Whats a good entry level digital biz card printer?

ScotJ

Well-known member
I've been looking for a really good entry level machine for doing biz cards in volumes of 500-1000; until we ramp up our biz and get a DI press or something more serious.

What entry level Xerox or Konica printers could we use for this? Quality is important, as is registration I would imagine. Any thoughts would be appreciated!
 
If you have $5-$15K I might recommend the Xanté Ilumina, (new or used) but you'll need to consider the cost of consumables. If you have $30k-$40K I'd recommend a used Konica Minolta Biz Hub 6500. Just my 2¢. These used and off-lease machines are out there, seek and you shall find.
 
If you got the money for it I'd recommend a DC240 - make sure you get it on a maintenance contract, the price per page is a horror story otherwise. That said, bus cards aren't too demanding usually, and if you want to do the top quality, perfect registration stuff then be prepared to drop some serious cash on a better machine.
 
yea, that's what I was thinking. You can add a service contract onto the used ones right? How good is the registration on those in mm?
 
yea, that's what I was thinking. You can add a service contract onto the used ones right? How good is the registration on those in mm?


Also, on a side note- what would you say the average card per page is for 13x19 12 point (paper only)
 
Yeah you should be able to add a maintenance contract for a used one ok. I imagine your sales rep could find you a few used ones going for a decent price too - just make sure you push them on the price a bit, don't ever accept their first offer! Given the current economic climate though, there's some stonking deals around.

Card per page? Not sure what you mean, if you're talking how many up (I'm based in UK so use SRA3) it's either 21 or 24. You can expect from 7-15p per page for a click charge. I've heard it works out about 50p per page if you buy the consumables yourself!

If you get a half decent tech and operator the FTB registration works out about 1mm. The one I run at the min is bang on for three corners and 1mm off on one (talking crop marks across the whole sheet - the image isn't exactly square - common issue but hasn't caused me any problems, even when sending jobs for die-cutting).

Make sure you run Xerox stocks (it's worth it in the long run) or at the very least something specifically made for digital.

I like the 240, it is a nice printer to run once you know what to watch out for and when to call the techs. It is certainly plenty of machine to get you started doing business cards - that's what I mainly print on mine.
 
O really? I was under the impression that the 240 can not do 16point? I thought it could only do 12 point?
 

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