With the proliferation of colour printing in the South African market, combined with the higher cost of printing in colour, many customers are choosing non-original toner cartridge alternatives in an attempt to effect an overall reduction in the total cost of ownership of their print fleet.
While these non-original cartridges may well effect a cost reduction in the short term, Peter Vieira, Business Development Manager for Oki`s local Corporate Solutions Division says customers will almost certainly see an increase in their overall print costs in the long term.
"This increase will not be evident in the cost of the non-original cartridge, but will result from toner leaks, poor print quality and the risk of long-term damage to the printer unit. Since this also negates the warranty from all printer vendors, the customer will be left with costly repair bills," he opines.
"Original manufacturer`s cartridges are more reliable, deliver better printed results and are less prone to failure, since they are expressly designed for use in the original manufacturer`s printer," he says. "This has been proven repeatedly by research from independent analysts and market observers."
Vieira points out that although original consumables do cost more from a plain acquisition perspective, there`s good reason for this. "Printer manufacturers put a great deal of capital and effort into ensuring that the results derived from using their original cartridges are everything the customer was initially promised. With a `clone` or remanufactured cartridge, this is not guaranteed.
"Take a real world example as testimony to this," Vieira continues. "Some of Oki`s newest units deliver 36 pages per minute in full colour. By definition, that implies the printed page will only be in contact with the printer`s fuser unit (the part that bonds the toner to the page) for less than 1.7 seconds.
"The technology to enable this exists predominantly in the toner and not in the printer`s componentry as many customers believe. If the paper is in the fuser for a very short period of time, it stands to reason that a special kind of toner needs to be used in this process."
This, Vieira says is referred to as a `polymerised spherical toner`, which essentially means that the size of each toner particle is identical to the next. "This is especially useful when doing large volumes of high speed printing, since the uniformity of the toner particles allows it to bond to pages at very high speed.
"When the right combination of toner and fuser is not present in a printer, customers start getting disastrous results. Toner can begin flaking or rubbing off pages," he says.
"Besides the shocking printed results, this also damages the inside of the printer. When toner starts sticking to the fuser unit, it not only transfers to other pages causing smudging, but can cause irreparable damage to the fuser - resulting in an additional cost for the customer," he explains.
Vieira says that users in the professional graphics market (advertising and other creative agencies) rely heavily on the quality and accuracy of colours in their printed pages.
"It`s their lifeblood," he adds. "By using generic toner in a high-quality printer, they`re almost certainly guaranteed sub-standard results.
"Oki puts a great deal of effort into getting the pigmentation of its cyan, magenta, yellow and black cartridges to an exacting standard. That`s what graphics professionals need in order to achieve life-like representations of the visual images they are creating.
"Currently, no compatible, refilled or remanufactured cartridge delivers the same results," he states, "Therefore, they are doing themselves a disservice by using the wrong consumables."
In conclusion, Vieira says customers must think twice before buying non-original consumables. "They need to ask themselves whether the bad results and potential risks of damaging their printers are worth the small cost saving. Since colour printing is all about achieving greater impact in documents, they will most likely find that the cost savings do not justify the risks." ENDS
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