Your Copier, printer, scanner and fax equipment are just like your car: they need regular maintenance repair to prevent premature repairs.  Dirt, paper fiber and toner builds up in the machine can cause excessive wear on the drums, rollers and fuser assembly. Regular copier printer scanner repair maintenance will reduce your cost and prolong the life of your equipment.

The average fuser assembly repair on a HP printer is $277. On a Ricoh, Sharp, and Canon copiers it’s $465 (average). Some brands and models are much higher to repair service.  Drums and developer units on copier printers are just as expensive. Fusers and drums are designed to last 20K, 5K, 120k or more (Kyocera 250K) pages between replacements. However if your machine is not properly maintained  their life is greatly reduced.

Would you run your car without an oil change, brake fluid or a dry radiator? . . .

Even toner cartridges on printers will have shorter lives if you do not get regular maintenance.  What are the repair maintenance steps for copiers, printers, faxes and scanners?

First, it’s not using condensed air to blow-out toner, dirt and paper particles. This actually causes more damage than good because it pushes the dirt and toner into the device causing damage to fusers, drums and other parts.  Step one on printers:  remove the toner cartridge, drawers, fuser assembly and other parts.  Then use a 2 micron filter vacuum.

Step two:  Use a rubber restore chemical on the paper feed rollers (or replace he rollers) and lubricate the proper internal gears.  During this process all the drums, developers, hoppers and other components are checked for leaks, excessive wear and corrosion.

Test and make any image quality adjustment. Yes you can do this yourself if you have the tools and know how. Many people do their own car oil changes and a few install their own tires including balancing them – do you? What is peace of mind worth to you to have the job done right?  Call now to prevent expensive copier printer or fax repair bills! Advanced Business Computers appreciates any comments or questions.

In the past 4 years HP has boosted their line of MFD All  in one laser toner cartridge based devices.  However, HP printer scanner copier machines has exhibited a far greater number of failures especially in the sub $1000 price point.

Case in point: HP 2480 all in on color laser printer copier fax scanner.  This very popular machine which came out 2..3 years ago had continually provided headaches for user.  First the scanners starting to fail which required replacing the ADF (automatic document feeder) on top scanner which costs around $217 plus labor to replace. Then the cartridge carousel started to have alignment problems which required adjustment and in several cases the problem repeated. HP has always had color laser printer carousel problems with the HP 2500, 3500, 3600 and the 3700 HP color laser printers.

Remember just a few years ago a good business class hp laser printer non all in one cost around $1100 depending upon the laser printer features. Now HP, Lexmark, Canon, Okidata and other companies are shoveling out laser based all in one for well under $1000 because Brother controlled the low end laser based MFD market and they wanted a piece.

Remember the old wise saying, “You get what you pay for”.   Brother still has  a major portion of the all in one laser based but HP and others has eroded their market.

If you had a limited budget which one is best for you?  Brother still produces the best sub $600 low volume all in one laser based machines.  HP and Okidata come in second in quality. However, if you are looking for a higher end business class laser printer scanner copier with low operating cost them look at the units that are in the $1500 and above range.

How do we know? Advanced Business Computers Inc. is a factory certified Okidata, Lexmark, HP, Brother, and Xerox repair center. Also, we provide warranty service for several of the brands.  One the average over 53 all in one machines laser based printer scanner copier fax are serviced every week by our technicians.  In short through experience since 1988.  Its important to know the history of a toner based laser printer copier equipment model.  Look beyond the product name.  Ask repair companies which laser printer copier scanner machines they recommend.

Over the years HP printers, Lexmark, Canon and other prints have greatly changed their fuser assemblies. I would not call it an laser printer improvement. When you get an 50 printer service error on HP printers,  921 error on Lexmark, SC54xx on Ricoh printers and fixing unit faliure on Canon printers is means the fuser assembly has failed.

The fuser assembly is the part that uses pressure and heat to melt the toner to the actual paper. It consist of gears, bushings,  heat rollers, pressure roller, paper pick fingers and other components, If you have an HP laser printer, Lexmark printer then for the most part you change the entire fuser assembly. If you business class Ricoh, Sharp, Canon, Gestetner, Savin and other copier printer scanners then the fuser assembly is rebuilt then majority of the time.

HP laser printers started to change their fusers to use films instead of Teflon coated rollers in their fuser assemblies.  This decreased the cost to make the machine but increase the failure rate of the laser printers.  Some other companies have followed suit. The HP laser printer fuser repair is a whole unit swap out an if obtain from a quality company should come with a 3 to 6 month warranty or 12,000 to 24,000 page warranty.  If it does not then switch your vendor!

Fuser repairs for copier printer scanners is more time consuming and costly than in straight printers. However, the advantage is then most of the companies still use the hard Teflon coated fuser that has a much great life and printer copier service failures.

Do not look for the cheapest price when replacing the fuser assembly during a HP printer repair or copier repair. Look for the best warranty and mid range price. This is especially important with repairing a copier printer because they are rebuilt which means some companies will try to get away with only a partial rebuild to save money and hurt you in the long run. if you have questions call Advanced Business Computers Inc for printer copier repairs in Miami, Ft. Lauderdale and other Florida locations.

When you purchase or lease a fax what are the options? How do you know the durability of the fax equipment? What are the standard features of fax equipment?  Selecting a fax machine as simple as checking the prices and speed.

Fax speed: We are talking about the transmission and receiving speed. In the USA most modern fax machines speeds is 33.6 baud. Older faxes are 19.6. The higher the number the faster it can send and receive. However, the actual speed is determined by the phone line quality and the slower of the two fax machines connected. If you send faxes overseas then expect slower fax machine sending and receiving.

Document feeding: The standard automatic document feeder (ADF or DAFD) can handle 30 pages. Mid range and higher machine will handle 50 and high volume fax equipment will handle up to 75 pages.

Three main fax machine or copier fax scanner all in one features to consider:

Fax printing feature: Printing all faxes received is the standard way of receiving faxes.  Due to legal requirements many companies are forced to retain a hard copy of faxes.

Faxing to computer storage and review: If you have an all in one copier, a fax copier or a fax software package you have the option to receive all your faxes to your computer system. Check with your copier scanner all in one dealer about this option and how to set it up on your computer network.  Basically this method sends all your faxes machines documents to your computer to review before printing. This cuts down on paper and toner costs but INCREASE man hours.

Many people like this option thinking it will reduce costs. It does not!!! Even if you just spend one human minute per fax to review them, it costs more in labor than the actual cost of paper/toner which takes on the average 5 seconds to review.

However, this is a great way to archive faxes due to legal requirements and reduces physical store space of actual pages printed on your office fax machine.

Fax to email: Many companies demand this feature. This features let you scan a fax a document on you office fax equipment and send it as an email. The fax sending process will send it either as a tiff or PDF file to somebody’s email. If you need the ability to spend in different formats talk to your copier fax scanner dealer to see which models have this ability.

One way to make sure you get all the office laser fax machine features at a great price is by obtaining a quality high end used fax machine at a low end price. Many companies buy laser office fax machines by price instead of durability, operating costs and features. High end faxes are designed for many, many years of quality service.  In addition, they are less costly to operate and fail less often.  Review quality used fax machines and compare the per page costs to new low ends ones and you will see a big difference!

If you have may questions please feel free to contact us.  See our website for additional information. Feel free to call us or request help through  our website or call us for a quick response.

Advanced Business Computers, Inc.

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