TCPglobal - news, views and issues on total cost of printing

Issue #0822/1 - In one of the most exciting developments seen in the field of business inkjet printing for years, brother has announced an A3 format inkjet All-in-One device, the MFC-6490CW, boasting a very high multifunction specification. Although the product is not yet announced in Europe, nor has it reached stores fully in the US, pricing is available for both hardware and print cartridges in the US so comparisons can be made against A3 single function inkjet, A4 multifunction inkjet and A4 multifunction laser devices.

Issue #0821/1 – Following the postponement of this article in favour of last week’s article ("Lexmark in-store inkjet visibility plummets"), we now consider the elusive new home/student range of inkjet devices from Lexmark and see just how expensive the X4650 is in comparison to its competition – Brother DCP-560CN, Canon PIXMA MP610, Epson Stylus Photo RX585 and Hewlett-Packard Photosmart C5280.

Issue #0820/1 – While undertaking research for an article on Lexmark’s recent launch of its new range of Home/Student inkjet devices, we were shocked at how difficult it is to find them in stores (article now to follow next week). So we decided that an impromptu survey was called for. In this article we analyse the share of ‘shelf space’ owned by each of Brother, Canon, Epson, Hewlett-Packard and Lexmark, together with the market conditions, strategies and implications. We see just how many Lexmark inkjet products are available in-store right now. It’s not a pretty sight – for Lexmark!

Issue #0818/2 - Sadly, the claims of most manufacturers need to be taken with a large pinch of salt when the words “affordable”, “lowest”, “smallest”, “fastest”, etc. are used in their marketing literature. In the case of the newly announced C3600 colour laser printer from Oki, the use of some of these terms is unfounded. Even “competitively-priced” can be misleading. Comparing with 10 competitors, Oki does not fair well overall where it really matters.

Issue #0817/1 – Special offers come and go but, as long as Hewlett-Packard does not change its Business Inkjet (Officejet Pro) strategy, there will be no less expensive way to print colour office documents. Current special offers place the Officejet L7480 at less than half price, an opportunity to save up to 42% on office colour printing when compared to a standard inkjet AiO or 60% compared to the least expensive colour laser AiO.