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Comment by thorntonbf | Hacker News Reader

Samsung has a printer business? Who knew?

Indeed, not the widest known product group of Samsung, but http://www.samsung.com/us/computing/printers/.

It is not uncommon for Asian (?) conglomerates to have a very wide range of products, as Hitachi, Sony, Yamaha (from trumpets and pianos, motorbikes, engines to electronics) and Toshiba demonstrate. TIL that Samsung even builds drillships.

I remember seeing enormous Toshiba turbines when visting a coal-fired power station.

Samsungs shipping division (Samsung Heavy Industries) is one of the largest ship-builders in the world, in fact (it was, possibly still is, the worlds second largest a few years ago).

They make pretty decent laser printers, from what I can tell.

They do. I got a Samsung C480 colour laser printer, scanner, copier a few weeks back to replace a broken Dell. The cartridges are far more accessible than the Dell. All three functions are reliable so far; so it's been a good buy for 208GBP. I'm becoming something of a Samsung loyalist. My Ultra laptop is still going strong after nearly four years, as is my 3 yr old Galaxy S4 phone and 10 yr old flat screen TV.

My Samsunf ML-2525W has been the most reliable printer that I have ever owned. It was cheap too.

My Samsung SL-M2020W/XAA was killed by a simple paper jam. There was literally no way to get it open to reach the shreds of jammed paper inside - one-way plastic tabs etc. Only time I've ever gone Office Space on a piece of equipment.

My family owns a CLP-315W Samsung Color Laser. It's been in service for years, has fantastic network support for Windows, OSX, and Linux, and a lot of the parts are interchangeable (even the Drum / Imaging unit can be replaced by the end user).

I dread the day I'll have to replace it, but until it keeps printing like a champ.

I own a ML-1640 (and bought one for my dad as well) with a low enough firmware number that lets me use any toner. It's a great black&white laser printer that works nicely on Linux.

There aren't many big electronics companies that haven't entered the printer business at some point, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_printer_companies

There may be other competitors to HP that re-brand Samsung devices as their own under a technology sharing agreement. Multi-function printers are essentially commoditized now so not sure how "innovation" will happen when one company buys up market share.

I have a cheap laser multifunction printer and it's actually pretty good and robust. They even provide drivers for Linux and it works perfectly. The only major annoyance is the Toner DRM but pretty much every vendor does that :-(

I did! I have been getting by on my £50 Samsung ML2165W for a couple of years, even with the starter toner I think. The replacement toners are more expensive than the printer, mind you.

It starts quickly, prints well and is really really small. It isn't AirPrint enabled, but they do offer their own app for iPad / Android, and it works alright for me from my Mac OS machine, so I am happy.

Samsung has pretty much every business.

Companies are weird in the things they own. Fun fact, Energizer (yes, the battery company. That Energizer) does a lot of business in feminine products, shaving products, and sun care stuff.

apparently HP

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