What would you recommend - graphics printing

[iSteve]

Hello,

 

I'm starting to do a bit of research in to upgrading the printing facilities in our school's art department. Here's some background:

 

-1400 pupils, 11-16 plus 6th form.

-Art department caters for both Art and Photography courses

-5 art rooms

 

Currently we have various printers in each room to cater for various scenarios:

-2x HP 2605dn colour lasers with RAM upgrades

-1x HP K8600dn for "good" colour printing

-2x HP 6940 for quick colour printing

-1x HP 1320 mono for text work

 

Now, these are "doing the job" but I feel we should provide something better, particularly for GCSE and A level work. The 2605s are ok but slow with large files and colour is a bit iffy particularly with remanufactured toners. Some students require large format / A3 printing, hence the K8600.

 

If you have have GCSE art / photography in your school, I'd be interested to hear what you provide, or what you would recommend printer hardware wise. As you can see, we favour HP.

 

TIA.

[bossman]

@iSteve:

 

We are currently leasing our printer for Technology and as you can imagine we use this for all kinds of projects.

The printer we are using is an OKI ES8430 A3/A4 and one of the products the technology leader requires is carton design printing on heavy weight card.

Not only is this covered by this particular printer the Art dept are so impressed that they wish to lease the same printer type for them to use for high gloss printing A3 and A4.

 

We only pay for what we use and the toners and repairs are all part of the bundle.