Xerox Phaser 6125 "What's the Total Cost of Operation"

In 31 years of selling laser printers to commercial accounts, well...I've pretty much seen it all. Over those years I've had many clients who did not purchase a laser printer from me, because they thought my printer was too expensive!

What peeves me the most is when I'm trying to communicate (help) the cost per page of a device or the total cost of ownership of the device. Many accounts will opt for the small inexpensive printers where the manufacturer states "with a maximum duty cycle of 40,000 pages per month" (Duty cycle: the maximum possible number of pages that can be printed per month) I ask you, what the heck does Duty Cycle really mean? Does it mean, I can print 40,000 pages each and every month on this device that only cost me $349 for the printer?

Let me show you what happens if you would print 40,000 pages per month on that device. The first printer device we'll look at is the Xerox Phaser 6125 (whoa, a Phaser, I'll need one of these to fight off the Romulans when Kirk and Spock pick me up later tonight).

I have this neat software package that can actually give the cost per page of most printers and multifunctional products and why shouldn't I. I'm the darn expert. Some software programs may vary in the price per page.

So, this really hot (phaser) Xerox Phaser 6125 sells for $349. While it has a neat print speed of 12 pages per minute for color and 18 pages per minute for black. The black toner cartridge cost for this device is $63.36 with a yield of 2,000 pages. Mind you that the 1,600 pages is based on probably 5% coverage of the page. There are three color cartridges, Cyan, and Yellow are $54.63 each and Magenta is $55.31 each. The estimated yield for the color cartridges is 1,000 pages based on 20% coverage.

Now, you may ask what is 20% color coverage of the page, pretty much if you condensed all of the color print area to one area, it means it can't cover more than 20% of the page. Take a trip here to see color page coverage examples

Back to the color cost per page (we're just gonna focus on the color cost per page), divide the cost of all four cartridges by the yield, and then add em up and you have a color cost per page of .1926. Ok, I gonna print me my  maximum volume of 40,000 pages, so, how much is that gonna cost me? It's gonna cost you $7,704 each and every month, and if you maintain that volume for 36 months, you'll be out a whopping $282,529! WHOA, NOW THAT'S A REALLY BIG NUMBER!

How about if you print all your docs with 40% coverage (go back to the page coverage link for an example). Get a load of this number, simple math it's twice the cost. $565,345 for the total cost of operation and that's about .39 cents per page. YIKES, THAT WILL ALMOST GET ME A RIDE INTO SPACE VIA THE RUSSIANS!

Wanna see more? At 100% coverage the Total Cost of Operation runs up to $1,413,217 and a cost per page for just under ONE DOLLAR. DAM, 1.4 MILLION DOLLARS THAT'S ENOUGH TO GET ME ON THE SPACE SHUTTLE FOR A WEEK!

Hey, I understand that most users don't print all their pages at 40%, and I understand (because I'm in the business) that this printer will might choke a few times before it prints 40,000 pages in one month, however how does the end user know this? There's no disclaimers, well maybe it can do 40,000 pages per month, but at 12 pages per minute that would take almost 55 hours to complete. Point is there should be some type of real measuring stick for these types of devices. Like there's no way on Earth or Romulus that this system will print 40,000 color pages per month every month and I don't like this "Print volume uniformly distributed over 30 days" it's in the fine print of the brochure!

In closing, if you're thinking about doing on 40,000 color pages per month, with 20% coverage on the page, opt for the SAVING MONEY, and call a Print4Pay Hotel member to save you some real cash. Here's a neat link (P4P Cafe) to get a quote on a Really Nice MFP so you can get that Really Expensive Ride to Romulus!!

-=Good Selling=-

New Ricoh 430DN Color Cost Per Page @ .038?

Take a look at this new Color Printer from Ricoh.  Printer Showcase is stating a cost per page of .038 per page!  Strange the numbers I have from Ricoh is .0513 per page for 20% coverage.  All in all .0513 is very inexpensive also, just would like to know how they figured their cost per page?



-=Greetings from the Highlands=-

8 Great Tips for Buying or Leasing a Copier!

Here's an email I received today from "K"

I am desperate for advice. I'm am in the process of leasing a color copier (of which I knew nothing until 2 weeks ago) for a non-profit organization that I work for. I am down to choosing between the Konica-Minolta Bizhub C360, Ricoh Aficio MP C4000 or Sharp MX 3100. We are coming off of a b&w copier with no networking so are really just looking to start up with some basic color copier features with networking that all these machines offer. My main concern now is durability and quality of service. I know that latter will depend on who we lease from but ANY insight to help would be greatly appreciated. THANK YOU!!!!
i.e. Tell me which you would choose!


First, I would rule out the Sharp, and here's my reasoning. Sharp is not a top tier manufacturer when it comes to multifunctional copiers. My experience is that they are inexpensive and built to stay that way, meaning alot of plastic and inexpensive parts seem to be used over and over.

KonicaMinolta and Ricoh are two very good choices. Durability wise...both should be able to last 5 years or longer. Feature wise they are both equal except for a few bells and whistles.

I can't tell you which to choose among these two. What I can tell you is to do a little digging with the company that is trying to sell you these units. Here's some questions I would ask.

1) How long the rep been with that company? The longer the better
2) If buying from a dealer, how long has the dealer been servicing that product line? 2 Years or less = not good
3) Ask for three to five references of service for that model from your reps, and then call those companies and ask them about billing practices, how fast they respond to a service call and if they think the service reps are competent, clean and friendly.
4) Take a trip to their web site, if their web site is out of date, so are they!
5) If you have the resource do a D & B check on them, if they are not paying their bills they are in dire straits and you will be too if you buy from them.
6) Ask for a sales contract for you to review first, read the fine print.
7) Ask for a lease contract to review first, read the fine print (especially about your option to own at the end of the lease)
8) Go see the units, ask if you can go to their location of business to get a demonstration. Seeing is believing, you can get a good look at their operation and if they conduct business in a professional manner.

Hope this helps, if you would like me to review sales contracts and leasing, I can do that also! Visit the New P4PCafe!

-=Cheers=-

Dell Printer Spec Review

- Dell launched three new printers, with the following features:
- All are made by Fuji of Japan (which makes most Xerox copiers and printers)
- Dell 5130cdn is 47ppm A4 top speed full color laser printer for $1549 base MSRP
- 4 tandem OPC drum design
- polymerized toner
- optional paper drawers can make unit floor standing
- optional hanging stapler finisher
- unit’s exterior is dark grey plastic
- 8.5 second first print out time
- 1200x1200dpi
- 800MHz processor
- PCL and PostScript print drivers
- supports up to 216gsm paper weight
- auto duplex up to 163gsm
- Dell 7130cdn is A3 speed LED color printer for $2700 base MSRP (Xerox sells an MFP version)
- Dell 3330dn is 40ppm A4 b/w laser printer for $599 base MSRP

-=Cheers=-

Ricoh Launches SP C820DN for Graphic Intensive Printing

RICOH LAUNCHES AFICIO SP C820DN / SP C821DN SERIES COLOR LASER

PRINTERS FOR GRAPHIC INTENSIVE ENVIRONMENTS

Color Laser Printers Deliver Vibrant Image Quality And Low Total Cost Of Ownership

West Caldwell, N.J., July 22, 2009 – Ricoh Americas Corporation, a leading provider of digital office equipment, today announced the availability of its Ricoh Aficio SP C820DN and SP C821DN Color Laser Printer Series. Ricoh’s newest color laser printers are an upgrade over the previous Aficio CL7200 and SP C811DN models and offer large workgroups an upgraded engine design based off the CL7200 engine, which produces faster warm-up times and first print times. The SP C820DN and SP C821DN eliminates the need for outsourcing as the printers produce high quality prints up to 9600x600 dpi and 1200x1200 dpi at a rate of up to 40 pages per minute for the Aficio C820DN and up to 50 pages per minute for the Aficio C821DN.

Ricoh’s new color laser printers are the perfect solution for graphic-intensive workgroups like marketing departments, print-for-pay vendors, pre-press departments and design agencies looking to produce full-color documents in-house. The SP C820DN and SP C821DN Series comes equipped with numerous professional-grade finishing options like the 1,000-sheet booklet finisher and 3,000 sheet finisher which allow users to produce full-color marketing materials at a fraction of the cost of outsourcing. The printers’ multi-bit printer engine uses true laser technology to achieve photographic quality prints. The SP C820DN and SP C821DN support PANTONE®, ColorSync, and custom ICM and ICC profiles which givesusers the flexibility to keep a wide range of jobs in-house. PANTONE Color Palettes will be available mid. August 2009.

The SP C820DN and SP C821DN not only equip workgroups with the ability to produce high quality output at interpolated resolutions up to 9600x600 dpi but the printers provide users with a combination of fast processing and fast print speeds. Businesses can go here to read the rest of the press release and specs

-=Good Selling=-