Laser colour printer better than an inkjet?

[Layback Bear]

There are a lot of articles about that on the web. Here is one: Warning: Laser Printers Could Be a Health Hazard | PCWorld

Thank you whs; that is good information.

 

[whs]

You are welcome.

 

[johngee]

To get back to the original question, I've just been through this. I had two Canon inkjet printers (Pixma 4500 and Pixma Pro-1). The small Canon was beginning to suffer with permanently blocked nozzles and really needed a new printhead that would cost considerably more than a new A4 inkjet, and I now use the Pro-1 for all my high quality colour anyway. So I replaced the small Canon with an OKI C511. Actually it prints better colour pictures than you might imagine! Initially I went a bit mad and printed all those downloaded pdf's of instruction manuals and the like. However the down side is that the toner life is calculated on the basis of 5% coverage, and you don't need much in the way of solid colour or grey or black to hugely exceed that. The black starter toner cartridge (supposedly good for 2000 pages) is almost depleted at less than half that. Having said that the 7000 page black toner sells at about 70 UKP here so even if you only got, say, 4000 pages from it, that's about 1.5 pence (around 2 US cents) per side, which I guess is a good deal lower than an inkjet.

Incidentally the print head of the old Canon started to give problems after "feeding" it with third party inks. I won't be doing that again.

 

[BomberAF]

...

Did you know that many laser printers are very unhealthy. They should never be operated in rooms where people live or spend any amout of times. The fumes from the cartridges are extremely toxic - they say.

This is true. Those fumes are bad.

Every source I read said they could be bad, not are bad. Also, the concern was with particulates, not fumes. Too much of anything is bad for you. Even water can kill you if you drink too much.

The 'fumes' you talk about are in fact ozone that is created by the laser causing 3 oxygen atoms to fuse together.

 

[nilank]

...

This is true. Those fumes are bad.

Every source I read said they could be bad, not are bad. Also, the concern was with particulates, not fumes. Too much of anything is bad for you. Even water can kill you if you drink too much.

The 'fumes' you talk about are in fact ozone that is created by the laser causing 3 oxygen atoms to fuse together.

Oh, good to know. BTW, I like its smell, really love it, lol

 

[johngee]

I mentioned a couple of posts or so ago the expected coverage of a printer, and that my OKI C511 had printed considerably fewer pages than expected from its black toner cartridge. Yesterday I was browsing the site of a UK supplier of ink and toner (Stinkyink) and found this:

What does 5% page coverage look like? | Stinkyink Blog

which is quite revealing - the "5%" standard is rarely realistic.

BTW the OKI has LED's - no laser induced ozone!

 

[bobkn]

I mentioned a couple of posts or so ago the expected coverage of a printer, and that my OKI C511 had printed considerably fewer pages than expected from its black toner cartridge. Yesterday I was browsing the site of a UK supplier of ink and toner (Stinkyink) and found this:

What does 5% page coverage look like? | Stinkyink Blog

which is quite revealing - the "5%" standard is rarely realistic.

BTW the OKI has LED's - no laser induced ozone!

As far as I know, there is no difference in ozone generation between laser and LED printers. The ozone comes from the high voltage charge needed to attract the toner to the drum.