Laserjet m476dn toner cartridge life

[beals5]

The printer is about 16 months old and still on its original toner cartridges.  I primarily bought this printer for its double-sided scanning--I use it a LOT.  Not so much for printing.  I have about 1200 B&W pages and 750 color pages so far.  I started getting "critical low" messages for my black cartridge at around 600 pages and my printer claims about 10% left on my color cartridges at 750 pages, so expecting those warnings shortly.

I've been ignoring the warnings as the printer is printing just fine on B&W for 600+ pages now.  My concern is the cartridges are supposed to be good for 2700 pages!!  Yes, "your milage may vary", but this seems a bit extreme.  Is there something about either the original cartridges or the relative low usage that means this is what I should expect or am I doing something wrong to get such low cartridge life?

I got a spare B&W cartridge (the extended version) and am about to get a spare set of color ones, but would like to know if I have a bigger issue or not before spending $300 for the set.

Thanks in advance.

will

[dansdaduk · Accepted solution]

A couple of points:

• As regards the "your milage may vary" comment:  toner yield figures from (most? all?) manufacturers are based on specific ISO tests; the simpler tests (I think) assume an average coverage of just 5% of each page with toner.

• As regards "original cartridges": the data sheet seems to indicate that lower-capacity starter cartridges are supplied with the device:

[beals5]

Dansdaduk:

Ah!  I did miss that in the fine print.  Fully understand on "reference pages" for toner life.  You have to have a standard.  If the expected life is 1200 pages then looks like even though I got the warnings way too early, I am getting roughly the expected life of the cartridges.  Gives me confidence that all is OK and fine to order the next batch of cartridges.

Thanks for pointing that out.

will

[dansdaduk]

@beals5 "... Fully understand on "reference pages" for toner life.  You have to have a standard ..."

Unfortunately, not everyone thinks like that, and they get annoyed that they don't get the 'expected page yield' when they print lots of full colour / full bleed images.