X-bit labs

Personal Laser Printers Roundup: Monochrome Printing

Category: Other

by Vasily Melnik

[ 01/19/2006 | 06:23 PM ]

We are going to introduce to you 9 laser printers for home and office use from such well-known companies as Brother, Canon, Epson, Hewlett-Packard, Konica-Minolta, Lexmark, OKI, Samsung and Xerox. We will look at sub-$200 models, to find out which one is going to be the best buy for your buck. All the details including in-depth performance and quality analysis in our extensive roundup!

Table of contents:

• Brother HL-2040
  
• Design and Ergonomics
  
• Drivers and Settings
  
• Printing Quality
  
• Canon LBP-2900
  
• Design and Ergonomics
  
• Drivers and Settings
  
• Printing Quality
  
• Epson EPL-6200L
  
• Design and Ergonomics
  
• Drivers and Settings
  
• Printing Quality
  
• HP DeskJet 1020
  
• Design and Ergonomics
  
• Drivers and Settings
  
• Printing Quality
  
• Konica-Minolta PagePro 1350W
  
• Design and Ergonomics
  
• Drivers and Settings
  
• Printing Quality
  
• Lexmark E230
  
• Design and Ergonomics
  
• Drivers and Settings
  
• Printing Quality
  
• OKI B4100
  
• Design and Ergonomics
  
• Drivers and Settings
  
• Printing Quality
  
• Samsung ML-1615
  
• Design and Ergonomics
  
• Drivers and Settings
  
• Printing Quality
  
• Xerox Phaser 3121
  
• Design and Ergonomics
  
• Drivers and Settings
  
• Printing Quality
  
• Printing Speed Comparison
  
• Conclusion
  

Despite the growing popularity of network electrographic printers, people are still highly interested in personal printing devices which are affordable (the most popular models are priced within $100-200 range) and require inexpensive supplies.

Other factors contributing to their popularity are compact dimensions and ease of use. Today’s personal laser printers have a small enough footprint to settle on the desk and don’t require a special stand. Many models have folding input and output paper trays to save more space, the most ergonomic ones even having everything inside and lacking any salient parts at all.

Before choosing your printer you should clearly realize what such devices can and – this is even more important – what they cannot do. The main purpose of a personal laser printer is to print text documents and simple black-and-white images in small volumes so if you are going to print 10-15 thousand and more sheets monthly, such a device just won’t do.

Also when the print speed is your priority, you may want to consider midrange printers since the maximum speed of today’s personal laser printers is only about 20 pages per minute.

The following table helps to compare the specifications of the printers to be tested in this roundup: