Anybody know anything about business-class copiers?

Kind of a longshot, but the knowledge base around here always has come through in the past...

I'm an attorney with a paperwork-heavy practice. I print ~5000 pages a month, give or take. I've been using a Brother multifunction laser monochrome (MFC-8480DN) for the last three years, and it's served really well for the money ($350 to buy and drums and toner are really pretty cheap). However, i'd like to step up to a business class copier with better envelope functionality (I do a lot of mail-merge type stuff, both for marketing and for the actual practice) and something with better scanning and ADF functionality. Also something that as I expand we can all use. I do like the Brother, but I feel like I'm at the top end of its duty cycle, and the stuff I can get at Staples seem to be comparable but no better.

I would much rather buy something used than get locked into a lease with Datacomm/etc.

Does anyone have any recommendations for brands/specific models? I'm thinking I'd spend $1,500-$2,000 for something that did everything I want it to do. Otherwise I'll go buy another Brother and suck it up when it comes to printing envelopes.

I have had great luck buying recent off lease machines from eBay. I have the good fortune of having a big dealer in such equipment locally but it's likely there's someone there that does similar stuff. I love our current machine, it's a Canon Imagerunner 2025i. Consumables are reasonable, it's fast, very reliable so far, and cost me a whopping $450 for a 3-year-old machine that cost over $5000 new with the feature set it has.

Really though any of the mainstream business class equipment should beat the pants off a Brother multifunction. I have a Brother at home and while it works fine it just doesn't measure up. Be careful of the oddball brands (oce, imagistics, etc) because they can be a hassle to deal with when they break. Canon, Ricoh, Xerox, the big HP stuff, etc. all should be fine. I wouldn't buy anything past about 4-5 years old because the feature set will be pretty dated. Make sure it supports scan to PDF email, printing with postscript, double sided scan and print, up to 11x17 prints, and has an available envelope feeder. Before buying, go to the manufacturer's web site and make sure drivers are available for modern computers. Look at what their support is like, do they have manuals downloadable, etc. I also like to buy service manuals on CD off eBay in case I need to work on it, make sure that's available if you want it.

Often times the place that sells the equipment to you used can service it. They can at least be a good source for parts and a reference for a repair shop.

Toshiba is a good brand! I ended up sticking with a black and white machine since even the newest and most awesome color ones take longer to warm up, take longer to print (comparing similar class machines, that is), and cost more to service. If you need color and use it often then definitely go with a color multifunction. But if you only use color once in a blue moon like me (literally once every 3-6 months) then I think a multifunction black and white and a dedicated color printer makes more sense. Most modern multifunctions can scan in color so you can still copy color documents by scanning it then printing on the other machine.

Thanks for the response. I think the Toshiba looks like a good option, although maybe even a little nicer than I need. I rarely use color (although if I had one, I might do in-house some of the stuff I outsource now, like marketing brochures). Scan to email would be nice, 11x17 is something I never have to worry about though. I think I might give that Copier-Mart place in STL a call this afternoon.

My experience with the business class machines is that while old, off lease units can be cheap to buy, the maintenance contract on one, if you don't want to be solely responsible for fixing it, will run as much or more than the purchase price.

As long as you go into the purchase knowing that it may be cheaper to replace than service after a major breakdown, go for it.

Karacticus wrote: My experience with the business class machines is that while old, off lease units can be cheap to buy, the maintenance contract on one, if you don't want to be solely responsible for fixing it, will run as much or more than the purchase price. As long as you go into the purchase knowing that it may be cheaper to replace than service after a major breakdown, go for it.

That's kinda what I'm worried about. I'm a DIY kind of guy, but I don't know much about repairing copiers. I'd hate to spend $1,500 and then it crap out on me two months later and cost that much again to repair. Having said that, aren't most maintenance contracts and extended warranties sucker bets (I know they are on almost everything else out there).

In a previous life I was IT in a Pharma R&D facility. I supported the multifinction copier systems we had from the networking/scanning/printer side of things along with a bunch of other stuff I thought I had forgotten.

We had some Cannons and a whole lot of Konicas. Since you are a lawyer, one thing to consider are the security settings on the device and if they keep a copy of what's scanned or copied on it. I had to disable those functions or set them to delete after each job depending on the machine. You probably don't want the liability of having clients documents lingering on the copier.

I agree with dculberson on the color scanning on a B&W machine and a dedicated color laser for when you need to print color. The color copiers were cheaper to run than the fleet of color lasers, but he B&W were even cheaper.

In my shop I'm using a Brother B&W MFC as the primary printer and have a Brother color laser for when I need to print some proofs for ads or new brochures.

My understanding is that service contracts on copiers in the large corporate environment (say 7000 employee site I'm at now) are what keeps most of the dealers in business, not sales-- they aren't so much a suckers bet a an insurance policy against a real reaming when they really have you at their mercy when it does break, and in my experience it's the nature of copiers that they will always break (or that someone will break them).

In some areas I've worked (this was where I did volunteer work at a non-profit) the local dealer wouldn't even look at the machine or even provide you parts if you didn't have a contract with them. Eventually, it was no longer practical to hold onto the machine when became old enough we couldn't get a contract on it anymore-- at least they were honest enough to discontinue the contract when they couldn't get parts.

psteav wrote:

Karacticus wrote: My experience with the business class machines is that while old, off lease units can be cheap to buy, the maintenance contract on one, if you don't want to be solely responsible for fixing it, will run as much or more than the purchase price. As long as you go into the purchase knowing that it may be cheaper to replace than service after a major breakdown, go for it.

That's kinda what I'm worried about. I'm a DIY kind of guy, but I don't know much about repairing copiers. I'd hate to spend $1,500 and then it crap out on me two months later and cost that much again to repair. Having said that, aren't most maintenance contracts and extended warranties sucker bets (I know they are on almost everything else out there).

Price the contract out. It might be worth it, but if you keep your Brother MFC around as a backup you should be covered if the big machine goes down and needs a service call.

I was in the copier business for 14 years, up until 18-months ago. A few comments.

1.) Your budget is a bit low. I think you'll be in the $2500-$3500 range.

2.) Envelopes are a bitch! You need to test at least 100 of the EXACT envelope you use through any/every machine you demo.

3.) You need to demo any machine before you buy. At your monthly volume, any dealership should be willing to bring in a machine(make sure it's the exact model!) for a week or 2 for you to test, in your environment, on your network, doing the jobs you need it to do.

4.) I've serviced, installed and consulted on every brand in the business. They each have good models, and each have bad ones too. I'd suggest avoiding the newest models and instead find one that's been out a couple years. Google user reviews on it and see what kind of luck/problems others have had. I still have quite a few contacts, so if you have some models you're interested in, I might be able to get some insider advice.

5.) You absolutely want a service agreement for the maintenance and supplies. It will be cheaper in the long term. Ask if they have a service-level agreement, and ask for references - and call them all.

Feel free to hit me up with any other questions!

I've been more than happy with no service contract for the last 12 years or so that I've been using this type of printer, but I'm a former computer tech and am more than comfortable doing repairs myself. Also we don't do 5000 pages a month, probably more like 500. At your volume and comfort level maybe it makes sense to have a service contract.

I've had my current machine for a year and have had to add toner once and cleaned some rollers on the duplexer once. Even if it failed me completely tomorrow I've saved money over having a service contract. (I paid $467 with tax for the machine.)

I'll get a bit more in-depth with my comment for #5 now that I'm back from lunch. :D

Here are the reasons you want a contract for the volume you'll be producing.

1.) Copiers break, parts can be difficult for the average consumer to find(there's really only one vendor, Precision Roller, and their selection is somewhat limited, especially on newer models. Their shipping is slow and/or expensive to the Midwest too).

2.) All modern copiers(well, MFPs more precisely) run off some type of(typically Linux) operating system, and nearly all of them have a hard drive. When the hard drive fails(and they all do, eventually) or a new critical firmware patch is released(often to compensate for an update Microsoft has released ), you will not find these available outside of the dealer network, and they often require manufacturer specific hardware/software to install. So the $2500+ device you just bought is now DOA until you pay a dealer to come fix it. And you probably could have bought an annual contact for the cost of that service call...

3.) Copier service agreements are cheap. Figure you might be under $0.005/pager, possibly even $0.0035. That's not a misprint. For $25/month(including toner cartridges) wouldn't you rather have someone else get toner all over their hands when something breaks, and have the reassurance that if they can't fix it timely, the responsibility falls back on the dealer to get you a suitable loaner ASAP???

For any of you who want to take on fixing your own device, I can certainly point you toward some resources that will help you out. But for most business owners who realize their time is better spent generating income, a service agreement is the only way to go.

In reply to dculberson:

I agree completely. On anything sub-$1500 it probably doesn't make sense to have a service agreement. Unless you're talking about a fleet of 20+ similar printers, where you can have an aggregate agreement that covers the whole fleet at one cost.

Hmm. I was anticipating that a service contract would cost more like $100-$300 monthly. $25 a month including toner is fine by me...Hopefully someone around here will be that cheap.

In reply to psteav:

Even at $0.0125, which would be really expensive, you're still only at $75/mo - and you no longer have to buy toner.

Profitability in the industry has dropped to nil, which is why I jumped ship. When you're looking at 10% margins on less than 1/2-cent, it takes a whole lotta dead trees to keep the office lights on!

When I was shopping for a printer about three years ago, we went with a Xerox Workcenter 5135. It was a nice machine that could do everything you asked of it, didn't give us too much problems and cost about 2500$ brand new. And like petegossett was saying, the service contract was so cheap that it was a no brainer. It would cost us 0.005/color page (whatever size) and 0.0035/BW page (whatever size). They even set it up on our network for nothing.

To have a comparable machine used, I would have had to spend about 1200$-1500$. While it's a good amount cheaper, unless you want to start DIY'ing it a lot, the saving wasn't worth it.

We have one of these in the office:

Konica-Minolta 'Bizhub' C452

I have no idea how much it cost, but it serves as the default printer for over 50 people in our office. It'll do double-sided color, 11x17 in color, multi-page PDF's in color. Color copies sometimes look better than the original (not sure how it manages that...).

I tend to agree about getting a service contract. That cost is a write-off. The time you waste attempting to fix a copier is not.

In reply to Ian F:

Bizhub C452, ballpark $4500 for the machine, another $1500 for the finisher, about $800 for a hole punch. It's been 18-months, but I probably still have dealer pricing for one of those.