Looking for a fast printer

[fred smith]

On Mon, Jan 14, 2008 at 05:15:31PM -0500, Tom Horsley wrote:
> On Mon, 14 Jan 2008 14:57:12 -0600
> Thomas Cameron <thomas.cameron at camerontech.com> wrote:
> 
> > Anyone got any real world experience with good cheap black and white
> > printers that don't cost an arm and a leg to operate?
> 
> I just got a Brother HL-2040 because it was the cheapest B&W laser
> printer I could find, but despite that, it works quite well. It claims
> 20 ppm (I've never timed it), and it just worked after I went through
> some printer alignment to get the margins set (which I documented
> at http://home.att.net/~Tom.Horsley/linux-tidbits.html so I'd
> remember how to do it next time).
> 
> I did notice it has two replaceable parts, the toner cartridge and
> the drum unit, and the replacement drum unit costs more than the
> printer (I don't think I'll ever replace it :-).

Just an added note:
Just over a year ago i bought a Brother HL2070N, pretty much the same
printer as the one Tom writes about above, except the 2070N has 16MB
RAM instead of 8 and has a network port too, and it's not the same
color! :). I think it may have more built-in fonts, but not certain
of that.

I bought it because:
1. it was cheap
2. it was fast,
3. Brother provides open source drivers for it, but
4. it turns out that my LInux (Centos 4.x at that time) recognized
it instantly when I plugged in the USB cable and has "just worked", so
I had no need to mess with the brother-provided drivers.

I got it at Amazon for around $133, but I've seen it elsewhere at
various times as low as $89. A week or so newegg had it for about 
that price.

I'm very happy with it so far, it starts up and prints the first page
from idle standby/poweroff mode in 8 or 10 seconds, and subsequent
pages usually as fast as it can feed 'em. I'm still working on the
original toner cartridge, at somewhat over 1600 pages. the original is
rated for 1500, and replacements at 2500.

You can get both the toner carts and the drum kit for less unreasonable
prices by shopping around, and of course there are the refurbed/refilled
ones for half that. I don't plan to buy a refurb/refilled cartridge, as
they last so long and (when bought from a good discounter) are cheap
enough that it's not worth the risk of a bad refurb. (If I used up a
toner cart every month I'd try refurbs, but as you can see, I don't.)

Fred
-- 
---- Fred Smith -- fredex at fcshome.stoneham.ma.us -----------------------------
    "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of
     heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven."
------------------------------ Matthew 7:21 (niv) -----------------------------
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