Quiet Printers

Green Shoes · Post by **Green Shoes** » Sat May 14, 2005 6:00 am

Hi all,

My old inkjet printer just died and I need to replace it with something. I do a lot of music engraving, so it needs to be something fairly specific:

B&W laser
1200x1200 dpi
duplex capable
network capable (ethernet port)
~$1000 (or less

)
Something that prints very consistently for a long time, i.e. HP
if it could print 11x17 that would be nice but by no means necessary

I really like the 8150dn that I use at work but the thing is loud as all get out, with a fan constantly running. I'm not quite as strict as how it sounds when it's printing as I expect a printer to be loud then; but does anyone know of a printer that fits these specs that's quiet when idling?

peteamer · Post by **peteamer** » Sat May 14, 2005 9:18 am

Green, (Hope you don't mind first names...) let me get this right, ... you want a laser printer... that's quiet in 'standby'...

mmm..., I think you may be asking a tad too much...

. (Have you been trained/advised by my missus?...)

As an office equipment engineer, (copier, fax, scanner, printer Et C. ) I think it is highly unlikely you will find your nirvana...

A laser printer uses heat to 'fix' the image to the sheet, even in 'standby mode' the 'fixing unit' will remain at ~120°C+,... you can see where we're going...

There may be units available that will fully go to sleep and wake up upon input from the network but I am unaware of any. People might tell you that their 'XYZ' printer at work is 'silent' during standby,... but that is in an office enviroment and unlikely to bear fruit at home considering your appreciation of the word 'silent'...

At work I deal with Kyocera, Minolta, Ricoh (Nashua, Rex Rotary, Gestetner and others), Panasonic and more. Some, in an office enviroment, are fairly quiet (considering) but I wouldn't want any at home.

As to why I have a (Minolta) QMS magicolor that's as noisy as hell, well free plus a spare toner of each colour and access to cheap (free) parts had a slight influence on my decision...

Sorry I've not been much help...

Good Luck in your Quest.

Pete

rtsai · Post by **rtsai** » Sat May 14, 2005 9:51 am

I'm happy with my Brother HL-1440 (home laser printer). It is definitely noisy when printing, but after the idle timeout (10-15 minutes, maybe), everything shuts down. Is that sufficient, or are you actually looking for silence when the printer is active? I don't print that often, so it's not a big deal, as long as when it shuts down it's basically completely off.

With the Brother HL-1440, there is an option to buy an Ethernet adapter (I think), but I don't think it's worth it. I have mine hooked up (via USB) to a computer running a print server, and all the other computers talk to that one (over the network).

Green Shoes · Post by **Green Shoes** » Sat May 14, 2005 12:43 pm

thanks for the suggestions, guys. Peteamer, I thought it might be a fruitless quest, but I thought it was worth a shot anyway. Didn't know that's how laser printers worked; I learned something new today

.

rtsai, I wasn't looking for something silent when it's in use; as much as I would love one I've never heard a printer that even approaches "not annoyingly loud". I've never heard of Brother; you're happy with it? I'll have to check them out. Is it a rebranded manufacturer or do they actually produce their own stuff?

thanks,
andy

(threw that one in for you first name folks

)

Spod · Post by **Spod** » Sat May 14, 2005 9:46 pm

Why not just switch it off when not in use? Especially if you don't print very often. If that's not a practical option...

I'm sure at least some laser printers eventually go into a sort of "deep sleep" mode, where almost everything but the network interface is shut down, even the display backlight. It takes a long time to react to a new job being sent, as it presumably has to warm the fixing unit back up again, but IIRC the fans do turn off. My memory may, of course, be playing tricks on me.
You may not notice this in your office printers because the interval between jobs isn't often long enough.

I know some brands of inkjet automatically switch on when a job is sent, and some will switch off automatically after a timeout. I don't know if any laser printers support this, however.

You could always email this query to HP & the other manufacturers., they could tell you which of their printers (if any) have a fanless power saving mode.

Elixer · Post by **Elixer** » Sat May 14, 2005 10:34 pm

HP 1012, Fanless Laserprinter. I'm not sure if it'll do 1200x1200, but it has no fan and so is completely silent in standby, and you can find it for around $150. I have one and have been very pleased.

peteamer · Post by **peteamer** » Sat May 14, 2005 11:32 pm

Spod wrote:You could always email this query to HP & the other manufacturers., they could tell you which of their printers (if any) have a fanless power saving mode.

... Nice Thinking

Elixer good shout on that, am just off to investigate out of pure intrigue.

Pete

sthayashi · Post by **sthayashi** » Mon May 16, 2005 2:24 pm

Brother HL-5170DN.

The cheaper models in the same line have gotten good reviews. It is both duplexing and networking, though I don't know how well either work from a Linux machine.

This is not a silent printer. Not even when it's not printing. But it has 2 things going for it.
1) It is network capable, so you can put it up to 100m away.
2) After about 5 minutes of inactivity, it will shut itself down completely.

So if you can tolerate 5 minutes of noise after you're done printing, this is the printer for you. It's on the pricier side, but it's great if you have to do a lot of printing.

Green Shoes · Post by **Green Shoes** » Mon May 16, 2005 5:26 pm

Thanks Steve, that one looks like a really good deal, actually. I appreciate the tip. Is Brother a re-branded HP (or vice-versa)? They use the same numbering-lettering system.

sthayashi · Post by **sthayashi** » Mon May 16, 2005 9:11 pm

Green Shoes wrote:Thanks Steve, that one looks like a really good deal, actually. I appreciate the tip. Is Brother a re-branded HP (or vice-versa)? They use the same numbering-lettering system.

It could be. One notable detail that the Brother is lacking is an LCD display for information. You have only 4 LEDs to determine what might be wrong with it.

I should also stress that I'm not a graphics person. 95% of the printing we've done on this have been research papers and anything colorful has always been printed on our inkjet. I do not trust myself to give the authoritative word that this printer will do what you want graphics-wise. So do your homework for this printer.

I should also correct my previous statement. It's more than just not silent, it's not quiet. At idle, it's quieter than lasers USED to be, but it is still louder than the gnashing sounds that my teeth make during the 5 minute waiting period for it to shut down. Of course, this printer sits on my desk less than 1m away from me (with the fans in my general direction no less).

Oh yes. Lastly, duplex printing is significantly slower than single sided printing. This should be obvious, but it needs to be said. My biggest complaint with the printer is that I can't turn on Duplex printing by default (I have to enable it for every print job). But this is a minor inconvenience for me.

StarfishChris · Post by **StarfishChris** » Tue May 17, 2005 2:44 am

Green Shoes wrote:Thanks Steve, that one looks like a really good deal, actually. I appreciate the tip. Is Brother a re-branded HP (or vice-versa)? They use the same numbering-lettering system.

They were always separate companies, as far as I can remember.

mimwdv · Post by **mimwdv** » Sat May 21, 2005 5:52 pm

I've got a samsung ml1740 which I'm very happy with. It sits under my desk at home, and is dead silent unless it's printing or warming up to print (which only takes a few seconds). It's not network capable, though, but you might be able to find a bigger sibling which is.

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