Networked Printing

Despite the inroads that email has made into the paper-based office, printing volumes never seem to decline. On the contrary, printing often forms a much larger part of the overall running-costs of an office than you might realise. Choice of the right -or wrong- printing solution can have a drastic effect on that budget.

Choice of printers must satisfy four basic requirements:

Suitability for print jobs.

Running costs.

Network compatibility.

Physical siting within office.

A key factor in your choice of printing hardware is that of how much printing you will be doing, in terms of pages per typical day. For the occasional invoice or notice, a low-volume 'personal' printer will serve perfectly well. For higher volumes or the routine printing of lengthy documents, an enterprise-class printer, whilst having higher purchase cost, will easily offset that initial expenditure by way of its vastly lower running-costs, plus the time saved through its higher printing-speed.

The usual mistake is to gravitate towards home-user solutions, without first considering the limitations of such models.

Inkjet Printers: Jack of all trades

Inkjets, the mainstay of the home user, look attractive thanks to their very low purchase price, plus the ability to print in colour. Their main drawbacks are high running costs, add long printing times for bulk jobs. The main cost element is the ink cartridge, which in some models contains only a teaspoon-worth of ink, and which may last only a few tens of pages of dense printout. Cost of inkjet cartridges has reduced considerably, but still varies over an enormous range, from as little as £2 to as much as £50 a cartridge. While inkjets do have their uses, they are a very poor choice for high-volume printing.

Areas where the inkjet does score are the occasional need to print in colour, or the need to print drawings and the like in A3 size, an A3 colour laser printer being a very bulky and costly piece of kit. (Although see later, hire may be an option here)

Inkjets seem attractive because the purchase price is often very low, perhaps as low as £30. BUT -and a very big but- this low purchase price is a deceptive loss-leader, and the manufacturer expects to make many times this amount from costly, high replacement-rate consumables. Thus the real cost of ownership of an inkjet printer bears no relation whatsoever to its selling price.

In a business environment, spending large amounts of money on a personal inkjet printer for every desk is probably the worst way to go. This will lead to high consumables costs, constant service-calls and results that look unprofessional.

Laser is King

Laser printers are the preferred tool for large-volume printing. Buyers are often dissuaded from taking the laser route when they see that not only the printer but also its cartridges are considerably more expensive than their inkjet equivalents. What is not apparent from these raw figures -and the key difference- is that one fill of laser toner will last many times the number of pages you'll get out of an inkjet refill. In fact, if your printing requirements are more than a few pages a day, the laser will pay for itself in very short order. The need for occasional printing in colour used to weigh in favour of the inkjet, but these days the price differential between mono and colour lasers has greatly reduced, making the laser an all-round best option. 

Then, there is the issue of security. Laser printout, being a plastic powder fused to the paper, is unaffected by most erasure methods, and therefore hard to alter without leaving evidence. Most inkjet ink is not indelible, and can easily be be bleached-out to make a hard-to-detect alteration to a document. Thus, only a trusting fool uses an inkjet to print legal documents.

Note: For the sake of brevity I use the term 'laser' here to refer-to any printer which uses optical scanning methods. LED printers also fall into this class.

Professional Image

To the trained eye, the difference between inkjet printout and other technologies is very easy to spot. Inkjet characters are always have slightly fuzzy outlines, unless printed on very costly paper. Most inkjet ink is water soluble, and hence smudges easily. Hence, inkjets are totally unsuited to printing of mailing labels -a point which most businesses should consider carefully.

More importantly, though, your printout sends messages to clients about the nature of your business. If the printout is identifiably from an inkjet, this would certainly not impress me as much as a letter printed on a business-class laser, with sharp, waterfast characters.

The requirements of a business user are for a sharp, professional, water-fast printout, combined with high speed, freedom from niggling troubles, and low per-page cost. These requirements are best met by a laser printer.

Multi-function units:

Lately there has been a trend towards "All-In-One" units which not only print, but also scan, copy and fax. Some of these units are now very inexpensive, and seem an attractive buy. Again, it's down-to volume of printing. Such a unit will probably be ideal for home or very light business use, but don't expect to mass-duplicate your catalogue on it. Or, even print a 100-page legal contract, for that matter.

Since an MFU will typically be expected to double as a photocopier, it should be self-evident that inkjet models will be extortionately costly to run, if used for any more than occasional copying work.

The only class of multifunction printing-unit suitable for heavy business use is one based on laser technology.

On this subject, be aware that not all MFU's in the upper price-brackets are laser models. In some cases a price of £200-£450 reflects the existence of special features like direct photo-printing. Therefore, don't assume that a MFU in this price-bracket will necessarily be a laser model. Always ensure that you understand what type of printing technology you are buying.

Enterprise-grade MFUs will invariably be of laser or similar technology. Budget MFUs are also notorious for badly written driver-software which makes the computer unstable, or which 'takes over' the computer completely whilst printing is in progress.

With most enterprise-grade models the scanning and fax functions can be networked as well as the printing function. With budget MFU's, be aware that in many cases only printing is networkable, the rest having to be operated from a computer directly connected to the machine.

Multifunction Lowdown:

• You seldom get more than you pay for. Sometimes, less.
• If the MFU you fancy uses ink, then think about the limitations before you buy.
• If you need to network all functions -and not just printing- look for an enterprise-class unit.
  

Networking:

Whilst standard printers can be 'shared' between computers using Windows Networking, it soon becomes apparent that this arrangement has its drawbacks. Not least is the need  for the computer 'hosting' the printer to be left powered-on all of the time. A more perplexing problem relates to the complex and oft-misunderstood way in which Microsoft Windows handles user's accounts and access-rights. With shared printers, a trivial change in user-logon, or change in the user's access-rights can give rise to all kinds of unexpected printing-problems.

For this reason, any office of more than two or three users would be better to think in terms of printers designed specifically for network use. These connect directly to a network point, without any intervening computer. This approach avoids most of the the annoying glitches experienced with 'shared' printers.  A slight drawback is the need for an additional network socket for the printer. Against this, independence from the users' computers and a generally more predictable behaviour are the benefits. 

• Preferably, look for a model with an RJ45 socket as standard.
• Otherwise, use a printserver-box.
• Ensure a spare network-socket exists for the printer.
• Use TCP/IP or LPR printing to share the printer, NOT Windows sharing.
  

Hire or Buy:

If the initial cost of a good printer seems prohibitive, or you just prefer to have a no-worries solution, then there are firms which specialise in the hire of business-class printers and MFUs.  Typically these contracts are based on a cost per page, with consumables -including toner- provided as part of the deal. You supply the paper and the computer, but keeping the printer working is the hire-company's worry. Cost is typically 0.5p to one penny per mono page, and 5p to 10p colour. I hardly need add that the colour page-cost compares extremely favourably with the typical pound-per-page of inkjet photo-printing. In fact, while you could achieve somewhat lower per-page costs by buying direct, given the need for printer support in any case, the hire option is a very attractive one.  

To summarise:

Try to envisage the type and quantity of printout which will be required.

If printers need to be shared, check their networkability.

Plan the siting of printers within the building so that users can access them easily.

Before purchasing, check the cost and life-expectancy of consumables.

Don't allow trivial gimmicks to sway your purchasing decisions.

Consider hire if this will reduce capital costs.

Laser, laser, laser.  -Did I mention, laser?

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