New Laser Printer Claims Big Savings

The Sun Herald

Saturday May 16, 1992

EDITED BY DAVID FRITH

BUSINESS computer users can save many thousands of dollars by switching to a revolutionary new printer technology, according to a major maker of office printers.

The technology will also help with environmental issues, says the maker, Kyocera Corporation of Japan.

Kyocera last week introduced to Australia the first of a range of radical new printers which its executives believe will undermine the current dominance of cartridge-based laser printers in the office market.

Most conventional laser printers need a replacement toner cartridge costing up to $250 every 4,000 pages. With typical offices racking up 3,000-5,000 pages a month, a printer may require 60-75 toner cartridges over its life.

Some models have a super-cartridge which lasts up to 15,000 pages, but costs up to $500.

The cartridges are expensive because they contain not only toner but also a revolving plastic drum and the mechanism to drive it. They can be recharged with toner for around $100, but wear on the drum means they must be thrown out after several recharges.

Kyocera's new printer has what it claims is a near-indestructible"amorphous silicon" drum that never needs replacing.

There is no cartridge to replace. Users simply add more toner as required.

According to Kyocera this cuts the cost of printing from 4 cents a page for some conventional laser printers to 1.8 cents-less than the cost of running a photocopier.

Not only that. It reduces a growing environmental problem: how to dispose of millions of empty toner cartridges business is producing every year.

A few makers, including Lexmark and Apple, have cartridge disposal schemes in operation, but most simply end up as landfill in suburban tips.

However, it is the economic advantages, rather than the environmental, which Kyocera believes will appeal most strongly to Australian business.

The company last week produced a survey by Sydney-based International Research Bureau which compared the total costs of owning one of the new printers-termed the Ecocsys 10-against rival laser printers produced by Lexmark, Dataproducts and Hewlett-Packard.

It put the total cost for an average office over 10 years, including purchase price, depreciation and consumables at $8,319 (Kyocera), $11,537(Lexmark), $13,653 (Dataproducts) and $12,425 (Hewlett-Packard).

"In the worst case, a user can save half the cost of the Ecosys printer in three years at 3,000 pages a month, and in most cases can save the whole cost in three years at 5,000 pages a month," says the survey.

It should be noted that Kyocera commissioned this survey. The results are contested by at least some of the rival printer companies mentioned.

The Kyocera Ecosys 10 is a 10 page-per-minute printer which uses a light-emitting diode rather than a laser to fuse toner particles on to a page.

It is claimed to produce the same quality print as standard 300 dots per inch laser printers.

It uses a proprietary toner which has tiny ceramic particles embedded in it. These particles are claimed to play their part in the printer's long life by cleaning and reconditioning the drum every time it is used.

Kyocera Electronics Australia, a fully owned subsidiary of the Japanese company, is aiming the $4,275 printer at what managing director Cliff Smith calls the "small network" market: government and business work-group users with personal computers linked by local area networks.

Smith estimates this market to be worth $217 million a year and reckons Kyocera can take 5 per cent of it over the next 12 months.

The company plans to release other Ecosys models, including one for the desktop publishing market, in the near future.

The current model lacks the PostScript page layout language required by most DTP operators.