There is talk in the office printing and imaging industry that Xerox’s solid ink technology is not environmentally-friendly because it uses more electricity than comparable laser-based products. So I thought I’d shed a bit of light on the truth behind the energy usage in our solid ink printers and multifunction printers (MFPs).
Solid ink products come with a power save mode similar to a laser products sleep mode or the hibernate mode built into your computer. Solid ink printers and MFPs typically drop into this mode after your work day. The mode also allows the printers and MFPs to wake up quickly once the day starts in your office and you’re ready to print. Yes, the power save mode does use more energy. But the amount of energy used is more like that of a 40W light bulb; that’s all. This is similar to leaving the porch light or hallway light on at night. It reminds me of the Motel 6 commercial a few years ago when Tom Bodett said, “We’ll leave the light on for you”.
What some people may not tell you is solid ink printers and multifunction printers use less energy than laser products when they are printing documents. Xerox also invented this great technology called Intelligent Ready and includes this with all solid ink printers and MFPs. The software actually learns your office’s printing habits over a few weeks time and will wake the printer up right before you typically send the first print of the day. It also sends the printer or multifunction printer into power save mode at the end of the day letting you worry about other things in your business besides your technology.
Do you have more questions about solid ink technology? Ask them here.
Nice Information on Xerox Printers
Thanks! We will be posting an article on solid ink monthly so stay tuned for more.
Lisa Weaver
Xerox, Social Media and Communications
informations sur Xerox belle
40 watts? That’s quite a lot really! I typical inkjet or laser printer only uses only a few watts when in sleep.
Thanks for your comments. You’re right – Solid Ink does use more energy in sleep mode than a laser device, but what we suggest to customers is to look at all aspects of power usage when researching a new product. And look at ways the MFP can help reduce energy consumption like Intelligent Ready from Xerox.
Paul Criswell
Xerox, Product Marketing Manager
I have considered a solid ink printer for some time now and this was actually helpful. I feel you brought up some great points to help me.
After five years of service, I finally decided to get rid of my still functional Phaser 8550 Solid ink printer. Technically, the printer worked great. Paper feed and duplexer hardly ever gave problems, printing speed was fast (after a tedious warm up). But the printer smelled terribly, the yellow always came out like ochre (not good as yellow is important in my logo), and, most of all, I was told never to shut down the printer. After replacing that by a Brother MFP, my electricity consumption went down by 1800 kWh/year (being about 325 Euro)!! Quite a bit more than “a light bulb” (which would of course be an 7 Watt power saving type if you leave it on over night). Also, if I would turn it off for a short period of time (e.g. to get it out of an error state), it would go through a cleaning loop when restarting. That would be alright if it would not waste an amount of solid ink for which I paid some 14 Euro (yes, I weighed the waste). All in all, I am very glad that I got rid of this peace of waste.
Rolf: Thanks for your post. It sounds like the Phaser 8550 served you well for over five years although the product is not supposed to give off any odors. And you are absolutely correct, we encourage all our customers to leave their Solid Ink products on all the time. Our Intelligent Ready software learns your printing behavior and will move into sleep mode when it’s not in use. That way it’s always ready when you are and in sleep mode to conserve energy when you’re not printing.