Don't Let the Cost of Toners Surprise You

There's no denying that the cost of printers is lowand an HP color inkjet printer for $150. A new
- unbelievably low, as a matter of fact. You canOriginal Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) toner
find brand-name photo printers for under acartridge for the Brother printer costs about
hundred dollars, and workhorse laser printers forsixty-five dollars and will print about 2,500 pages.
under two hundred dollars. Color inkjet printersThe black ink cartridge for the HP only costs
remain a bargain, starting at around a hundred andabout thirty dollars. Great deal, right? No, because
twenty-five dollars. If you're not careful, though,the black ink cartridge will only print about 800
what you save in the purchase price of a printerpages. The Brother cartridge will give you a cost
goes down the drain when you have to buyper page of a little over two-and-a-half cents,
replacement toner cartridges or ink cartridges.whereas the HP cartridge ups the ante to
When deciding which printer to buy, it pays tothree-and-three-quarters cents per page. That
determine the cost per page printed. That cost ismay not sound like a lot, but over the course of
calculated by the cost of the cartridge you use.printing the equivalent of ten cartons of paper, or
Let's say, for example, that you purchased a50,000 pages, you'll pay $625 more for the HP ink
black and white Brother Laser Printer for $150than you will for the Brother toner.