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We have long held the view that, although an inkjet is cheaper than a laser to purchase, the running costs can sometimes make it a more expensive option over the 3 year life of a degree. I nearly always recommend a laser for someone who needs enlarged typeface print out or needs to print a lot of deraft copies. Otherwise I recommend the cheapest inkjet I can find, like the HP Deskjet 400. When the HP deskjet 500 came out and lasers were still very expensive, we did some quantitive tests which confirmed our suspicians. Colour was quite out of the question with costs of stlg1 per page. In addition the inkjet often required more expensive paper than the laser. This month Which? magazine have published some quantitive results for the current generation of printers. In brief: An inkjet averages 5p in ink to print a page. A laser averages around 2p in toner to print a page. The cheapest inkjet was 3.9p and the cheapest laser was 0.6p The most expensive inkjet was 5.5p and the most expensive laser was 3p. Average cost using a colour inkjet was 30p per page in ink with special paper at 14p a sheet. Cheapest ink cost was 13p / page. For printing colour photographs, photograde paper is recommended at 56 to 86p per sheet. Photorealistic kits for colour inkjets were not rated highly. The kit for the Canon BJC-4200 works out at stlg1.30 per page in ink alone. The HP Deskjet 820Cxi and 870Cxi were rated as having excellent colour with their standard cartridges at 13p / page. The laser with the cheapest running costs (0.6p / page) was the Panasonic KX-P6300 at a typical purchase price of stlg275 inc VAT. Does anybody have experience of this model? Any comments? Regards Paul Dilley, Technical Manager Computer Centre for People with Disabilities, University of Westminster ** The London & South East Regional Access Centre ** Tel: +44 171 911 5000 Fax: +44 171 911 5162 http://www.wmin.ac.uk/ccpd/ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%