Bad – I decided not to buy the Brother while looking for a replacement for a solid little Samsung ML2010 which will NOT work with a Mac OSX upgrade, whatever I do (Sam. don't upgrade his drivers too often!).
I rejected the brother because I thought the build was a bit flimsy but mainly because of the split toner cartridge and drum arrangement. This reduces the cost of carts, though not by that much ($75 against $100-125). After 10K to 20K copies you are looking at replacing the drum. Officeworks had the printer for $139 (compared to around $120 for a Xerox or HP) but the replacement drum was $209. Given that the printer has a drum in it already and a cartridge and a lot more besides, how can they justify such a disgraceful price for a replacement part? Almost 150% of the new product! When the time came, you'd simply throw out the printer and buy a new model, right? I hope they're not claiming any environmental credentials anywhere.
I found this simply outrageous, regardless of the quality of the printer. Lower cost toner than opposition models. Paper tray is fully enclosed. Flimsy build, ugly design, cost of consumables.
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Do not be so surprised. Many vendors sell their products at or below manufacturing costs hoping to make an eventual profit on the consumables. ie: XBox & Playstations need to sell at least 2 games in order to break even.
That is also why some printers ship with "demo" toner cartridges, just to get the initial purchase price down. Note: Buy the time you factor in Retailers profit margin, GST, Transport costs, Distributors profit, etc. To sell a printer for $100, the manufacturer needs make it for $15-40.
For the retailer carrying spares in their inventory ties up money that they pay interest on.
It may suck for us, but it is commerce. Not outrageous.