The weaknesses of a Dot Matrix printer are:
- The printer produces quite low to medium quality printing
- It can only print in black and white
- It makes a lot of noise while printing
- You have to print with continuous paper that has sprocket holes in it
- The printing speed is slow
Laser Printer
Laser printers work in the same way as photocopiers. A laser printer works by the laser drawing an image onto a photosensitive drum. The drum rotates and passes the toner reservoir. The toner reservoir contains powdered plastic. A piece of paper passes through two rollers and the toner is then passed onto this piece of paper. The paper then goes through another set of rollers which are 200°C. The heat from the rollers heats up the paper, making the toner stick to the paper.
The strengths of a Laser Printer are:
- They do not make as much noise while they are printing
- They produce high quality printing
- They print in black and white, but some can also print in colour
- The printing speed is fast
The weaknesses of a Laser Printer are:
- They cost a lot of money
- You cannot produce multiple copies at the same time.
There are many differences between a Dot Matrix Printer and a Laser Printer.
A Dot Matrix printer is an impact printer but a Laser printer is a non-impact printer. This means that a Dot Matrix printer has a printhead with a set of pins which shoot out and strike the paper, but a Laser printer does not strike the paper while it is printing. Instead, it makes a copy of the image by drawing the image onto a photosensitive drum and then prints the image out.
A Dot Matrix printer only prints in black and white, but a lot of Laser printers print in black and white and in colour.
Dot Matrix printers make a lot of noise but Laser printers are relatively quiet. The fact that Dot Matrix printers are noisy may not be good for the employees working in the business because they may not be able to concentrate if there is a lot of background noise.
Dot Matrix printers produce low to medium quality printing whereas Laser printers produce high quality printing.
Laser printers offer less paper handling flexibility compared to Dot Matrix printers.
In my opinion, for my business, I would choose to buy a Dot Matrix printer because the running costs are very low and they can strong. They can also operate in harsh conditions. Also, multiple copies can be made at the same time if several copies of self-carbonating paper are placed in the printer. This saves a lot of precious time, which is vital if a business wants to operate efficiently.
If you were only going to print things such as statements and memorandums, or in the case of my business, things like receipts, you would not need to have very high quality printing so it would not matter that the Dot Matrix printer produces low to medium quality printing.
Also, if you were only going to print things that you weren’t going to show special or important people, it would not matter if the paper had sprocket holes down each side of it because only you or your partner(s) [if you have a partnership] would see it.
Another important aspect of buying a Dot Matrix printer rather than a Laser printer is that it costs much less money. It is very good if you do not have much money to spend because it does all the same jobs as a Laser printer but it just doesn’t have all the extra luxuries that a Laser printer has.
However, if later on my business was doing very well and I had enough money to buy a Laser printer, I would probably buy one because if you would need to print things in colour (in the case of my business – menus, posters and business cards), you would need a printer which can print things in colour to make everything stand out and look more professional than plain black and white printing. They also have high quality printing so if you were printing something which you were going to show other people e.g. a poster, the customers and other people would be tempted to come into your business to see if the business and service is as good as the printing! Laser printers also print quite quickly so this would save a lot of time.
Overall, I would recommend a Dot Matrix printer.
