Issue #0616/1 - Continuing to make laser printing more affordable in both the small office and home, Hewlett-Packard and Dell cement their position at the bottom end of the market with new 12ppm offerings – but they don’t set the world on fire.
Canon is alone in maintaining laser printer engine manufacturing right at the bottom end of the market, with an engine rated at 12ppm. This engine is used by both Canon and Hewlett-Packard in the LBP-2900 and LaserJet 1018 respectively. Apart from these two models, all other entry-level printers are rated at 16ppm or higher.
Canon LBP-2900At this end of the scale, we generally find somewhat basic printers that are targeted at home or unsophisticated personal business use, with few facilities beyond the basic print function. To reflect the bottom end of the market, we have chosen mono laser printers that are 16ppm, or lower.
All are GDI (Host-based) and therefore carry little intelligence in the printer. All the work is done by the host computer, with user-feedback being handled through the PC interface rather than through a costly LCD display on the printer.
Hewlett-PackardLaserJet 1018
Understandably, none are networked as standard, though a network connection is available for all models, if only as an external, third-party device. USB 2.0 is the standard interface on all models.
Paper capacity on most machines of this class is also basic. Only the Brother HL-2030 and Kyocera Mita FS-720 have a healthy 250-sheet input tray, while the rest make do with a maximum of 150 sheets.
Several of the machines are able to handle manual duplexing through the driver. This is achieved by the driver splitting the print job into odd and even pages, printing one set before asking the user to re-feed the pages for printing of the other sides. This is a useful function to have but is likely rarely to be used, except in the case of special projects, because of the hassle factor of re-feeding the sheets.
In addition, while Canon’s LBP-2900 and the Konica Minolta PagePro 1400W do not offer manual duplex functionality, Brother offers users n-up printing (printing more than one page per side of paper) and poster printing capabilities.
Dell 1110Dell has just removed its 14ppm mono laser printer 1100 from the market and re-launched it (this week) as a 16ppm device, laser printer 1110, at a 25% price premium but with the same toner priced at the same level as the 1100.
This just about sums up the nature of the printers in this class, the nature of which is to be affordable and compact, meaning that there is little to differentiate the machines apart from the 250-sheet paper input capacity of the FS-720 and HL-2030 and the manual duplexing capability of all but the Canon and Konica Minolta machines.
However, when pricing and Total Cost of Printing is brought into play, there is almost always something to differentiate.
Basic printer purchase price puts Hewlett-Packard’s LaserJet 1018 as the lowest cost printer in the group, at £79 / €117, by a margin of 10% from the Konica Minolta and Brother printers.
When considering Total Cost of Printing, other factors are involved, of course.
One of those factors is that most of the devices here are quoted as having a maximum duty cycle of at least 9,000 pages – and the FS-720 is as high as 12,000 pages. Only Brother does not quote a duty cycle but, given the nature of the HL-2030 with its high paper capacity and more advanced printing functions, it would be very surprising if it were less than 10,000 pages per month.
However, Hewlett-Packard’s LaserJet 1018 is quoted with a 3,000-page duty cycle, one-third to one-quarter of the figure quoted for the other printers.
Certainly, at this end of the market, printers are unlikely to be used for much more than a handful of prints each day, meaning a monthly volume that would probably be hard-pressed to exceed 1,000 pages, almost 50 pages per day, let alone 3,000 pages. So, the low duty cycle is unlikely to be a major problem except to high volume users, who should probably be choosing a printer with higher duty cycle anyway.
| UK – Mono | Purchase | Print Speed |
Nominal CPP |
Long-term CPP over 3 years |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hewlett-Packard LaserJet 1018 | £79 | 12 ppm | 2.30 pence | 2.42 pence |
| Brother HL-2030 | £89 | 16 ppm | 1.94 pence | 2.04 pence |
| Canon LBP-2900 | £90 | 12 ppm | 2.55 pence | 2.70 pence |
| Dell 1110 | £69 | 16 ppm | 1.95 pence | 2.15 pence |
| Konica Minolta PagePro 1400W | £88 | 16 ppm | 2.27 pence | 2.48 pence |
| Kyocera Mita FS-720 | £122 | 16 ppm | 0.87 pence | 1.20 pence |
Note that for this group of printers, the long-term Cost of Printing over three years shown in the accompanying table is calculated on the basis of 1,250 pages per month; is based on the use of maximum capacity supplies; takes into account any standard, or starter, supplies shipped with the device; and also includes the cost of purchase. All prices are manufacturer’s recommended prices without tax.
In our cost comparison (accompanying table), to provide for the needs of a range of users, we’ve presented figures at three different page volumes - based on a very low monthly throughput of 100 pages per month (5 per day), to reflect home usage; based on 500 pages per month (25 per day); and then based on 1,250 pages per month (around 60 per day) to reflect a reasonably busy individual working from home or in a small office environment.
Users with the lower page count are more likely to be swayed by the lowest purchase price in the hope that the toner might never need changing – or at least changing only once or twice a year – while busier users should be considering the overall Cost of Printing and considering the total outlay over a period of ownership.
In fact, at the lowest page count used, a user could run most of the machines with just one replacement toner. This creates its own difficulty for the PagePro 1400W, in that the 1000-page starter toner means the user would have to buy two toners, and also for the FS-720 because its new 6000-page toner would hardly be touched after three years.
For these reasons, these two printers appear to be the most expensive overall at such a small page count. In particular, it means that the Kyocera Mita is not the printer to buy for a very small number of pages per month. However, for a higher volume a pages, it rapidly becomes the most economical by a long way because its high toner capacity and low toner cost significantly offset the slightly higher purchase price. And, for the PagePro 1400W, the Cost of Printing falls into line with the others in the group.
For the two main subjects of this comparison though, the relatively high toner costs mean relatively poor economy, despite attractive purchase prices. Hewlett-Packard has positioned its LaserJet 1018 as the lowest cost machine to buy while Canon adds high purchase price to its high toner cost to create the most expensive machine in the group for all but the lowest page volume.
Cost per Page
One factor that works in favour of both Hewlett-Packard and Canon is that the supplies for these new machines have not been keyed to fit these machines alone. Neither manufacturer has repackaged the toner for the new printer release, as would be expected, to create a new cost centre for a new printer.
With the LaserJet 1018 being a part of the LaserJet 101x family, Hewlett-Packard has retained a family identity for these entry-level personal printers. The Q2612A toner that fits all of the previous 101x series printers also fits the new LaserJet 1018. Likewise, Canon’s 703 toner cartridge follows the same pattern, fitting the new LBP-2900 as well as recent LBP offerings.
This means that existing owners of LaserJet 101x family printers or similarly-engined Canon printers, can buy either of the new models in the knowledge that only one toner cartridge needs to be stocked to fit all machines (brand specific). Alternatively, if a customer is replacing an older machine, any cartridges held in stock will not be wasted.
Put into perspective, as long as the page volume is reasonable, the Hewlett-Packard LaserJet 1018 is a fair machine unless the low duty cycle is a problem – with Total Cost of Printing falling in the middle of the pack.
Canon’s LBP-2900, on the other hand, comes out worst on almost all fronts, both cost and functionality.
For selection of a low-end printer though, with its high duty cycle, high capacity toner and high capacity paper tray, the Kypcera Mita FS-720 is probably a far more attractive option all round than either LaserJet 1018 or LBP2900 – as long as monthly page count exceeds 300 pages.
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