Xerox Phaser 8550

[Sust]

Im thinking of getting one of those "solid ink" xerox phaser printers for my small office.
Hardwarecentral Link

However, I've noticed that reviewers never get to use these things long enough to tell what could possibly go wrong and how horribly things go wrong.
After doing a search around google and the AT forums, I've people report the following cons:

Expensive to repair when things go wrong.
It's bad to attempt to remove solid ink when it's still hot.
Long warm-up time that also happens to use up solid ink while warming up.

Does anyone have anything else to say about this printer?

 

[PhaZe]

we have 5 phaser 8400 at my work.
they are expensive but man i just love how the print. I say they are worth it but I print for free...

edit: I wanted to add that not only are the warm ups long but they smell as well.
(melting wax)

 

[Arcanedeath]

be prepared to leave it on all the time so the wax stays warm and it doesn't flush it down the tubes when the printer is power cycled and I'd sugget getting a UPS just for one of these cause if they lose power you just lost a boatload of ink/wax. on the upside they make amazing prints and for full color things on cardstock like flyers and cards that don't absorb ink well they work very well.

 

[Chesebert]

Originally posted by: PhaZe
we have 5 phaser 8400 at my work.
they are expensive but man i just love how the print. I say they are worth it but I print for free...

edit: I wanted to add that not only are the warm ups long but they smell as well.
(melting wax)

2nd that. Had it for 2 years and boy they sure print nice and black/white are no more expensive than other laser I have. I think I have printed like 17,000 pages...LOL

great stuff!

 

[imported_michaelpatrick33]

Originally posted by: PhaZe
we have 5 phaser 8400 at my work.
they are expensive but man i just love how the print. I say they are worth it but I print for free...

edit: I wanted to add that not only are the warm ups long but they smell as well.
(melting wax)

I have one 5 phaser 8400 at work also and it prints fast and it prints great quality stuff but you definitely need to leave it on all the time. There is a big warning to not shut it off for fear of blowing it up, LOL.

Edit: I don't get any smell sensation but it is in an open space.

 

[Yanagi]

As I'm giving support on these machiens I thought i might be able to answer your questions.

Solid Ink machines sometimes can suffer from the the wax "cooking" which can lead to the colors printing incorrect. This is caused by the wax beeing melted too long and will be discolored. If you buy this kind of machine make sure you print 20-30 pages a day on it. and print a lot of color. Previous models suffered more from this issue and so far the 8550 seems pretty stable in that regard ie. havent had any calls basicly on that problem. Another reason to print alot on it is that if you havent printed for some time it will go through a cleaning process meaning it will waste ink in that process leading to higher cost per page.

As other also mentioned, keep it powered up all the time. As soon as you power it up it will go through an exptesive cleaning process to make sure the print head doesnt have any blocked jets.

A common problem (when problem occurs) is that you will get light stripes. The reason is that a print jet has been blocked and no ink will come through it. Easily resolved by running the light stripes procedure. Run it up to 3 times. If nogo power it off overnight and try again. We also have on our website something called Jetfix snippets which might help aswell.

Long warmup time: It takes more time than a laser for sure but the 8550 is quite quick compared to previous models so as long as you keep it powered up at all times and print regulary on it it shouldnt be too much of a problem.

If you have any other questions I'll be glad to help


EDIT: Oh, and in regards for repairing, dunno how it is in the US but we have flat fee quotes for this machine. so if it breaks it will be 350 US or thereabouts to repair it. Unless its the print head. The print head in itself costs about the same as a new machine. But havent seen the print head fail on a 8550 yet. It was much more of a problem with the 8200 and previous models. Havent seen too much of it on the 8400 either.

 

[Sust]

Thanks for the reply, guys and/or gals

In regards to the Unint. Power Supply, laser printers are typically a no-no due to amp draw (I think?) so do these solid ink printers cause excess drain on the batteries within a UPS too?

And since the printer is supposed to be left on at all times to keep the ink "warm", does that also mean that new ink chunks can be thrown into an empty ink well while the printer is still warmed up?

Furthermore, does the printer have to go through an entire warm-up sequence every time you replenish with a new chunk of ink?

Also, does the wax really scrape off of printouts?

 

[Yanagi]

HI again sust. The ink will be melted into reservoirs. But you do not throw them into the reservior. You place them into.. Well some rail. Dont know the english word since I'm swedish. And they will be melted when needed. The ink in the reservior will always be warm when powered on (IIRC around 140 degrees Celcius. I'm not too aware of the power drain on that machine but if you want I can look it up until monday.

It will not warmup again after you put new ink in it. Only after beeing started up. Or after sleep mode aswell.

To conclude:
You can ALWAYS load new ink until its full.
It will only warm up after going out of sleep mode or after beeing powered up. Or if it hasnt been used for a while and have cooled down.

EDIT: Wax can be scraped off with fingernail since its not fused into the paper. It will not scrape of from the printer unless the printer is faulty. Which would be the rapid release guide or the wiper blade that is damaged/dirty.

 

[imported_Hornswoggler]

I helped deploy about a dozen 8200's at work a few years back and can share some of our experiences.

To answer some of the questions:

yes, the wax can be scrapped off with a fingernail or coin or something. Its not as easy as, say, a lotto ticket, but can still scrape off. I also had a user who would put his prints into a binder with clear sleeves and the image would rub off onto the sleeves. I would also imagine leaving the prints in a hot car would cause it trouble or make it more delicate.

As for reliability, I do not remember there being much problem or else they would have formed a reputation or been the butt of some jokes or something. I have since transfered to a different facility so I do not know how they are doing now, but other than the issues mentioned above, there were just fine.

Oh, and always make sure the printer is fully cooled down before moving it. I never moved a warm one, but was warned by xerox not to.

 

[Czar]

We have two of those at work, one 8500 and one 8400, excelent quality, could have better dpi but good enough.. I'll whip out a sample for you

 

[Czar]

Here you go. Also like some have pointed out the vax can be a problem, but with these its only a problem if you fold the paper, brakes the vax in the fold, creates an ugly white line where it shows the paper

this is the original photo I printed
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/czar/IMG_2845.JPG

this is the printout
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/czar/IMG_2911.JPG
take notice at the center where it says 405 thats where the focus was

 

[Sust]

Hmm... 20-30 colored pages per day, huh?
I dont think that we print that much color in my office so maybe this printer is not the best idea anymore.
If I had to guesstimate our printing needs, I would say that our colored printouts are typically 65% black and white text and maybe 35% colored images.

Dammit. Otherwise, this printer sounds perfect for my group

Does anyone have anything to say about xerox laser printers like the 6350DP?

 

[woland223]

I thought I might give some info. I work with lots of laser printers (color and b/w) and a few xerox (older 840,850,and 860s and 1 8200).

some thoughts,

I think they are more expensive then regular color laser printers. I don't know the exact costs of the printers, but I do have a feeling for it. Our Xerox Rep tells us $.08/copy .... I think thats way optimistic, more likeabout $.10 - $.12/page. Most HP color laser printers are around $.07 - $.10/page.

They have amazing quality. Not more dpi, but really nice looking pages. They have an almost ink on paper look vs toner on paper look. Regular laser printers don't do well with printing photos, but the xerox wax printers do much better. Its pages almost look like it was printed on glossy paper... Its really hard to describe the different look these Wax printers have.

My experience is that Xerox printers are not very reliable, when compared to other color laser printers. They need about 5 times more work done on them, and the parts cost 2 or more times more then the same sort of part for a color laser printer. Our Xerox Rep promises that the new ones are much better then the older ones though... so that might not apply to the new 8400/8500 printers.

last thing, yes they need to be left on... and they HAVE to be plugged into a good power source (NO UPS!!!) We had one plugged into a UPS and it killed the printer... It killed the power supply, took out the main logic board, which may or may not have killed the print head.... oh... if the print head goes... so goes your printer.... a used re-built print head was $700!!! new $1200 !!!! (that?s just for the part, not including labor to put it in!).

Oh, one last thing... we have HP printers that are 8 and 10 Years old they are still going. These Xerox printers are not going to last that long. They have far too many parts go out, and they just don't seem to last as long as a normal color laser printer.

Over all, if Quality of your prints is your top concern, then xerox wax printers might be what your looking for. They really do make very nice prints. If costs/durability are important, go to a normal color laser printer (im a fan of HP printers myself).

Hope this helps

 

[mechBgon]

Another aspect of the "crayon printers" is that the waxy print doesn't slide well across glass, such as when you try to toss 50 pages of Phaser printout into the automatic document feeder of a big photocopier. Laser's the way to go for that.

 

[Ken90630]

Originally posted by: mechBgon
Another aspect of the "crayon printers" is that the waxy print doesn't slide well across glass, such as when you try to toss 50 pages of Phaser printout into the automatic document feeder of a big photocopier. Laser's the way to go for that.

I can vouch for what mech said there. I used to be a copier/fax machine tech, and he's right.

There is a potential solution, however. There is a consumer glass polish called Brillianize. It will put a clear coat on the glass surface that enables documents to slide across its surface without skewing or binding up. It's sort of like car wax, only transparent. And you have to reapply it every so often -- particularly after using Windex to clean the glass -- but it only takes 30 seconds or so. It doesn't have any effect whatsoever on copy quality (again, it's transparent).

Although I haven't bought any in many years [still using up my old supply ], you could prolly find Brillianize by Googling it. Or search for "anti-stat glass polish" or something. Just FYI.

 

[Yanagi]

Originally posted by: Sust
Hmm... 20-30 colored pages per day, huh?
I dont think that we print that much color in my office so maybe this printer is not the best idea anymore.
If I had to guesstimate our printing needs, I would say that our colored printouts are typically 65% black and white text and maybe 35% colored images.

Dammit. Otherwise, this printer sounds perfect for my group

Does anyone have anything to say about xerox laser printers like the 6350DP?

The Phaser 6350DP, havent had any issues with that one. It gives fairly good quality printouts in color and B&W. Its fairly fast and compact for its price. The only issue i can really think of atm is that you may get a "Yellow Toner Low" Message with the starter kit when infact the cartridge isnt really empty. Its a Firmware issue and might have been fixed by now. Other than that a really good machine.