Inkjet printers used to be dominant in home and personal environments. Monochrome laser printers were used for mass productivity on the other hand. Times have changed and so has printer preference. The difference comes in the way technologies adhere ink to the page. Inkjet Printing Technology Inkjets spray ink onto the page through tiny nozzles, creating microscopic dots. Uncoated paper or everyday white paper absorbs ink. This causes bleeding which blurs the edges of everyday text. Specialized photo paper can prevent the bleeds and control drying times. This makes professional quality color prints possible. However, regular text will not look as sharp when printed from an inkjet because of the bleeding effect. But laser printers do not have such limitation. Laser Printing Technology Laser printers like Lexmark E360dn work by utilizing high heat to fuse powdered toner to paper. There is no bleeding effect because laser toner is not absorbed into paper. Prints are smudge-proof; not needing drying time and rarely require specialized paper. Difference In Usage Sometimes, a monochrome laser printer is the best way to churn out long essays, school assignments and business reports. Inkjet printers produce great photos but they're expensive to run, especially when printing only black-and-white text. If churning out long school assignments or business reports, a monochrome laser printer will be a wise investment that will soon pay for itself. Then reserve a color inkjet printer for producing photos, color charts and the few pages of the report that demand it. Difference In Printing Capabilities The sharp, crisp edges typical with laser printer outputs don’t allow for the same subtle gradients of color that an inkjet can produce. Color lasers must lay down colors one at a time, and toner has a bit of opacity, unlike wet inkjet inks. Color lasers aren't the preferred choice for maximum photo-quality prints. They can produce quick and crisp results with solid image quality and perfect text. It may be impractical to consider owning two printers, but color inkjet printers tend to slowly chew through the color ink even when printing text or if they use multiple cartridges. This is partly because they clean the heads and waste ink on start-up. Conclusion Both types of printers have their advantages. To make the best choice, first consider printing needs, and then dig into the tech specs. Lexmark E360dn printer for an instance, is a very capable laser printer and is a low cost Eco-Responsible printer. However, it is limited to black-and-white print outs.
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