Comments on: Replacement for a Sharp UX-P200 FAX machine (esp. with cheap film)?

Question: Replacement for a Sharp UX-P200 FAX machine (esp. with cheap film)?

mygothlaundry — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 11:48:06 -0800

Faxfilter: Our small office (10 people) has just unanimously agreed to take our Sharp UX-P200 fax machine out into the street, stomp on it and set it on fire. Does anyone have any recommendations for a replacement? It's pretty heavily used, probably 10 - 20 ingoing/outgoing faxes per day. One of the (many) issues with the Sharp was that while the machine was cheap, the carbon film cost was ridiculous. We're a small non-profit - so cost is very important. Thanks!

By: Keith Talent

Keith Talent — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 12:35:46 -0800

Have you investigated having faxes come straight into your PC? I beleive XP contains a utility for doing this.

By: b1tr0t

b1tr0t — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 12:40:04 -0800

Monochrome laser printers are by far the cheapest output device on a per-page basis. If you receive a lot of incoming faxes and want to print them all, look for a laser fax

By: caution live frogs

caution live frogs — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 12:41:40 -0800

how about one of those all-in-one printer/scanner/fax/copier things that HP or some other similar company makes? they use standard paper and toner cartridges rather than the carbon film. if you do go this route look for the laserjet rather than inkjet plain paper fax, as the inkjet will cost you an arm and a leg for ink and isn't designed for the volume you do. the HP LaserJet 3030 for example is a combo laserjet printer/scanner/copier/fax with document feeder that can handle around 7000 pages a month. only $500...

By: mygothlaundry

mygothlaundry — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 12:43:46 -0800

There are too many documents that need to be signed and then sent back for that to work. We tried it for a while but, as backwards as we are - and we're pretty durn backwards - it turns out there are people even behind us on the technology evolutionary scale, and they want faxes. So we need a real fax machine.

By: mygothlaundry

mygothlaundry — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 12:46:32 -0800

Oops, the "need to be signed comment" was replying to Keith & I didn't see the next one! Thanks for the recommendations. We have a couple laser printers that are working fine, so we really just need a stand alone fax.

By: Mo Nickels

Mo Nickels — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 12:47:12 -0800

Ten to 20 faxes a day constitutes "heavy use"? Did you lose a couple of zeros there?

By: ParisParamus

ParisParamus — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 12:47:49 -0800

I would highly recommend looking into a service such as MAxemail.com, which, for about $6/month, will send you received faxes as pdf attachments. Sending is still an open question, but the savings in paper, time, etc can be wonderful.

By: PissOnYourParade

PissOnYourParade — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 13:40:37 -0800

Just get a laser fax machine. When your running an office and your sending contracts and documents back and forth, you don't want to be messing around with e-fax and scanning and what not.

We've had pretty good luck with an older version of this Panasonic. But I bet there all pretty much the same around the price point.

One toner lasts 5000+ pages and it can do printing and copying if you want it to.

By: defcom1

defcom1 — Wed, 24 Nov 2004 15:57:31 -0800

I second the laser fax. I work in a largish office (400 people) we have multiple fax machines spread across the floors, they're all laser fax units. :) Work great, the cartridges aren't the cheapest ($60-$70) but last 5000+ pages, so your price per page is about as cheap as you're gonna get. (The all-in-one units with the inkjet cartridges cost much more per page)

By: madmanz123

madmanz123 — Fri, 26 Nov 2004 16:55:19 -0800

Get your laser fax from brother, inexpensive and rock solid machines in my experiance. We have several that work very well.

By: yaquina27

yaquina27 — Sat, 27 Nov 2004 10:30:45 -0800

As the owner of a very small business, I'm a big fan of eFax. They charge $12.95 per month, and they provide you with your own fax number, so you don't have to dedicate one of your landlines for inbound faxes. They have local numbers in many major metro areas. The secret is to use the service for receiving faxes only. Incoming faxes are forwarded to an email address (actually up to 5 email addresses). My assistant receives all faxes and forwards them via email to the person(s) who need them. We then print faxes on our large network printer (at a very low cost per page) on an as-needed basis. I save faxes in my email client for future reference. And best of all, I can easily receive faxes via email while I'm travelling. We use an HP LaserJet 3150 for outbound faxes, but any decent page-feed fax machine would work. So the non-geeks in the office have no trouble whatsoever.