Customer Reviews

Xerox Phaser 8560/N Color Printer

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Out of the Box
The printer weighs about 60 pounds, get it out of the box, pop in the inks. Essentially, the consumable ink for these printers comes in blocks of wax. The blocks of wax cost about 10 bucks a piece/per color in volume when you buy the generic (since its literally just wax with no proprietary/moving parts whatsoever, why not buy generic?) and have a yield of about 1000 pages each. You can stack them up to four high. Simply drop it in the slot (the blocks are formed so that it's impossible to put the wrong color in the hole, or put the block in the wrong way). Then plug it in and let it warm up (takes around 15 minutes to melt enough wax). It will then print out a config document

Functionality
What really drew me to this printer was the wide support and lack of proprietary components (wax blocks are very easy to replicate), and the formats supported are no different. The printer comes with 256MB of RAM, a USB and ethernet connection. It supports proprietary drivers (comes with a CD with WIndows and Mac drivers), also Postscript 3, which is great for linux users and also, mac users who do graphics work (the PS support makes this printer smoke any HP printer in the pricerange) . It does 30 PPM and also does not heat the paper like laser printers do (you can use glossy papers an other stuff that will melt in lasers). Also, I have gotten 110lb Xerox Index card stock to load from the paper tray (which is specified as having a 32lb max)

Print Quality
Print quality is great, but not photo quality. The texture of the ink is great. It feels raised, but also waxy, almost like the surface was coated with crayons. This gives any document a glossy sheen. The print quality is a tad better than the color lasers I have tried, and better than inkjets at documents, but falls short of inkjet quality when talking about optimal conditions (absolute best printing quality and heavy glossy paper). Essentially, not photo quality (by a hair), but fantastic at text, graphics, etc

Pros/Cons
+Phenomenal quality at a level above normal color lasers
+Almost no proprietary parts
+Low cost per page (.04 i read at some website)
+Postscript support
+30PPM color
+Few paper restrictions compared to Lasers
-High Initial Cost
-If printer is turned off, ink has to be reheated, and this sucks ink
-Large, energy hungry
-More for high volume printers (im going to be recouping about $400 of the cost within two months by charging some clients for printing)

This is a great business-oriented printer. Print quality is very good and it is very fast after is warmed up (10 min or so from power-on). No complaints there whatsoever.

Be careful if getting it for a home office. Every time the printer gets turned off, it dumps the hot ink into the overflow container, so you have to keep it on all the time unless you can afford $70 ink refills every other week. The problem with keeping it on all the time is that it's very noisy even in standby mode which is distracting in a home office. If you get it for home, I'd recommend setting it up in a different room than you work in.

There's already been good information about this printer and it's clearly great for business use. However, I think it can be good for home offices as well - as long as you do a good amount of color printing and know how to minimize the costs.

1) ALWAYS leave it on - a lot of ink is wasted every time it's switched off since the heated ink is dumped out.

2) Since has to be on, make sure to put it into "Power Save Mode" whenever it won't be used for awhile. This mode uses 56W versus 124W in standby. It takes longer to warm up, but you aren't wasting energy.

3) Use generic ink. This is the major selling point of this printer for people who need to print a lot of color images. There's really no need for Xerox ink because Media Sciences ink is nearly indistinguishable. The cost per page for color prints is much lower than laser printers using the generic ink.

Bottom line - if you print a lot in color and are tired of expensive toner cartridges, this printer will save you a lot of money since you can use generic ink and get the same results.

I purchased this printer one month ago after owning (within the year) a Lexmark c530dn and an HP2600dn.

There is no comparison in quality of print, speed of print, cost of materials (practically half $ of the other two), and quality of machine/parts. The solid ink is a great solution as well.

I am a graphic designer and I do a good deal of printing (and printing large files) and I have been searching long and hard for a good machine that I could rely on and that wouldn't eat me alive on ink cost and consumables and that can print my files quickly (almost instantaneously). After trying out two competitors (mentioned above), I finally purchased this one and it's great. Highly recommended.

Pro: Fast, accurate, easy to use, reasonable usage cost, quiet, color quality

Con: You will need to be a person whom prints often or daily or the print heads will clog. This is a "working" machine and not something that needs to sit unused for a week or two. Also, when it prints there is a sudden, loud sound as the page is coming out. It's brief, but loud.

Update (9/15/2008)
One reviewer has recommended a third-party ink and I will not say this is bad (it saves a good deal of cash). However, I am of two minds:

A. I have not read any objective reports that say it is safe to use 3rd-party ink. In fact, I can only find reports from users whom say these inks have clogged their jet heads. (Though keep in mind that people tend to only comment if they are complaining.)
B. In my reading, one person gave a good argument that you could save enough money on ink costs by using 3rd party ink to actually purchase another Phaser if it goes kaput (because of using the 3rd-party ink). I can't verify this as true, but it's something to think on. :)

I bought this printer because of the low "ink" cost, which other users have mentioned come in wax blocks. The quality is very nice, I use it for when I want to print my office letterhead in color. The printer does take a LONG time to warm up, but I'm not a high-volume user, so that's OK. One thing I would like to warn people about is the downside of using wax inks. For one thing, if you take the page too quickly after printing and put it into a scanner, you can find black wax spots globbed onto your scanner. It comes off with alcohol, but my scanner eyes are not exactly easily accessible and it's a pain. The second thing is that there is a waxy film over the whole page, which you CANNOT highlight and is very difficult to use pen on, so it's not good for printing out reports for others to make comments onto the pages. And finally, I have never found the ink locally, not even at Fry's, so if you suddenly run out of ink, you'll have to wait for express mail because you have to buy it online. But all in all I am very happy with it.

I purchased an 8560/DN in September 2008, here's my impressions after one year.

At the time I was using a Epson Stylus 800 to make art proofs, but waiting 5 minutes per page
grows old fast. After looking at the print samples of the various color laser 'type' printers on the market, I came to the grim conclusion that most laser output looks pretty bad - certainly not up to the quality of a good ink jet printer - but the Xerox's image quality (which I would grade as 'fair') was better than most.

Pros:
No messy toner cartridges. The uniquely shaped wax blocks are a marvel of industrial design. I wouldn't trust a secretary to change toner cartridges in most laser printers... A four year old can reliably add new ink to the Xerox.

Fast output. When warmed up, the first page comes out of the printer in just a couple of seconds.

Great looking output. Keeping in mind that the quality of any laser/wax printer will not be as good as an ink jet, the Xerox color output is excellent for general office use and is quite useful for rough proofing of artwork.

Duplexer is built-in. No optional accessories to purchase for double sided printing.

Best network capabilities of any printer. Supports Apple Bonjour/Rendezvous, Appletalk, LPR/LPD, etc. Zero configuration for MAC.

Real Adobe Postscript. Not some clone.

Cons:
Supplies to tend to be more expensive than black and white laser. But are on par with competing color laser supplies. Xerox explicitly states in the manual that using an aftermarket ink will *not* in and of itself void any warranty. Damage caused by aftermarket inks will not be repaired at Xerox's expense.

In the course of a year I've run 10,000 pages through the printer. Here's some statistics:

Pages printed: ~10,000
Ink consumed: 2 sets (8 pieces of each color and maybe 12 black)
Jams: Zero
Smeared pages: Zero
Repair calls: 1. Sensor that detects ink in loading chute failed. Xerox repair showed up the next day
and fixed it in 30 minutes. Pretty amazing, actually.

Now lets address some of the topics raised in other reviews:

Power use: It uses about the same power as a typical laser printer. It will go into power save mode after 'normal' hours. Never turn it off. The only time I've turned mine off is when I went on vacation for two weeks.

Aftermarket Ink: Third party inks are available at a significant discount from the official Xerox inks. Almost every reviewer mentions the poor color rendition with these inks. If you must cost costs, I'd buy only the third party black.

Warranty: My warranty is up this month. Coincidentally (or perhaps not), I have just received a letter from Xerox offering me the opportunity to extend my warranty. 1 Year: $219, 2 Years: $416, 3 Years: $591

Noise: Ok, there might be something to this criticism. When it's printing, it sounds like some sort of Rube Goldberg contraption. It makes clanking noises, it wheezes. You'd think there was an asthmatic midget inside spray painting wax on the pages. When idle it is completely silent except for the occasional clunking sound as it performs maintenance to prevent wax from clogging up the system.

Conclusion:

Just like Reviewer Thidwick, I now wish I'd purchased the Mopier version - I probably will and will take the printer home.

This is probably the best piece of office equipment I've ever purchased.

-joe

I purchased the xerox Phaser 8560N about one month ago. It is a great printer, clear color copies and fast once it warms up. It takes about 3 or 4 minutes to get ready to print from a sleeping mode. To conserve ink the printer must be left on all the time. The reason it uses more ink to shut it down and restart is that it goes through a cleaning process that prints a dark color page using all the colors. Even while it is in sleep mode the printer stays warm which in turn heats up my small office.

The Xerox replacement ink seemed a bit pricey, so after having this machine and loving it for over a year, we decided to use the less expensive ink. Don't do it! The ink melted all over the place inside our printer. It made a real mess. Our copies have ink bled all over them. We have tried to run out all the cheap ink just in "junk" copies so we can try and clean up the machine and go back to xerox products. We went back to xerox products, but it was too late. The printer is ruined! So after 1 year of use, we have to buy a new printer. That makes the "cheap ink" VERY EXPENSIVE!! Cheap doesn't always pay!

Pros: Beautiful glossy color output, great network drivers, fast printing, minimal lag before printing, inexpensive ecologically-friendly ink.

Cons: 5-10min warm up when turning on, waxy ink can be scratched off (especially on glossy stock) the page and can be difficult to write over. Color accuracy can be an issue if using for proofs, but fine for everyday use.

Best printer I've ever owned or seen! No comparison. I was originally put off by the price tag; however, it's worth every penny. I can't believe I put up with inkjets for so long. I'm cured. This printer is such a relief: fast printing, easy network installation, inexpensive ink, no ink-cartridges to throw away, and amazing glossy color. In fact, the dry ink technology (it's almost like a wax) allows you to print on low quality paper and have a pristine glossy output. Sorry if I'm gushing, but I love this thing. The software does not bog the computer and there's virtually no lag between pressing print and the printing--even using the printer via the network port. Compare that to HP printers that require cumbersome, buggy software that bogs the computer, crashes regularly, and takes 30 seconds to a minute before it even thinks about printing.

This printer is a breeze and the results are beautiful. I'm telling everyone about these things.

Our only problem was with tray selection when printing envelopes from MS Word. Xerox tech support was very patient and got it solved. It was fixed by changing the paper selection for tray 1 to "dynamic" and the manual tray to "automatic".

I wish now that I'd gone with the full copier/fax/scanner/printer version of this. I would have loved to have replaced everything in our office with 8560MFP/N multi-function version (although multi-function units don't always work as well as dedicated units--but Xerox has earned my trust). Instead, I just replaced our fax machine with a Brother MFP with "PC Fax" that can send our faxes to the Xerox.

Buy this (or maybe the 8560MFP/N) and thank yourself later!

I bought the Xerox Phaser 8560N to replace an HP Color Laserjet printer that I was fed up with. The Xerox product is fantastic. I bought it directly from Xerox (by phone). The print quality is beautiful. Not messing with the toner cartridges is wonderful. The speed of printing is fantastic. Why am I so pleased with this printer? In part because I was so frustrated with the HP models.

I use this printer as part of a home network of Macs. I had an issue getting it networked properly (a problem with my Airport Base Station, it turns out) and contacted Xerox customer support. That experience also exceeded my expectation. Again, in part, because my expectation was so low with other equipment manufacturers.

I hope this is helpful. Good luck.