Need laser printer/copier reccomendations

[hsmom27]

I need a new printer copier. I have a lot of kids and use a bunch of pdfs, and DH copies a lot of papers for work. I currently have a Brother MFC 7840W. Disregard that price, I paid less than $200 some 5 years ago. RIght now I need to replace the toner and drum and by the time I do that I could get a new printer. So what's out there for $200 or less? Or what should I definitely avoid. Thanks.

[cjzimmer1]

I had a brother all in one for year that worked great and was easy to replace the toner. It started making strange noises when running paper through and since we had a little extra money at the time we decided to get a new one since the old one was 6-7 years old and the newer ones could do duplex. So we bought a MFC7460 and every time I replaced the toner it STILL tells me the toner needed to be replaced (even when I put a brand new cartridge in) and made copies like it was running out of ink. I found a website were people were talking about tricks to get more use out of their toner since most printers are coded to through error codes when only 50-75% of the toner is actually used (manufacturers just want you to spend more money on ink). Anyways the one that finally worked on mine was to open the front panel, hit the clear/cancel button, when it gave me a message about replacing the drum enter *10. Now my toner cartridge that was supposedly low works great and the quality is perfect. My cartridge was never low on ink but the printer was confused.

 

Unless you are absolutely certain you need to replace these parts (like you know you printed 10,000+ pages in the last 5 years), I would try the codes I mentioned above, if they don't work (since yours is a slightly different model), I would google your model number and low toner message or drum replacement message and see if there is any tricks you can use to keep your printer running. I was glad I took the time to hunt around because it saved us from buying ANOTHER printer.