Printers

Inkjet or Laser? Essential Tips on Choosing the Right Printer for a Small Business

by Sushant Singh November 10, 2020 0 comments

The world is going digital rapidly with most organizations preferring to do everything virtually instead of face to face. Despite this strong digital drive, there are still some core functions that rely on print-outs or copies. For instance, there will still be a vendor who’d like you to submit signed and stamped copies of various documents that you need to give them, like invoices, vendor agreements, etc. You’ll still need to keep print-outs and keep them in folders for regulatory compliance purpose. There will still be a need to take color print-outs of all your design samples, because they don’t look the same on screen. Which printer would be suitable for each of these needs? Let’s simplify this decision.

First of all, you need to understand that there are two types of printing processes that are the most popular. One is Inkjet and the other is laser-based printing. If you have seen what various printer OEMs offer, then you probably are familiar with the consumer-grade printers that are mostly seen in homes. Those are the inkjet printers. An inkjet printer sprays tiny droplets of ink on paper to print documents, while a laser printer etches the image of a document you’d like to print onto a drum and then transfers it on paper. Each type of printing process affects the printer’s speed, cost, functions, and image quality. Let’s understand which one is suitable for what application.

When to use Laser Printers

Laser printers are mostly seen in offices all over, mostly due to the fact that they can handle high volumes of black and white documents. Businesses will often use laser printers since they can print much faster than inkjet printers. Most are equipped with high-capacity paper trays, so they can print more pages at a given time. They’re also built to handle the printing of thousands of pages per month without succumbing to wear-and-tear. Their per page printing cost is also very low as compared to inkjet printers. This brings down their TCO or Total Cost of Ownership, which makes them ideal for a small business, as it keeps their monthly printing bills under control.

The toner used by laser printers is also longer-lasting, which means the print outs won’t fade or wash away for years. This makes them the perfect choice for printing and maintaining office documents, invoices, etc. for years, which is mandated by law. In fact, laser printers are also used where you need sharp precision, clean printing, and even high-quality graphics in the print-outs. Nowadays, most businesses, be it manufacturing, retail, banking, legal, FMCG, or health have to use QR/Barcodes as a mandate. Laser printers are always preferable for this application to avoid smudging.

Nowadays, there are more compact versions of lasers that are coming in the market, which are ideally suited for homes or small offices. The Neverstop Laserjet series from HP, for instance, is a perfect example of this. It has a duty cycle of around 20,000 page per month, and the cost per page is only 29 paise. It prints 5x more pages out of the box before the first toner reload. In fact, it’s the world’s first printer to come with toner tank technology, which allows you to re-fill the toner yourself in just 15 seconds. The printer also supports mobile printing, allowing you to fire prints directly from your smartphone or tablet over WiFi.

Laser printers are also more precise than inkjet printers because they use a laser to etch out the prints. This makes them a good option where you need to print-out very precise print-outs, such as architectural drawings.

Where Inkjets Shine

With all that being said, black and white or monochrome laser printers don’t print color photos as good as inkjet printers do. They can print basic photos for everyday use, but they’re not built to print gallery-quality photos. For that reason, they’re not optimal for photographers or designers. There are color laser printers also available, which are able to print really good quality color prints, but they’re not really meant for small offices as they’re not as affordable. This is where inkjets come in. They use a nozzle to spray ink on the paper using a combination of colors from ink cartridges. Nowadays, inkjet printers are coming with ink-tank technology, which makes it easy to re-fill the ink in them, and the per-page printing cost also comes down drastically.

The good thing for both business and home consumers is that there are OEMs like HP that offer printers for everyone’s needs. Their printers also come with features like HP SureStart and Run time intrusion detection that makes them safe and secure for offices. Even their home printers offer some of these security features along with the added facility of printing wirelessly using smartphones and tablets with the HP Smart App.

Please check out https://www8.hp.com/in/en/printers/neverstop-laser.html for more info on HP’s Neverstop printers.

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