DeKALB – Starting in March, NIU began replacing the Canon printers and Pharos software to the new PaperCut software and Ricoh printers. 

PaperCut is a software application built to help organizations by minimizing paper waste and toner ink, save time and improve document security, according to PaperCut’s website.  

Tara Frost, the project manager behind the transition, explained the decision was made to consolidate the number of devices NIU had. 

“The Canon Slate was old and we had a lot of different models of Canon out there, we wanted to consolidate the number of devices, types of devices,” Frost said. “The decision was made rather than update the old canons, we were just going to move to Ricohs and consolidate the different types of models that we had out there.”   

With Gordon Flesch, the vendor they worked with, Frost with the IT Department did a deep dive into print utilization last summer to see how printers were being used across campus.  

Frost said they considered how often printers at different locations were used.

“We are also decreasing the total amount of printers that we have across campus,” Frost said. “We had some printers out there that were printing less than 50 pages a month and we were paying a lot of money for that. And so we decreased the overall footprint of printers.” 

The Ricoh printers will be at the same locations the Canons were at, aside from the few that were removed. 

Frost said the new printers have features the previous Canon models did not. 

One of these features includes the printer showing the student their balance when they print so students and staff know how much money they have on either their OneCard or account as they go to print. 

Frost said the new printers have a smaller carbon footprint than the last printer, since they use less ink and power.      

The prices to print will be the same – 5¢ black/white and 12¢ color.

Frost said NIU sent announcements notifying students of the changes to the printers. 

“We’re also putting up posters at each of the public facing printers that have a QR code,” Frost said. “So if a student didn’t read the announcement and didn’t, wasn’t aware and walked up and said, ‘Hey, where’s my Canon?’ There’ll be a sign there. They can scan the QR code and it’ll tell them exactly what they need to do to print to the device.” 

Frost also mentioned that the new printers are the same as the previous ones. 

“All the functionality that the Canons had, which was, you know, you could send print jobs, you can scan documents, you could scan documents to yourself, you can scan documents to other people, all that functionality is the same,” Frost said. 

Frost said they have rolled out printers in multiple departments. 

“We’ve gotten, you know, pretty good feedback on utilization. It seems pretty intuitive for folks to use,” Frost said.

Only those with a OneCard can use the printers. 

“Sometimes we give out courtesy cards for say volunteers or things like that, but there you have to have some affiliation with NIU because you will have to have a one card in order to release the print job,” Frost said.

In addition, with the new printers, students can print from anywhere and have 24 hours to pick up their print job, Frost said.

The previous printers will be replaced first across campus and then in public locations, according to the Anywhere Prints website. 

Frost asks students to contact the service desk if they run into issues using the new printers. The contact number is 815-753-8100 or email them at [email protected].