Konica/Minolta

Lisa of Jacksonville, FL November 2, 2009

After looking at many reviews on printers, I settled on the Minolta 1600W color laser printer as the best deal for the money. I purchased the printer – NEW - around 8/20/09 for 158.65. On or around 9/20/09, the printer ran out of black toner and I had to order a black toner cartridge for 65.74. Just over a month later (and a little over 60 sixty days since I purchased the printer), on or around 10/28/09, all of the three color cartridges ran out of toner.

Replacement costs for the three color toner cartridges range from 206.97 to 383.85. This is apparently a new model and not all discount toner suppliers carry the toner for this model. Adding the cost of the black toner I bought in September to the cost to purchase new color cartridges would be somewhere between 365.62 to 542.50.

I spoke with Ray at Konica's customer service who advised that the printers Konica makes are worth much more than their sales price, and that they "make up the difference" by pricing the toner very high. Maybe I am naive and this is standard practice, but it should be disclosed on the sales literature that the printer comes with "starter toner cartridges" which will need to be replaced after 500 pages, and that the cost of the replacement cartridges, although having a much higher yield of 1500 to 2500 pages, will well exceed the price of the printer.

If I went to a car dealership and the salesman showed me the car of my dreams with all of the features I was looking for at a great price, I would buy it. If I were to find out after buying the car that it came with "starter tires" that would only last two weeks and that the cost of the replacement tires for this particular car exceeded the amount I paid for the car by double, I would be mad as hell and screaming for some governmental agency to step in and say "this is not fair dealing with the consumer". But there doesn't appear to be anyone who can stop these printer manufacturers from selling their printers cheap and their replacement toner cartridges at inflated prices to "make up the difference".

Do your research. Price the replacement toner cartridges when you are pricing the printer. Ask what the yield is for their "starter cartridges", that is, how many pages will you be able to print with the starter cartridges. Then make up your mind whether it's a good deal or not.

I have a worthless two month old printer that I can't use (it won't even print black and white pages without the color toner cartridges), a worthless black toner cartridge about thirty days old which is 82% full, and I am forced to buy a new printer because it is more economical than buying toner for the printer I have.

hayes of adrian, MI June 3, 2009

This copier, scanner and fax has never worked correctly since it was purchased 03/2008. We have had several service calls and anything seems to work. Help, we feel maybe this machine needs to be replaced. I will be waiting to hear from you as we really need to get this matter taken care of in a timely manner. Thanks for you time

Dave of Maitland, FL October 17, 2007

Dave of Maitland FL (10/17/07)
Copytronics promised the Konica Minolta C640 Copier would perform to a standard it never achieved. The ability promised us to print on 8 1/2 x 11 for our mass mailings has never worked. We were promised a speed of 65 PPM (never reached) and a run of 200,000 copies/prints before maintenance with barely better than a rate 100,000. They sent over several technicians including their best without result.

We've spent quite a bit of extra money using outside vendors to handle our printing needs. Due to the slower rate of printing and maintenance issues, we've missed printing/copying deadlines. The whole matter has caused considerable, lost productivity.

Brock of Napa, CA April 26, 2006

Brock of Napa CA (04/26/06)
My digital camera has a known defect. I did not learn that it is a known defect until today. My camera became out of warranty on Feb. 15, 2006. I became aware of the defect soon after purchasing it, but I did not know it was a known defect. I immediately phoned Konica Minolta and reported the problem, not knowing that it was a known documented defect. I was not told that it was a known defect. I was told that I could send the camera in to be looked at. I did not want to be many weeks without the use of my camera.

 I thought it was a temporary problem and perhaps was caused by some camera setting and that it was clear up on its own. I did not send it in. The problem did clear up and I thought that it was gone permanently. After some time, the problem returned. I was concerned, but thought again that it would clear up on its own. Again it went away, and I thought it was a mysterious problem that came and went, but I could not find what the problem was related to. For the past 2 months, I have been noticing the problem and today I decided to test all the settings on the camera to see if I could find the cause of the problem. I went online and searched for any postings referring to the problem that I encountered. I found that it was a documented known problem.

In my personal camera, it was just as others had written about, but more noticeable than it was described in the postings that I found. I phoned Konica Minolta today and discussed the problem with them. I asked if they saw in my records that I had reported the problem shortly after purchase. I was told, "Yes", that the documentation was in my account. However, because the camera was out of warranty, it would cost approximately 200.00 to be repaired.

I feel that since this was a known defect in the camera and that it existed at the time that it was purchased, that the camera should be replaced or repaired without charge. The defect is not exclusive to my personal cameral As I understand it, it exists on all Konica Minolta A200 digital camera. The defect is a major one. The digital camera has a still mode and a movie mode with audio. When the camera is in movie mode, there is a continuous background sound that is a clicking, grinding sound. It seems to be related to the camera doing some automatic focusing operation, even though I have the auto focus option turned off. It occurs when the camera is in movie mode, even when it is not recording. If I place the lens cap over the lens, the sound stops. When a video of any scene is recorded and is played back, there is a constant clicking, grinding sound that overlays any other sound that may be part of the video.

Vincent of Holmes, NY April 11, 2006

Vincent Maier of Holmes NY (04/11/06)
In January 2006, I submitted a 50.00 rebate for the purchase of DimageX1 camera. They refused my rebate because of the UPC that supplied. I supplied the only UPC that was on the camera box.The rebate was a reason that we purchased the Konica Minolta camera.

We feel that Konica Minolta has reneged on their contract to send us the 50.00 rebate.

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