Most laser printers or AIOs include an Ethernet jack, and some integrate Wi-Fi. Models with fax functionality will have a phone-line interface. AIOs provide copying and scanning in addition to printing, and in some cases, fax capabilities, too. While the vast majority of new inkjets (barring photo printers) are AIOs, with lasers you'll find an abundance of both single-function printers and AIOs as you shop. In higher-quality lasers, the overall output quality for text, graphics, and photos is typically good enough for brochures and other marketing materials, allowing many companies to take such printing in-house. Many current color lasers print photos that are fine for many business uses, such as client newsletters. And inexpensive monochrome lasers with modest paper handling can serve as personal desktop printers in any size office. A mono laser printer can provide the speed, durability, and paper handling to deal with the high printing volume of a busy office. Indeed, don't underestimate the power of a seemingly simple monochrome laser. So a color laser-given the added cost of its color toner-makes sense to buy only if you are sure that you need that kind of color output. The strength of color laser output is in printing text, business graphics, charts, and the like. Laser-printed color photos tend to look flat.
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It's something to think about if you'll use the color printing function only rarely, as the four cartridges (black, plus cyan, magenta, and yellow toners) can be dear.Īlso know that as a rule, almost any inkjet's color photos will be superior in quality to color photos printed on any color laser. Just know, though, that color laser toner can be an investment come refill time, often exceeding the cost of the printer. You just need to know what you're getting into before you buy one of these.Ĭolor laser AIOs, meanwhile, bring much of the functionality of an inkjet AIO and combine it with the clean text that lasers are known for, as well as smudge-proof color output. In a sense, the mono laser AIO combines the cost efficiency of a mono laser (which requires just one color of toner, black) with the convenience factor that an AIO brings. Mono laser AIOs obviously print only in black-and-white, but they can scan in color, as well as make monochrome copies of any kind of source material, like a standard photocopier can. You can find both monochrome and color laser AIOs, but when you're talking about a mono laser AIO, there is an inherent mismatch of functionality there.
In contrast, the laser all-in-one (often shortened to "AIO") is a more varied animal. They fall into two rough classes: inexpensive units meant for homes or student use (usually monochrome), and larger models designed for a home office, a small office, or a workgroup (which come in mono-only and color varieties). If all you need is stacks of relatively uncomplicated documents, they're perfectly fine for that.
"Printer-only" models are well and good they are all about sheer text or business-document output to the exclusion of all else. You can break down lasers into four key types, defined by two questions: (1) Is the printer a mono-only laser, or can it do color, too? And, (2) is it only a printer, or an all-in-one (AIO) model that can print, scan, and copy (and perhaps handle faxes)? Laser models exist in all four combinations. Indeed, certain types of businesses, such as medical offices, may mandate laser printing for archival tasks and record keeping. It's also a good one if high-quality text printing matters most. If you print a lot of large jobs, and stick mostly to text and clean graphics instead of color photographs, a laser printer is the right match. Lasers are better suited to bulk text output: contracts, long research papers, book drafts. So, who would find a laser printer a more attractive proposition than an inkjet? In most cases, not the person seeking an occasional-use printer for motley tasks: at one moment to print a personal e-mail, the next to copy a color image out of a book, or to print photos. On the downside, lasers often have a significantly higher upfront cost, and they're nowhere near as capable as inkjets at reproducing fine gradients in complex color output such as photos. Still, laser printers have remained relevant by focusing on their traditional strengths: fast print speeds and reasonable costs per page (especially for text output), as well as the extremely clean look of the finished product.