Am I stupid buying a used C1 without a service contact?

There's a C1 on Fleabay (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/CANON-IMAGEPR...hoto_Printers_Printers_JN&hash=item2310dcfc8c) which looks like a bargain. I'm only going to be printing 1k-3k SRA3 prints per month for the forseable future. I'm used the desktop lasers where nothing really goes wrong, so the cynic in me thinks that I'll be ripped off with a service contract and I'm better off just buying toners and drums when I need them.

Or am I being unbelievably naive? The machine in question has done 250,000 prints.

TIA

Gavin

 

I would get some-sort of service agreement. Unless your extremely savvy with production machines, and can do developer changes and wire replacements, Fixing unit replacements, etc.

 

If you print very light coverage or can tolerate some print defects, you might save a little bit of money buying your own toner and drums.
If your coverage is what I'd call "average" for a commercial printer and you need good quality, you'll come out ahead with an inclusive service contract.
Plus you'll save time sourcing consumables and time is money.
Plus when something breaks, when you're going it alone, you could have hours spent diagnosing the problem or having to buy parts to trial and error since you have no spare parts on the shelf to test with.

 

Cheers both.
I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that, for my purposes, a second hand machine would be fine as backup but problematic as a main machine. And you're right, you can waste hours on the internet looking for toners costing £2 less!

I'm having a Docucolour 550 demoed to me today so I'll see what that gives.

Thanks again,

Gavin
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When I started printing digital 9 years ago I started by buying two canon color machines and buying all my own consumables and durables and we did that for a year and around 400,000 11x17 prints until switching to full service contract machines. Often I got good deals on ebay, but that takes time searching, watching, bidding. Then making sure the item actually arrives. Once or twice I got a dud and that added more time, though the sellers made it right. There are places like red tag toner that sell some consumables cheap, but again you have to search for what they have available. Even retail, I sometimes found prices went up at the store I was buying from for x y or z or they would be out of stock that month and then had to find a new source. All in all it took time. There are some places like precision roller that have some of the common parts like developer assemblies, but other parts are very difficult to get. With our service contract machines they have access to the more esoteric parts that shouldn't normally break but sometimes do. If it's a really odd part that isn't expected to need replacement, they have a donor machine and will get the assembly there. On a canon under contract we ended up replacing a full door assembly because of the vertical path assembly contained within; on our xerox the full duplex assembly because a metal roller that wasn't available as a separate part was shot. If these were not under contract, that would be costly and very difficult to find as a separate part to get the machine running again promptly.