domestic laser printers

[AJH]

I seldom need to print stuff nowadays and long ago decided I would use a local print firm to do any high quality prints of photos etc. as I was fed up with inkjet printers' print heads blocking from lack of use.

So I bought a cheap samsumg clp320 colour laser which worked okay, not very good colour quality but okay for the occasional print, replaced the toners with a "starter" kit as they ran out, because the full size toners were more expensive than the machine, but it started smearing colours over the page. Now it has got low on yellow and of course won't even print in black and white.

Not a problem as I inherited a HP 1300 black and white printer. This, despite giving the toner a shake, now prints faintly in the centre portion. This toner also costs more than a replacement printer.

I am considering just junking them but wondered is there anything I can diy to clean the samsung to stop the toner smearing, is it a problem with the drum needing cleaning?

Else any recommendations for a reasonable, preferably colour, laser I doubt I'll ever need to print more than a ream of so again.

[Bev]

It may be worth you looking again at HP inkjets - not long ago they were offering free for life refills if you only printered 15 pages a month. The refills were sent monthly. You have to connect printer to internet and pay for the extra copies at x pence per page but it may be worth looking into before you make a final decision.

[Tricky Dicky]

A while back when I was in the same position only printing the odd few sheets on a Samsung colour laser buying a full set of toners was well over the price of the printer. I nearly just bought a new one with another starter set of toners. I wish I could do without a printer unfortunately the need to print out the boarding pass and recently a returns notice means having something just in case.

Richard

[tabbypurr]

Sometimes cleaning toner crud of the drum is all that's needed to fix smearing. Can result from a full waste toner collector, or need for a general interior clean. I'm not saying there are no other causes.

Definitely stick with laser/LED. While they're not perfect, inkjets are a mare in comparison. My ancient HPs still work, albeit slow at processing compared to newer machines.

NT

[Rambo]

I have a Clp 320 which had the same problem as yours, clean and wash out the toner collector clean the dust off the drum with a lint free cloth, don't touch it with your fingers and your good to go.

[NY]

We were in the same position: we didn't use our inkjet sufficiently often to keep the ink flowing, so I set a reminder on my phone to print a Windows test page every week. But eventually colours started to fail, and then the black failed. I didn't care about perfect colour reproduction, so I bought cheaper clone cartridges, but being an Epson, it would intermittently refuse to acknowledge that there was even a cartridge installed in one of the bays. And it wouldn't print in black only unless all the colours were present and not empty.

So we bought a laser printer - HP - and the reproduction of colour photos is a lot better than I'd been expecting, given that they say inkjets give more faithful and more subtle gradations than lasers.

We've not had the laser long enough to use up the cartridges it came with, but I'm preparing for "ouch" prices when we need new ones. But they last indefinitely until the toner is used up - toner doesn't "dry up" if you don't print a test page every so often.

And if you get any toner on your clothes, brush and bang as much out as you can, and then wash the item in *COLD* water. *Never* warm or hot, or that will cause the toner to fuse into the cloth as it is designed to fuse to the paper.

[Brian Gaff (Sofa)]

Go to a shop or online company and you can get the toner anddrum cart for most hps at well under 20 quid. Brian

[John Rumm]

You can try cleaning the surface of the drum (soft cloth, and some IPA). Don't do it in bright light. Also clean the rest of the paper path. Printing a solid page of black, and then feeding it through again a few times each way up, can help clean the fuser rollers.

If looking at new, and you want lower running costs, get a mono laser - much cheaper to keep in refiles.

Something like:

also claims to come with full carts rather than "starter" ones.

[alan_m]

Maybe

[Martin Brown]

I have used them before for my Dell and the cartridges were fine. Not quite as photo real as the original Dell ones but I could buy a full CMYK set for a quarter the price of a single OEM toner.

Machine grumbles slightly about warrantee invalidated for using non-OEM toner but it is nearly a decade old now.

[JoeJoe]

I've been using non-original HP toner s for years without a problem.

[Davey]

A few years ago, I was in the same position, and bought an HP Laserjet

200 M251. It just works, and I am still on the starter colour toners.

[Adrian Caspersz]

That's a domestic printer alright. Made for SOHO users and sold on the razor blade pricing model, so not much of an escape from the world of ink cartridges. But you inherited it, so some claw back.

I prefer printers built for offices. They have better ink capacity, larger paper trays and cheaper replacement compatible carts. From companies like printerland.co.uk they are not that much different in cost than what you may find in John Lewis...

Just found a YouTube vid on how to strip Samsumg printers down if it helps.

Disassembly Samsung Laser Printer CLP-320/360 and others

This fellow seems to specialise in lots of other similar videos.

Toner Cartridge Printing Defects: Causes and Solutions

[The Natural Philosopher]

I have been happy with a HP M252n. third party toner/drums sometimes leaves bands or tone variation and isn't always 100% right colorwise,. but its good enough for me.

[Harry Bloomfield, Esq.]

Adrian Caspersz has brought this to us :

I have add an ex-office throwaway HP4000 laser, complete with networking card - it was free for collection. I must have had it for a decade now it has only needed a replacement compatible toner cartridge and paper. It just works when needed, which is not that often. I also have a couple of freecycle SOHO colour lasers, which are needed even less often. For one of them I managed to get a very cheap set of new cartridges. These work via a print server, all in the spare room, all powered via a wireless remote control power switch - so I can turn printers on from anywhere, print, then switch off.

[nothanks]

On 20/05/2020 21:46, NY wrote: ... snipped

...snipped

Sadly it seems that toner "does" degrade. I have an infrequently-used CLP680 colour laser printer and a couple of years ago complained to Samsung that the print colour had become poor. Their answer was that toner does not have an indefinite life. I changed the toners and the problem was solved. FWIW I've always bought my toners from stinkyink

[Chris Green]

It might grumble about Warranty or Guarantee but not warrantee (unless they have the same typo generator).

[Andy Burns]

Don't think that's correct, a "full" 17A cartridge is 1600 pages, they only claim it's supplied with a 700 page cartridge, they do admit it's an "introductory" cartridge further down the page

[John Rumm]

Yup it does give mixed messages... still if it comes with the one not as advertised, go back to ebuyer and ask for what you bought :-)

[Peter Johnson]

I think that must depend on the brand. My first laser, a Ricoh, had organic toner that stopped working with age - it must be nearly 30 years ago now so I can't remember the details. Since then I've used HP LaserJets and they use inorganic toner. The present one, a CP2025, colour, about 10 years old, sees very little use these days and has never, so far, had a problem with the toner.