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Laser Printer Buying Advice

B

blasto333

macrumors regular
Original poster
I am looking for a black and white laser printer that is reasonably priced that works well with Mac OS X.

The printer must be very reliable and not run out of toner fast. If anyone has a laser printer they love let me know.

Thanks,

Chris Muench
 
Check out Dell's outlet store. I've got a 3100cn that I love (it's color, so probably not what you're looking for, but I've never had any trouble with it, and it was a great price).

-Colin
 
I am going to pickup a Lexmark 522n very soon. It is color, and costs around $380 from newegg. There are some bw samsungs that seem to get great reviews there, and the price is very good. I opted for a color, in case I need/want it. With the lexmark, and many others, you can disable color printing if you wish.

Kimo
 
I have had 3 laser printers in the last 11 years. My first was back in 1995 with a Brother HL-630. Was okay. Got a NEC 870 in 1999 and that thing ran for 6 years. Then last year got a Brother HL-5140. For text Lasers cannot be beat. The latter 2 were also pretty good at graphics.
 
bodeh6 said:
Then last year got a Brother HL-5140. For text Lasers cannot be beat.
Click to expand...
Agree with you about the Brother 51 series printers. Personally, I have the Brother HL-5170DN (with built in networking).

Works great with Mac OS X.

Also works with Mac OS 9, Newtons, WinXP, Win2K, etc.

Pretty cheap too:

- About $190 at Tiger Direct
 
I own a Samsung color laser printer and I often wish I didn't. It was cheap, features duplexing, and is quieter than most color lasers, but that's where the advantages end. I would never buy another laser printer without some form of Postscript, either real or emulated. The text and halftone quality on non-Postscript printers is a big disappointment. If you're looking for an inexpensive monochrome laser printer, I'd recommend considering a used HP LaserJet with Postscript. We've been running a 5MP for many, many years. They can last virtually forever, and the toner cartridges are cheap.
 
i have had a brother 5050, HP 1200, HP 1300, and I strongly recommend the HPs.

I still use all three, but the brother has decided to stop playing nice with my airport and i have tried everything. they are just not as mac friendly imo.

HP also has a duplex printer in the same 1300 line that my neighboor has and loves, but he uses it with a pc. i would assume it would work just as well, and duplex can be a great paper saver.
 
Hp 1020

I just have to chime in here:

I have the HP 1020, currently priced at $99.00 at New Egg. Although it says it is not mac compatible, after some research on Amazon I learned that the mac driver for the hp 1022 (downloadable from HP) works. This set up was easy for me to install and get working, and does work for me with the Mac OS. I cannot say enough good things about the printer: It is small, fairly quiet, doesn't make my lights flicker and the cartridge seems to last and last.

I bought this printer from a bricks and mortor Staples store (for $79 with rebate) so I could return it if there was a problem. There were no problems!
 
STAY away from the Samsung ML-1720 Laser.

F***er clogs too easily, and only will allow you to insert around 10 pages without clogging to death trying to suck them all in. 😡 This is our work printer, and its a pain in my ass.

I humbly recommend the HP Laserjet 5. Mines over 8 years old, and is still churning happily.
 
To the OP, some things to consider:

Paper feeding. Personally, I prefer a full sized internal paper tray plus a manual feed capability verses just an external or semi-external paper tray so common in the small laser printers.

Duplex printing is a nice feature and a paper saver.

Some printers are very noisy when sitting idle. You might want to check this out if noise level is important to you.

Another area to consider is how hard is it to change the drum and ink cartridges? Most are fairly easy when it comes to the ink cartridges. However, replacing a drum is another story. Granted drum replacement is not often needed unless you use your printer a lot.

Postscript compatibility is important for good text and graphics.

And since you are using Mac OS X, make sure the printer can connect via Rendevous. It makes setting up the printer very easy.

Suggest that you get built in networking if you want to share the printer.

Lastly, there are many little features which can make difference. Things such as straight through printing, simple multiple envelope feeding, paper holding tray that works, can handle Legal sized paper, easy to trouble shoot or clear a jam, simple indicator lights, etc.

Hope this helps.
 
I have the Brother 2070-N. Bought it at Staples for $150. It has a built-in network port, as well as both Parallel and USB ports. The paper tray does not protrude from the front of the machine (my main reason for buying it), holds 250 sheets of paper, toner cartridge is rated for 1,500 prints, and drum is rated for 12,000.

It starts up really fast (less than 10 seconds) and starts printing, then shuts off shortly after (1 minute?, never really timed it). When it's off, it makes no noise at all, when it's on you'll definitely hear the fan going, though.

I only use it to print online receipts, registration info, movie tickets, etc... Works perfectly for that purpose. It support Mac OS 9 and 10.4+. This is the product page for it at Brother's website.
 
We have a Hewlitt-Packard 2200D in our office and it works pretty damned well, we've had it for five years and it still pumps out several thousand pages a year for us. Toner is pricey (around $100/cartridge), but you can buy refill kits for $8 a pop that are pretty good as well, though if you reuse the same cartridge long enough, you get some noticeable defects in image printing (fade lines and the like). Text printing is still sharp as hell, though.
 
I have the Samsung ML-2010.
I have found it to be good quality for B&W text printing and reasonable from the standpoint of toner expenditure.
It is currently on sale for $80 at Microcenter; I have seen it even in the $70 price range at times online.

I was also able to set it up with my Airport Express for wireless printing, though this has had some glitches lately. However, I have also had trouble with AirTunes so I suspect the problem may actually be the Express & not the printer.

Nonetheless, I have been very happy with this printer - in fact, I just got my parents to buy one for use with their iBook.

Best wishes!
 
If you don't mind used printers, try an HP LaserJet 5M. I bought one off ebay for $25. Easy to work on, toner readily available and works with OS9 and X without any issues. They show up for free on craigslist on occasion also.
 
pjarvi said:
I have the Brother 2070-N. Bought it at Staples for $150. It has a built-in network port, as well as both Parallel and USB ports. The paper tray does not protrude from the front of the machine (my main reason for buying it), holds 250 sheets of paper, toner cartridge is rated for 1,500 prints, and drum is rated for 12,000.

It starts up really fast (less than 10 seconds) and starts printing, then shuts off shortly after (1 minute?, never really timed it). When it's off, it makes no noise at all, when it's on you'll definitely hear the fan going, though.

I only use it to print online receipts, registration info, movie tickets, etc... Works perfectly for that purpose. It support Mac OS 9 and 10.4+. This is the product page for it at Brother's website.
Click to expand...
Yep, the Brother 20 series is good too.

The new Brother models work well and are simple to maintain.

HP's are worth a look as well. But not all models are good. HP quality has gone down hill since the 5 series.
 
Brother HL1440

I have a Brother HL1440, and I have to say it was the best purchase I have made. It is not the prettiest or the fastest out there, but I haven't had any problems in the last 3 years. I do a lot of printing and I have only recently changed the toner. It was pricey $60, but once every few years is not bad, and the replacement cartridge has twice as much toner as the stock cartridge. I would like double sided printing sometimes, but honestly turning the pages over is not that big of a hassle. I don't know if they still produce this model, but you may be able to find it left over someplace like Amazon.
 
AstrosFan said:
I have the Samsung ML-2010.
I have found it to be good quality for B&W text printing and reasonable from the standpoint of toner expenditure.
It is currently on sale for $80 at Microcenter; I have seen it even in the $70 price range at times online.
Click to expand...
I was thinking about recommending this printer but wasn't sure what the OP plans on using this printer for. 😱

As a student who only prints out papers or whatnot, the print quality isn't an issue for me (although I doubt whether or not I could even distinguish between differing qualities).

I love my Samsung ML-2010. Watch the prices online; I was able to get mine for about $20 after rebates. 😀 Not bad, eh? Although MSRP on a refill/ new toner cartridge is about $80, a lot of people online have reported that buying toner and refilling it yourself (about $5-$15) will more than suffice. I dunno because I just got my printer in January 2006, but it prints relatively quickly, isn't very big. Two cons (one of which I see mentioned a lot but doesn't impact me at all); 1) holds a max of 100ish pages and 2) can be noisy at times. If you finish the print job it'll idle noisily for a few minutes before getting near-silent again.
 
I've been using a Brother HL-2040 I got for around $40 new after a rebate on Amazon. My parents use HP 1022's and they're much nicer. The Brother does the job, though, and it's lasted a year of college paper and music printing without running out of toner.

Edit: Looks like someone else watches for rebates and sales, eh Devilot?
 
Oh man, I remember my NEC 870. It just woudn't die!! 🙂 I eventually gave it to my brother, were it finally stopped working. (actually it just wouldn't automatically grab sheets of paper, so I could probably fix it).

Kimo

bodeh6 said:
I have had 3 laser printers in the last 11 years. My first was back in 1995 with a Brother HL-630. Was okay. Got a NEC 870 in 1999 and that thing ran for 6 years. Then last year got a Brother HL-5140. For text Lasers cannot be beat. The latter 2 were also pretty good at graphics.
Click to expand...
 
I picked up a Brother HL-2040 for $60 at my local Office Max last week after reading this thread... and boy, do I love it! I was getting really tired of flakey inkjet printers and hadn't realized that laser printers had come down in price so much. It spits out print jobs much quicker than an inkjet, and includes a toner cartridge that's good for 1500 pages! Life is good.
 
i am in the same boat...
I am looking for one under 100 pounds...
So do most samsung printers work with macs? because the site i was looking at says the cheapest model doest work with my macbook and after one dud (as in it won't work with my mb) canon (not my fault, my sister bought it before the mb dream came through). I am not risking anything.

http://www.printerbase.co.uk/monopr...llel=All&network=All&duplex=All&submit=Search

I am thinking of the brother (2nd from top) but I'd love the minota (3rd from top) but does anyone know whether it is mac compatible? it says its not... otherwise does anyone know of a printer of comparable tiny size? I live in the eves (slopy roofs) so I can only fit something small in ym work area!


Thanks.
 
pjarvi said:
I have the Brother 2070-N. Bought it at Staples for $150. It has a built-in network port, as well as both Parallel and USB ports.
Click to expand...

Hey, we're brother brothers. I got one too. Printing through your wireless network is pretty cool. I definitely recommend it.
 
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