There is no doubt most offices have taken advantage of the benefits of wireless internet. Without having to deal with cumbersome cables, employees are able to conduct their work throughout the office, increasing collaboration. Now you can increase the productivity of your business even more with multifunction devices with Wi-Fi connectivity. A wireless device allows documents to be printed from portable laptops, digital cameras or other devices within range.

Through the use of a built-in Wireless Network Interface Card (WNIC), printers are now more mobile and versatile than ever. By replacing the standard USB connection, you allow for minimal cabling to connect the device to electricity. Not only does this provide mobile printing, but it also makes reallocating your devices quick and easy. 

Wireless multifunction devices still have all the features of a standard device and also reduce clutter and dangerous cables in offices. With access to a central printer connected to a Wi-Fi hub, hundreds of employees will have printing capabilities without having to share cables.

When it comes to designing and customizing the layout of workspaces, wireless devices offer expanded flexibility. Most wireless multifunction systems can work within a radius of about 150 feet. continue reading...

Unmanaged office printing can easily consume up to 3% of annual revenues according to the Gartner group. Therefore, if you are searching for an area to trim your company’s overhead, your print environment is a great place to start. To control and reduce this expense there are a few strategies you can integrate.

Consolidate Devices

If you look around your office there are probably areas that have a laser printer, a copier and a fax machine sitting right next to each other. This presents a great cost-saving opportunity. Each of these devices has a separate cost of operation that comes from stocking unique supplies, supporting the network, handling repairs and service and electricity. With today’s skyrocketing energy costs, it is possible that it actually costs more to power your devices than it costs to put supplies in the devices!

You can combine devices with multifunction systems that print, copy, fax and scan in a single unit. These reliable systems can handle applications from desktops to workgroups to departments. Consolidating devices with multifunction systems could provide instant and long-term cost reduction for your organization.

Re-Route Print Jobs

Some of your printing devices are less expensive to operate than others. For the most part, high-volume networked systems have a lower operational cost than smaller desktop devices. While desktop devices may be necessary for productivity or privacy reasons, larger print jobs could easily be routed to network devices to reduce costs.

New software makes it easy to re-route print jobs automatically. You can assess your basic needs and set routing rules. For example, print jobs over 20 pages could be sent to a networked multifunction system. The end user would simply print their job exactly like they normally would. However, with this software a pop up window would let them know that their job was routed to the workgroup device as a cost-saving strategy. Applying print routing to your organization could create cost savings of 30% or more. continue reading...

By Marlene Orr, Senior Printer Analyst, June 8, 2010

HP kicked off Internet Week NYC with a news conference broadcast live via the Web. Appropriately, the theme was harnessing the power of the Internet to customize and simplify the printing experience. In his introduction, Vyomesh Joshi (VJ), president of HP’s Imaging and Printing Group, noted that since the advent of Web 2.0, there has been an explosion in the amount of available content on the Web. In fact, HP's research shows that by next year, Internet printing will surpass printing from word processing programs.

VJ said that while creating the content has become easier (think of the countless social networking and photo-sharing Web sites), capturing and printing that content has not always been so easy.

Addressing the shift last year, HP introduced its first Web-connected printer (the Photosmart Premium All-in-One), which let users download software to the AiO so they could access and print Web content from the control panel. Since then, the company has paid close attention to customer behavior, learning that about 70 percent of users downloaded applications to allow them to capture and print content without turning on their PC. 

To keep up with what it says is a growing customer need, HP will Web-connect every new HP printer with a purchase price greater than $99. But it’s not just about the software applications anymore. Cloud printing (untethered/wireless printing, whereby data is sent over the Internet to a selected printer) is nothing new, but HP is taking it to the next level by allowing users to print from mobile devices with no additional software or drivers required. As VJ said, “If you can e-mail it, you can print it.” With ePrint technology, users can print a document by using nothing more than the resident e-mail program on a device to send it to the printer. So, not only can users download apps to access and print content without turning on their PCs, they can now print from mobile devices (like smart phones and tablet PCs) that have traditionally had inherent limitations to printing. continue reading...

The world is focused on recycling. One of the best places to start may be with your office laser printers and multifunction systems.

Here are three simple steps to cutting waste and saving money: continue reading...

• Recycle Paper Put recycling bins next to your printers and copiers. Most municipalities have recycling services. You can also use recycled paper in your printers and copiers. Make sure to select a good quality of recycled paper that is rated for laser printers and copiers.
• Duplex Printing A great way to immediately cut paper usage is to set your printers and multifunction systems to default to duplex (two-sided) printing. This is especially helpful for long print jobs because duplex printing literally cuts your paper usage in half.

Technological advances have resulted in many different printers, but of course not all printers will print the same quality. There are many different types of printers on the market, and all of them have different functions and characteristics.

Some questions you may want to ask before buying a printer are:

· Are you a large or small company?

· What will this device be used for?

· What quality and performance features are you looking for?

· What is your budget? continue reading...

Fax Servers and Multifunction Printers offer a lot of the same capabilities and are a great tool for any office.

A Fax Server is a set of software running on a server computer that is equipped with one or more fax-capable modems attached to a telephone line or a software modem emulator that can transmit the signal over an IP network. A fax  server’s function is to receive fax calls and accept documents from users, convert them into faxes, and transmit them, store them, or pass them onto a different user. Users can communicate with the server through a local network or the Internet.

One little known fact is that a Multifunction Printer can offer a lot of the features a fax server can. A Multifunction Printer is an office machine that can incorporate multiple devices in one so a business can have a centralized document management system. A MFP combines the abilities of a printer, scanner, photocopier, fax machine, and email and is great with handling many processes at once. continue reading...

Printers and scanners are an absolute necessity in every organization, business, office, educational institution, and more. The numerous brands and features of printers and scanners can vary anywhere from the numerous accessories, to the simplicity of black and white, color or both depending on the intended job.

Printers are available for specific purposes such as printers for mobile receipts, mobile thermal labels, network thermal labels and more. While some scanners can also be used for specific scanning purposes of photos, business cards, documents, and checks. Although some machines can accomplish both jobs of the printer and scanner.

Printers

The print preview option works out to be a great advantage as it helps a person to see how everything would look like in final, hard copy. Another advantage of printers is allowing storage of all the information in files for future reference with an ease and peace of mind that nothing important will be lost.

Laser printers, print quickly while, inkjet printers are cheaper they are slower. Yet, both printers use ink cartridges and will need to be changed. A good sensible solution to dealing with constantly changing cartridges is to use reusable cartridges.

Scanners

Scanners are machines you can scan just about anything and view it in soft copy on your laptop or computer. Meaning important documents like proof of purchase receipts, photos, contracts, and articles from newspapers or magazines, can be scanned and shared over email with friends or colleagues. continue reading...

If you’re in the market for a color laser printer for the first time, you are in for some surprises and a few shocks. Color laser printers have come a long way in function and reliability and are now offered by a large number of companies. Laser printers can be all-in-one machines and be as industrial-strong as any company would need them to be. They can also be more moderately priced for the smaller companies and even less expensive for home, business, or personal use.

When comparing color laser printers you need to consider many aspects in order to ensure the best purchase for your needs. Excellent refurbished printers are available at remarkable savings and many will include a warranty that will give peace of mind concerning the cost. Any color laser printer comparison needs to consider those as well. Some laser printers are capable of label making, shredding, gluing pages, collating, stapling and will easily serve the printing needs of one computer or an entire department. A color laser printer comparison needs to consider the ink the printer will use, because toner and cartridges can get very expensive. continue reading...

Optical Character Recognition (OCR) has made great progress in the fight for paperless offices. It’s become a staple component in just about any document management software.

So what is OCR? Wikipedia offers this definition: “…the mechanical or electronic translation of images of handwritten, typewritten or printed text (usually captured by a scanner) into machine-editable text.” (2008)

Fundamentally, a computer reads the document and creates a library of searchable information. This type of application allows an EDM solution the opportunity to build a database of text, making the search for usable information within and across documents much easier.

While many argue the accuracy levels for OCR engines can reach 98 or 99 percent, small-to-medium businesses (SMBs) may find this hard to achieve with most commercially-available software. Many variables can affect the accuracy levels of output, ranging from document condition to readability.

Where problems can begin to occur is when OCR is not applied to the text contained within the scanned document, but used to lift index values themselves (e.g. customer name, number, etc.). This becomes dangerous if there are no quality assurances or stop-loss measures in place. If that is the case, it becomes likely a document will be misplaced due to a character being off here or there. continue reading...

Vince Ferraro of the HP Laser Jet Blog points us to the PC Magazine Review of monochrome laser printers. Here is what Vince said in his blog post: continue reading...