See also:

• Xerox 8560 * Special with 3 year warranty* Solid Ink Technology
• Xerox 8570 Colorcube Solid Ink Technology

Prices at bottom of page

We also have great prices on genuine Fuji Xerox Solid Ink consumables!

Following on from it's solid ink cousins (the Xerox 8400, 8500 and 8560 printers), the Fuji Xerox Phaser 8560 / ColorCube™ range represents the latest in solid ink technology.

Solid ink (also known as colorstix/colour sticks or solid wax) is a vibrant, inexpensive and environmentally friendly printing method, which is redifining colour laser printing. 

The Fuji Xerox Phaser 8560 comes in several configurations:

• Phaser 8560DN - This is the standard model, featuring Duplex (double-sided printing) and Network. • Phaser 8560DT - This model is the same as the above DN model, with an additional paper tray added. • Phaser 8560MFP - The multifunction version, with print/scan/copy modes. Also known as the 8560MFP/D.

• Phaser 8560MFPX - The multifunction version as above, with a Fax and 2 paper trays added. AKA 8560 MFP/X. Solid Ink is a relatively new printing technology, where blocks of ink (or colorstix) replace conventional toner cartridges.

The Xerox 8560 printer melts these solid blocks of colour, then applies the ink to the page when printing. This method of printing has many advantages which we will outline in the review. 2. High Print Quality The excellent image quality offered by the 8560 printer makes it a popular choice amongst designers, graphic artists, sales and marketing teams and specialty printers.

Featuring a Resolution of up to 2400 DPI FinePoint, as well as Adobe PostScript and other PDLs (Page Description Languages) the 8560 easily handles photographs and detailed graphics. The 8560's colorstix provide solid, vibrant colours, without banding - a common problem amongst conventional laser printers when printing large amounts of colour.

The 8560 also handles a wide variety of matte paper textures and thicknesses, making it a favourite among wedding invite and stationery printers. The 8560 is one of the fastest printers in it's class.

Boasting an impressive speed of 30ppm (pages per minute) in both colour and mono, as well as a First Page Out time as fast as 15 seconds (from warm-up state). AIM tip: The Phaser 8560 is most effective when left on!

When powered off, any solid ink that the printer had melted into a ready state must be discarded, causing unnecessary waste. Leave your printer powered on, and let it go into sleep mode.

This may it will conserve energy, while still keeping a small amount of solid ink ready to use. The 8560's intelligent features will also track the times that it is commonly used - so if you start printing daily at 9am, the Phaser will 'wake up' a few minutes early and be ready to print when you are.

Solid Ink printers are increadible cheap to run. Unlike conventional toner based machines, the Phaser 8560 printers do not require drum cartridges, fusers or imaging units.

The only consumables required are the four colours of ink (cyan, magenta, yellow and black), a maintenance cartridge, and an ink waste tray. Running costs at time of review (December 2010) are as follows:

• Black colorstix, 6,600 pages - Under $100 • Cyan colorstix, 3,300 pages - Under $100 • Magenta colorstix, 3,300 pages - Under $100 • Yellow colorstix, 3,300 pages - Under $100 • Maintenance kit 30,000 pages $229 • Ink waste tray 200,000 pages $49 • TOTAL COST PER PRINT UNDER $0.12 Page yields calculated at 5% coverage per colour, 20% total coverage A4. *To be used as a guide only. Prices are April 2011.

Environmentally Friendly

Solid Ink colorstix are blocks of pure colour - unlike toner cartridges they do not come in a large plastic casing.

This means that there is much less waste created by the Phaser 8560. In fact, for every 70kg of waste created by a conventional toner cartridges, a Phaser series printer (8400/8500/8550/8560) only creates 2kg!

Researchers have also claimed that conventional toner cartridges may contain particles that are carcinogenic (cancer causing). It has been suggested that working in a confined or poorly ventilated space in close proximity to a laser printer may be detrimental to your health.

Easy to use

Solid ink stix are colour, number and shape coded - it couldn't be easier to refill a Xerox Phaser printer! Like the children's toy where the square peg won't fit in the round hole, a yellow colour stick can't fit into a cyan hole - it's child's play :)

Watch a video on Fuji-Xerox Solid Ink and why it's much better for the enviroment. (Takes a few moments to load)

In busy work groups, this ease of use translates into efficiency. Should the ink run low during a print job, any one can refill it - no need to call the IT guy.

Users can also pop open the lid at any time and clearly see how much ink they have left. As each colour stick prints around 1,100 pages, we can clearly see in the image below that we've got enough yellow to keep us out of trouble for around 4,400 pages.

FAQ

Does solid ink print slower the more color you add to the page?

No, it's full-color at full speed thanks to the single-pass design of the latest solid ink printers. Unlike even the fastest inkjet printers, filling the page with color from top to bottom won't slow a solid ink printer down at all. And our solid ink printers are twice as fast as the typical color laser.

Can solid ink print on both sides of the page?

Yes. Automatic two-sided printing is especially fast and reliable on Xerox solid ink printers because the duplex paper path is already built into every printer. The memory and software required to turn on the duplex function comes standard on the Phaser 8560DP.

Can I print transparencies with solid ink?

Xerox solid ink printers are legendary for their bright colors, smooth gradients, and fast, easy, reliable transparency printing. In fact, a recent review of Xerox solid ink in Presentations Magazine put it this way: "...probably the best printer for color transparencies I have seen, due to the rich and even color afforded by its unique ink system." And unlike some color lasers, there's no chance of having a sheet of transparency film melt onto a hot fuser roller because, with solid ink, there is no fuser.

How reliable is solid ink technology?

The elegantly simple design of a single-pass solid ink printer allows it to have 60% fewer parts than the typical four-pass color laser. The secret is in the printhead, which is precisely engineered and calibrated to deliver full-page full-color prints in one pass through the printer. The simpler, more color-oriented design of solid ink printers allows a shorter paper path and avoids all the cartridges, drums, belts, and rollers that make color lasers so complex.

The best way to sum up solid ink reliability is to look at the stated maximum monthly color page volume: At 85,000 pages per month, it's over twice that of typical color lasers and up to 65 times that of color inkjets.

How many pages can I print with each ink stick?

A package of three solid ink sticks (cyan, magenta, or yellow) produces up to 3,400 pages with typical ink coverage. That's well over 1,000 pages for each ink stick. Also, unlike laser and inkjet printers, which must be allowed to run out of toner or ink, the solid ink design lets you drop an ink stick in the printer any time. Simply top off the solid ink sticks at your convenience and you will never have to worry about running out of ink in the middle of an important job again.

Are the ink sticks safe to handle? Are they messy?

The resin-based solid ink sticks are clean and do not rub off on hands or clothing. Unlike liquid ink jet or laser toner, solid ink cannot leak or spill in the process of replenishing the ink supply. And with no cartridges to dispose of, and only one other consumable, solid ink is the most earth-friendly network color printer available today.

Can I match the color output to my screen or to other color devices?

Matching what you see on your monitor or what you expect from your final production printer can be tricky. But solid ink is especially good at it for three reasons:

(1) Since solid ink printers can print a wider range of colors than most color lasers, it is more likely to accurately render the target color.
(2) Solid ink prints the same color consistently, page-to-page and job-to-job.
(3) Extensive color management is built into every Xerox solid ink printer and includes TekColor Automatic Color Correction, which intelligently optimizes the color of every element on the page.

See the latest Fuji-Xerox ColorCube™ printers.