good experiences with HP from injets to B&W lasers to Color Lasers (other companies i worked for). Looks like i may go back to HP afterall. I will keep you all posted after my purchase (next month).

cheers!

 

[contaxable]

Hi Falanks

Thanks for the heads up. My print requirement for office is mainly logo and color text. Pix quality may be second priority as I would prefer a professional lab to do print and coatings/lamination.

Also, thks for sharing yet another injet model from HP that does not clog up.

Just out of interest, may i suggest you try premium papers (glossy) to bring out the potential of the pictures you printed. But to go to such extent is purely for the fun of it. Lab prints would save all the troubles (ie printer calibration, ink cost, photo paper cost, lamination cost, trial and error costs, etc).