Laser reliability, colour, and at a price affordable to the home user

If like most of us you've been using cheap inkjet printers because you only do light printing at home then you'll likely have experienced a few frustrations: frequent paper jams and mis-feeds, poor quality prints after long periods of inactivity as the ink dries or blocks the print heads, and having to pay more to replace a set of ink cartridges than you paid for the printer itself. The only answer to get around some of these frustrations used to be to purchase a more expensive "Business" inkjet which doesn't necessarily solve the problems related to ink.

Now however we have a colour laser at the same price as a high end inkjet. Why is this a good thing?

Laser printers have always been workhorses best known usually for their high print speed, and for being better suited for printing high volumes. If you are a home user it's not likely that you will print 1000's of pages per month so why then would you want a laser printer? Well another thing laser printers are known for is their legendary reliability which oddly enough makes them more suitable for low print volumes than a cheaper inkjet. Need to quickly print out a map and directions to the function / interview / meeting you are already late for? If your inkjet hasn't been used in a while and the ink has dried or the paper jams because dust has collected on the top page in the open tray then it may just take a trip across the room at this point. This is unlikely to happen with this laser because the toner does not dry, it doesn't have print heads that can get blocked, the paper tray is internal, and it's rather heavy so unless you're a body builder you won't be able to throw it very far...

On photo printing: it prints photos very well on plain paper - far better than an injket would - but this limits photo use for photos included in documents or pamphlets etc. Inkjets still have a much higher resolution when printing photos and if used with high quality inkjet photo paper will print proper photo quality glossy prints suitable for framing or sticking in an album whereas a colour laser at this level will not be able to compete. If photo printing is a must then this product won't be for you and I'd recommend a high end inkjet or alternatively making use of your local camera store.