My House of Ink

Although many businesses are trying to go green and paperless, fax machines are still commonly used around the world. Some people may see them as old-fashioned and nearly obsolete because e-mail is so widely used, but fax machines are useful, efficient and inexpensive business tools. If you need to send a copy of a document quickly, sending a fax is much faster than scanning it into a computer and then attaching it to an e-mail.

Thermal fax machines work by using heat to melt a special ribbon, called a thermal fax ribbon, against a piece of paper to create a print-out. The ribbon can be made of a base film that has an attached substance that makes up the ink. The ink is typically made of one of three materials: wax, resin, or a wax/resin composite. Thermal ribbons that have wax ink are often less expensive, but the print-outs they produce can smudge easily. Ribbons with a resin material are more expensive, but produce high-quality documents that don’t smudge easily. Thermal ribbons with a wax/resin composite are a good middle ground for both price and print-out quality.