OKI C310dn
OKI pioneered the use of LEDs in print engines and this is a mid-priced colour machine. It’s deeper than it is wide, due to the in-line design of its engine. The simple control panel is well designed, with a two-line, backlit LCD. The standard paper tray takes 250-sheets, with a second tray optional, and there’s a generous 100-sheet multi-purpose feed. USB and network connections are standard and speed results were 16ppm for black, 12ppm for colour, with a healthy 11.5ppm printing duplex. Black text and colour graphics are fine, but the colour gamut is too limited to do photos justice. Running costs, at 2.0p for black and 11.8p for colour, are about average.
Reg Rating 70%
Price £404
More info Oki
Samsung CLP-670ND
Billed as a very fast colour laser for workgroups, this printer managed 18ppm under test, which is fast, but not breathtaking. It did 12.5ppm in colour and 9.5ppm duplex, which is also only fair. The big machine has a traditional design, with a 250-sheet main tray and a 100-sheet multi-purpose feed, with a full-width control panel, using a four-way, illuminated navigation ring. USB and network connections are standard and print quality is sharp with attention-seeking colours. Running costs, at 2.4p for black and 10.6p for colour, are mid-range. Don’t pay too much attention to the printer’s RRP; it can be had for under £400.
Reg Rating 80%
Price £900
More info Samsung
Next page: Xerox Phaser 6010
COMMENTS
Solid ink, right...
While the Xerox solid ink printers produce nice looking printouts, they also produce a bad smell and need to placed in a well ventilated area. Also, if you only occasionally print with them, they waste a lot of ink on start-up and it's a slow printer anyway, especially if the printer was off.
The whole roundup is stupid anyway. The prices range from 139 to 634, and the blurb on the first page states "Here are ten, capable colour lasers you should consider for a short list" but the reviewer has given 60% verdict to two printers. Why would I put the Xerox 6010 on my short list if the reviewer states that "it may be OK". That HP is noisy, slow and the previous cheap HP carousel models were also prone to break.
Clearly the reviewer works in a retailer or distributor and reviews whatever he has handy there. And that's just fine. But these reviews should be more consistent. Comparing a £200 laptop to a £2000 model makes no sense, why do it with printers?
No mention of OS compatibility.
Even the ones running on Ethernet are not necessarily postscript compatible, and some Linux drivers are crap (or non-existant)
Noise
It's all well & good listing the running costs for the printers, but of equal importance for a small office is noise.
I've found that many colour laser printers can be incredibly noisy, especially the carousel models that rotate the toner cartridges between passes.
Any chance of adding a noise level next time you review printers?
Add to review..
Theres several important factors that are missing from the printer reviews on thereg lately, and i feel they would make the reviews far more useful.
1, Standards support - does the printer require proprietary drivers (and if so for what platforms are drivers made available), or can it work with postscript or pcl? I would always prefer a postscript printer simply because it works with everything and will continue working even long after the manufacturer has given up making drivers... Some devices (eg hp touchpad) only support pcl, some things only support postscript.
2, Airprint - lots of people want to print from iOS devices, would be good to know which printers support it.. Worth noting tho that with a small linux box you can make an airprint server for any printer that linux supports (i do this with my old laserjet)..
3, Noise - for home or small office use noise is important... some printers are even noisy when idle!
4, Startup time - from cold, and from going into powersave mode (assuming it has one)
5, Available prints in the default toners - for some people not wanting to print a lot, the default toners may last a long time... Especially true with lasers which don't dry out like inkjets, it may be more economical for some people to buy cheaper printers with generally higher running costs for very occasional use.
6, power consumption and heat output
Also a table at the end summing things up...
10,100,500,1000 pages per month
that's way beyond the duty cycle of all these printers put together...
