Specifications

various colors. This means that most color lasers, such as the HP 4500 series, end up with a 4-page-
per-minute (ppm) output rate. By comparison, the Xerox Phaser 850 has an astounding 14ppm out-
put rate, in color, which is the same speed in monochrome and the same speed as a monochrome
laser. That’s true color printing at the same speed as monochrome.
Low Costs for Consumable and Maintenance Items
One of the biggest benefits of solid-ink printing is that of consumables, or rather the lack of them. A
solid-ink printer can print 45,000 pages nonstop before it needs any attention. The only part that
needs to be replaced at that time is a very low-cost maintenance roller, which can be replaced in less
than one minute with no tools. Because you can add solid ink sticks even while the printer is run-
ning, you can print for almost two years without ever having a single print job interrupted.
By comparison, the average number of pages a color laser printer can print before it requires some
form of attention (new imaging kit, transfer kit, toner cartridge, fuser, and so on) is only about 1,250
pages. That would occur every two or three weeks in a normal office environment. Not only are the
consumables less costly for the solid-ink printer, but Xerox and Tektronix offer black ink for free dur-
ing the life of the printer. Thus there is no penalty for printing monochrome; in fact, you could say
monochrome printing is subsidized.
Consider that an average office prints about 50,000 pages every two years. To print 100,000 pages (or
four years’ worth of printing), a typical color laser will consume 100 expensive toner cartridges ($100
each), 20 imaging kits ($75 each), 2 transfer kits ($150 each), and 1 fuser ($200). To print the same
number of pages on a solid-ink printer uses only 85 blocks of ink ($50 per block, except black ink,
which is free for the life of the printer), and 2 maintenance rollers ($130 each). This makes the total
cost of consumables less than half that of a color laser, and with far less maintenance and print stop-
pages or problems along the way.
Not only does the solid-ink printer have very little in the way of consumables compared to a color
laser or even an inkjet, but the ink blocks are 100% biodegradable and even edible, although I don’t
think they taste very good. Seriously, though, very little is wasted with solid-ink technology, and the
wax ink blocks are no more harmful to the environment than crayons. Also, no toner cartridges have
to be thrown away or sent back for refilling.
If any color runs out, the printer simply stops and waits for you to drop in another block. The last
page printed before the ink runs out will look as good as the first page printed after the ink is replen-
ished. There is simply no degradation in quality no matter what the status of the ink.
Unlike lasers, no registration problems occur with solid-ink. Because the color is applied to the drum
in one pass, the registration is perfect every time. Inkjets have problems with various types of papers,
whereas solid-ink prints the same regardless of paper type. In other words, you can use cheap paper
without bleeding, smudging, or dull color output.
Temperature and humidity levels have little or no effect on solid-ink print quality. Solid-ink prints are
not affected by contact with moisture.
Over the years I’ve tried inkjet and color laser printers, and neither of them were workable for me as a
sole printer. I still had to maintain a laser printer for black-and-white printing. With solid-ink tech-
nology, I now have the first printer I’ve seen that can serve as the sole printer in an office, handling
both color and black-and-white with the same speed and efficiency. Check with Xerox at
http://www.tektronix.xerox.com for more information on solid-ink printing and the printer models
available. Now that Xerox has purchased this Tektronix-developed technology, I expect to see many
more applications in the future as people discover how well it works.