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United States24701 Posts
I was chatting with some people on irc recently about the idea of getting my own copy machine.
The backstory:
I teach in public schools so I make a lot of photocopies. Normally I make them using the copy machines available to teachers. However, they are often broken, not working well, or being used by lots of other teachers. The time and stress involved in hunting for working copy machines has become a serious problem for me. I figured I'd research how expensive it would be if I bought my own copy machine and brought paper from the school to my home to make the copies I need. I define a single copy as printing on to one side of a sheet of paper. Thus, a two-sided copy would count as 2 copies, and a packet would count as multiple copies.
The features a copy machine I would need are as follows:
- Duplex (2 sided copies) with 2-sided document feeder
- Hole Punching and Stapling in Finisher
- Able to handle several thousand copies a month
Features it would not need:
- Paper sizes other than 8.5x11
- scan to file
- network card and/or functionality as a computer printer
- very high printing speed
I had hoped there was a fairly low-level machine that can do this. Someone on IRC suggested getting a machine without the staple/punch finishing options to save money, and punching/stapling separately. That's not a bad suggestion but the stapling process would be a huge pain in the ass without at the very least collating available... the hold punching probably wouldn't be as bad but not a great deal either.
You can't really research this stuff online... you have to go through retailers (dealers) and get quotes. I spoke to one guy at a supplier near me and explained my needs, and he said he'd get back to me. He explained that one of the major expenses of having your own photocopy machines is the maintenance on them as they do only two things: print copies and break down. His company offers a service package which includes all maintenance and all materials (such as toner/etc) except for paper (not a problem) and staples (not a huge deal).
About 30 hours later he gets back to me with the following proposal:
Canon ImageRunner 3225
Print/Copy/Scan
25 prints per minute
Duplexing Auto Document Feeder
Two 550 sheet paper draws
50 page bypass feeder
Stapler
Hole Puncher
Cabinet
Lease: Monthly Investment for 5 years, including service plan: $146.00. Service includes 3000 copies per month. If I go over/under the price goes up/down $0.0095 per copy. He said if I'm interested in this he'll look into any possible lease offers or rebates.
Purchase: $5,766 not including a service plan
For comparison, how expensive would it be to do 3000 copies per month at a print shop like kinko's or staples? If we estimate 8 cents per copy (let's say), 3000 copies is $240.00 per month, not to mention the inconvenience of going to a public store frequently.
ARG THIS IS TOO DAMN EXPENSIVE WHAT DO I DO? This wouldn't be a problem if schools actually were equipped with sufficient photocopy technology (also some teachers do dumb things when trying to unjam them and damage them).
 
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Do the hubba bubba, baby.
+ Show Spoiler +Yeah, I don't know anything about printing/copying >.>
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If you would get your own copier, would it be in the school or at home and you would just copy everything beforehand ?
If its the latter, you could achieve most of it with a decent printer with scan function, even if its quite slower (and definitely won´t have stapler/hole puncher unfortunately). If its the first one, I would feel rather awkward anyway : because either you allow other teachers to use your copy machine too, which even if you´d get "highest priority" there would still be more breakdown/maintenance, and you´d be essentially "donating" your school a new copier, or you´d have a copier there and tell everyone else that they aren´t allowed to use it.
Its a tough situation (starting to teach myself, I really feel what you mean), but if speed doesn´t matter too much a decent printer would probably your best bet.
Hope this helps a bit ...
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United States24701 Posts
On September 15 2011 08:50 Espelz wrote:
If you would get your own copier, would it be in the school or at home and you would just copy everything beforehand ?
If its the latter, you could achieve most of it with a decent printer with scan function, even if its quite slower (and definitely won´t have stapler/hole puncher unfortunately). If its the first one, I would feel rather awkward anyway : because either you allow other teachers to use your copy machine too, which even if you´d get "highest priority" there would still be more breakdown/maintenance, and you´d be essentially "donating" your school a new copier, or you´d have a copier there and tell everyone else that they aren´t allowed to use it.
Its a tough situation (starting to teach myself, I really feel what you mean), but if speed doesn´t matter too much a decent printer would probably your best bet.
Hope this helps a bit ...
I would keep it at home; not in the school. I did however plant the idea in my direct boss of trying to possibly get a machine on science dept. money to only be used by out department...
As I said, people on IRC suggested I get a cheaper copier without the punch/staple functionality... but this is a deal breaker for me. I staple copies on a daily basis and punch everything since almost all of my students use 3 ring binders to store all papers. Punching copies isn't that big of a deal if you buy a high quality mass hole-puncher, I guess, but stapling packets individually, and especially without a collate function, is extremely time consuming and annoying. 'Pass a stapler around' also isn't a viable solution for me.
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I don't know much about copiers and stuff, but if you didn't need the features you listed, you could buy like a $100 printer/scanner/copier and it should be able to do what you need since you don't care about speed. You'd use twice as much paper though and you'd have to pay for a lot of ink.
Also, doesn't your school have business-level hole-punches and staplers? 3000 copies per month is about 100 copies per day. Can't you hole punch and staple a stack of 100 sheets at once?
Edit: Oh lol I forgot you need to staple stuff in packets.
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motbob
United States12546 Posts
It seems obvious to me that you should make every effort to buy lightly used. It seems like that's the only way you'd be able to acquire a reasonably priced copy machine.
Of course it might be impossible to buy a lightly used copier that comes with a guarantee of reliability.
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I've already made my argument that TAs are cheaper and more user friendly than $5k copy machines.
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I now understand how hard it is for my teachers to staple papers and hole punch them all. Eyes have been opened. Shouldn't your school have a nice holepuncher that holepunches all the sheets at once? I guess stapling by hand is time consuming.. Unless you go "hey you 3 kids. Staple all these packages together. no recess for you!"
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This is the plan: You hire me to do mass stapling, save money. ;P
But in all honesty, my econ teacher looked into it. There really aren't good options that staple for less than 5k. He ended up just using Haas connections to get one for free, but I'd imagine that's a bit out of the question for you.
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Are there no copy stores around you? How's the US school budget doing anyway?
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I have a plan to fix your situation:
Step 1: Learn spanish and get a certificate saying so.
Step 2: Show your boss said certificate.
Step 3: Cherish the Bilingual pay raise (its ~5k per year at my school).
Step 4: Buy printer.
Step 5: Next year buy [insert exotic car here] with the extra 5k you got.
Step 6: PROFIT!?!?!
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Copiers are a huge bitch to maintain, they break all the time. I've been involved in the purchasing of a few at my current job and no matter how much we spend one of them is down for over a day and the maintenance guy is here at least once a month. When you're budgeting for one be sure to take in to account that it will break at the worst possible time and you'll need an alternative to get all those copies done in time. Not to mention the repair guy probably won't do weekends/holidays without an extra charge... you gonna take a day off work so your copier can be fixed?
Blows that this is even an issue... what grade level / economic status are the kids you teach? No chance of just emailing pdfs to all of them?
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United States24701 Posts
On September 15 2011 09:08 motbob wrote:
It seems obvious to me that you should make every effort to buy lightly used. It seems like that's the only way you'd be able to acquire a reasonably priced copy machine.
Of course it might be impossible to buy a lightly used copier that comes with a guarantee of reliability.
Let me research used machines.
On September 15 2011 09:11 Probe1 wrote:
I've already made my argument that TAs are cheaper and more user friendly than $5k copy machines.
By TAs do you mean student helpers?
On September 15 2011 09:11 RyuChus wrote:
I now understand how hard it is for my teachers to staple papers and hole punch them all. Eyes have been opened. Shouldn't your school have a nice holepuncher that holepunches all the sheets at once? I guess stapling by hand is time consuming.. Unless you go "hey you 3 kids. Staple all these packages together. no recess for you!"
I could get a mass hole puncher... I don't have much experience with them but that wouldn't be a huge deal. It's mainly the stapling that is a real problem.
On September 15 2011 09:53 Body_Shield wrote:
Are there no copy stores around you? How's the US school budget doing anyway?
As I said in my OP that's very expensive also in the long run. As for the budget that's a very vague question but schools are hurting right now.
On September 15 2011 09:55 mucker wrote:
Not to mention the repair guy probably won't do weekends/holidays without an extra charge... you gonna take a day off work so your copier can be fixed?
Blows that this is even an issue... what grade level / economic status are the kids you teach? No chance of just emailing pdfs to all of them? I could rush home on a given afternoon.... I'm sure 3pm wouldn't be too late for him on a weekday. I'd have to bring a fair amount of work home with me to compensate but that's not a big deal.
Alternate methods of giving the students the materials such as e-mailing them the pdf is not an option... at least not for 99% of my students. This is not due to socio-economic situation though.
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I'm not sure how to solve your problem, but a possible prevention of this issue for the school:
Copiers and the likes relocated to one room
Hire someone to fill requests for copies, etc
Have said employee(s) do all copy-related work
At least this way, less stupid people touch the machines?
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Your a teacher? The math blogs make a lot more sense now.
When I was in high school, I had some teachers that just made us print everything from home. Option #3 I guess.
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United States24701 Posts
On September 15 2011 10:41 GigaFlop wrote:
I'm not sure how to solve your problem, but a possible prevention of this issue for the school:
Copiers and the likes relocated to one room
Hire someone to fill requests for copies, etc
Have said employee(s) do all copy-related work
At least this way, less stupid people touch the machines?
There is one machine in a room with a copy person but it's a bit harder for me to access and still breaks a fair amount. To have them make your copies you need to submit them a while in advance which is a deal breaker for me most of the time. There is a second copy machine in a room I have access to, and it is often broken.
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Can you send out the packets to your students ahead of time and have them print them out?
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United States24701 Posts
On September 15 2011 11:27 n.DieJokes wrote:
Can you send out the packets to your students ahead of time and have them print them out?
No.
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you need to staple and 3 hole punch them? one defeats the purpose of the other. you are a cruel man micronesia.
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United States24701 Posts
On September 15 2011 11:39 mahnini wrote:
you need to staple and 3 hole punch them? one defeats the purpose of the other. you are a cruel man micronesia.
3 hole punch is for storage; staple is to keep the pages together while they are not in the binder... I don't really see a problem lol
Plus I have the option to not hole punch whenever I am doing packets, but hole punch single sheets...
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Break into another school and steal that 200 pound beast.
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You will not find a machine that can do hole-punch/collate/stapling under a thousand.
If you can find ways around these features though, your cost will be minimum.
- Duplex is doable for consumer-level laser jets. However, you'll need to research reviews to find one that works consistently.
- Collate seems to be your biggest concern. Luckily, that's something that you can set software-side rather than relying on printer features. It won't work as well as a hardware solution, but it'll save you a few thousand dollars.
![[image loading]](http://imgur.com/cOuDM.jpg)
- Get your top student to help you with stapling/hole punching
If the above caveats are acceptable, you can probably find a machine that fit your budget <$500 and $15/1k pages. I am a fan of HP and to a lesser extend Brother machines, mostly because their ink can be bought cheaply on the web (~$15/cartridge). When you have time for it, just wait for a deal to pop up on http://slickdeals.net on laserjets.
[edit] Here's one that may work right now
Brother HL-2270DW http://slickdeals.net/forums/showthread.php?t=3148112
ink ($14/each for 4) http://www.meritline.com/brother-tn450-toner-compatible-high-yield---p-65640.aspx
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United States24701 Posts
On September 15 2011 11:59 Primadog wrote:
You will not find a machine that can do hole-punch/collate/stapling under a thousand. I'd be willing to pay a couple of thousand.
If you can find ways around these features though, your cost will be minimum. - Duplex is doable for consumer-level laser jets. However, you'll need to research reviews to find one that works consistently.
- Collate seems to be your biggest concern. Luckily, that's something that you can set software-side rather than relying on printer features. It won't work as well as a hardware solution, but it'll save you a few thousand dollars.
The collate would need to physically offset each packet to make it easier to staple them.... a cheap machine won't do that obviously. Stapling packets from a big stack of printed papers really sucks if the papers haven't been offset.
Get your top student to help you with stapling/hole punching
As I said... I need a decent machine.
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Never knew that office printers were this expensive. With the trend of continual education budget cuts, it's no wonder teachers have a hard time fighting for photocopying.
Why not try to get funding from the school (/board) for this? Is there an option to count your monthly lease payments towards final purchase, if you decide to do that later? I have a feeling that at least a couple tech-savvy staff members (including yourself? hmmm) will learn enough about the machine in a couple months that you won't need servicing plans afterwards. Then again, $146/month for 5 years (assuming fixed) compared to $5766 one-time pay seems like a decent deal, especially considering the fact that dumb old teachers will fuck up the machine in the early months of usage.
If you're going to strictly limit this to personal use, I'd definitely look for lower rates than those.
Oh, and yeah, never go ink. Definitely avoid ink. Laser all the way.
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Whatever you're teaching, do it in a way that doesn't require you to print thousands of copies.
or
Plan all the copying you'll need for next term and come in for a couple of days outside term time to get it all done.
Buying your own personal copy machine seems ridiculous
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United States24701 Posts
On September 15 2011 23:17 OpticalShot wrote:
Never knew that office printers were this expensive. With the trend of continual education budget cuts, it's no wonder teachers have a hard time fighting for photocopying. Yeah, although it's always a problem to some extent, even when times are 'good.'
Why not try to get funding from the school (/board) for this? Not going to happen.
Is there an option to count your monthly lease payments towards final purchase, if you decide to do that later? Yes you can buy after the lease.
I have a feeling that at least a couple tech-savvy staff members (including yourself? hmmm) will learn enough about the machine in a couple months that you won't need servicing plans afterwards. Then again, $146/month for 5 years (assuming fixed) compared to $5766 one-time pay seems like a decent deal, especially considering the fact that dumb old teachers will fuck up the machine in the early months of usage. Well it would be my personal machine so nobody else would use it. Keep in mind that 5766 quote is not including any service or parts.
If you're going to strictly limit this to personal use, I'd definitely look for lower rates than those. Yeah this is too much for me to use just for copies for my own class.
On September 16 2011 03:05 deathly rat wrote:
Whatever you're teaching, do it in a way that doesn't require you to print thousands of copies. This is a good suggestion. I've already cut back on using photocopies as much as is reasonably possible given the many circumstances surrounding my job. I could probably find some more ways to cut back but I still need a fair bit either way so the problem doesn't go away.
Plan all the copying you'll need for next term and come in for a couple of days outside term time to get it all done. Another reasonable suggestion although it's mainly viable if you either A) always do a ton of work over the summer or B) have a light schedule so you have time to get way ahead with your planning. Both of these don't apply to me and have some other drawbacks that I won't go into.
Buying your own personal copy machine seems ridiculous Agreed.
The past two days the machine has been working!! Hooray.
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heres an idea, maybe viable maybe not
take a copy machine/maintenance class (if they exist) or find some way to gain this skill
-repair schools for extra $$
-have your own
-(copy for other people for $$ if they reimburse time?)
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EPT
