Fire the Lasers

I was looking to get some printing done recently when I remembered seeing a cheap laser printer advertised on a computer hardware site I sometimes use. So I looked into the price and it was almost as cheap to buy a laser printer, spare toner and paper and DIY the job as it was to pay for printing/copying, and I'd have a printer into the bargain. Needless to say, I was sold.

A bit of rooting about led me to the HP LaserJet 1010. There are other, cheaper laser printers on the market, but having used a fair few different types of printers over the years, I can say, hand on heart, that HP is by far the best. So, when I saw that I could have an HP model for little more than the Samsungs and Brothers I was umming and aahing over, I went for it (having checked the price on replacement toners wsn't crippling obviously).

Anyway, I've just printed about 800 1700 pages in succession and it flew through them. It's not only very fast to first page print, but is fairly rapid over all, it's a pretty small thing too. It was a breeze to set up and while it's not the quietest printer in the world, it certainly gives an inkjet a run for it's money. As for running costs, the toner vs catridge debate actually ends in the toners favour on cost and quality.

The only real negatives I can find is that the paper tray and output bin are quite small (150 sheets), which I overcame by printing 100 pages at a time, but is a little annoying, and that the paper tray is external/exposed and not a slide tray as with it's bigger cousins. That said, for most home/small business applications, where you generally print less than 10 pages at a time, it wouldn't be a problem.

I think it's time people started looking at lasers for home use (especially if you only want b&w), I'm certainly very pleased with this little beauty.