The Cost of Colour


Printer Services Newsletter 4.2

Welcome to the next chapter in our series of newsletters for 2014. As we again close in on the end of financial year don’t forget to be ready for the printing rush. We are always contactable to help you with any queries that you might have regarding your printer or supply needs.  

The Cost of Colour

Or, Do you really need colour? Now with the growing range and reduced prices of laser printers it is tempting to buy a colour laser for the home or office. They can be a great piece of equipment but do you really need a colour machine? If you are thinking of purchasing a new colour laser printer there are some important factors to consider.

Colour printers use four different toner cartridges – 3 colour and 1 black cartridge, therefore the cost of toner replacement is more expensive than that of a black and white laser printer.  Also take note that colour printers will use more consumables than a black and white printer which increases the running cost a lot.

Making the choice to spend more when selecting colour printers can save you money.  As a general rule the more expensive printers have lesser running costs than the smaller less expensive printers.  A higher end colour printer can represent better value for money if you do a high volume of colour printing.  

The Right Colour Machine For You

When deciding which colour printer to purchase here are the important questions you need to answer first.  

How many pages per month do you print?  It is important to match the monthly duty cycle to your printer requirements.  If you chose a printer which is too small you will have reliability problems and most likely be paying too much on consumables.  This will lead to you needing to replace the printer prematurely.

Colour quality?  Do you want standard business colour? Or do you need high quality graphic printing? Business colour is general office documents in colour, ie graphs, proposals and basic presentations.  Graphic colour would be for promotional material such as advertising, brochures and photographs.  Choosing business colour can quite often reduce the purchase price.

Running costs?  Most color printers work out around 14 cents per page or less.  Be aware that this is not the case for the super cheap colour printers which can be as high as 45 cents per page.  These printers are sold cheaply by the manufacturer in the hope of recovering costs by the purchases of consumables.  Cost per page is based on 20% of the page being covered with toner unlike 5% which is used for black & white. If you intend to print a lot of black and white we recommend a second mono laser printer.

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