Best Laser Printers - 2013
If you print more documents than photos, you may not need a colour printer. Here we review six mono laser printers available at budget prices.
There's no point in paying for a colour printer, along with the extra print cartridges, if you only ever print black and white documents. If you don't print photos, a mono laser printer could work out cheaper and will often print in better quality than a colour inkjet. Here we've tested six printers, all under £100, to see which produces the best results.
HOW WE TESTED
We printed a series of test documents and pictures, to check how well the printers reproduce text and images. These prints were compared across all the models to evaluate which ones produce the best-looking prints. We also timed how long it took each one to complete the printing test, to see which is the fastest.
OKI B401D
The Oki B401d is the largest laser printer we tested in this group. It certainly looks like it means business, and it has the specifications to match. The printer connects to your PC via a USB 2 port. If you want an Ethernet network option, look for the B401dn - we spotted it online for the same price. To keep you informed of what the printer is doing, there's a two-line LCD information panel integrated into the lid. The chunky chassis has a 250-page internal paper tray, as well as a manual tray for printing on thicker card and envelopes. The B401d is quick. In our tests it even beat the 29ppm (pages per minute) speed quoted by Oki. We recorded an average of 31.6ppm across all our tests. Printing on both sides of paper slowed the process down to 16.7ppm. but that still wasn't far behind how long the Dell model took to print on just one side. The Oki falls in the middle of our price range but does well when it comes to long-term running costs, managing to produce pages for just 2.2p each. The print quality of the Oki is also excellent. When printing text, the characters are laid down with pinpoint accuracy. Images don't have the bold, strong blacks of other printers, and there's some banding, but this is made up for in the quality of detail. Contrast is the best of any printer in this test, with near-perfect greyscales. You can use the Oki's ProQ setting to improve print quality and significantly reduce banding, but the speed will drop to 16.7ppm.
DELL B1160W
The Dell B1160w is the only printer in this Group Test to come with Wi-Fi, but this wireless capability has led to some corners being cut, including a smaller capacity sheet feeder and no information screen. However, its print quality is excellent, if not as impressive as Oki B401d. Text looks almost perfect and photos and images also look good, with fine detail and very little banding. The 81160w prints each A4 page at a cost of around 3.2p, and this is its main weakness. In our test, only the Kyocera was more expensive to run. However, the toner cartridge costs £48 and prints 1.500 sheets, so if your printer only gets light use, you won't have to replace it for ages. Of all the printers we tested, this was the slowest to print. but if you're in no hurry, the results are worth waiting for.
BROTHER HL-2250DN
While the Dell printer was the only model in our test to include Wi-Fi. the Brother HL-2250DN is the only one with an Ethernet port, providing a fast and simple way to add the printer to your network, if you have a spare port on your router. The printer is good value for money because, despite being the second most expensive in the group, its running costs are low. Prints cost 2p each, which is the cheapest of all the models we tested. The print quality is only average, and we judged it to be around the middle of this group. From reading distance, text is perfectly acceptable, but close scrutiny shows up flaws. Images and shaded pictures didn't work so well, with obvious banding and dithering (using dots to make shades of grey). Dark areas lacked a lot of detail, too.
CANON I-SENSYS LBP6200D
The Canon i-Sensys LBP6200d is a well-designed, solid printer with a front panel that folds down to securely hold 250 sheets of A4 paper, and a transparent fold-over cover to protect it from dust. It was the second fastest printer overall, managing 25 pages per minute. Even when printing both sides, it managed 15.4ppm. It's good value to run, with prints costing just 2.6p per sheet. But the print quality fell short. Text was bold but not crisp, while shaded images and photos used too much dithering which made them look rough.
PANTUM P2000
Pantum is a new name in laser printing, and has launched the P2000 at a very affordable price. It came second from bottom in our speed tests, but it doesn't compromise on running costs, with a price per sheet of just 2.4p. Print quality is its biggest weakness, however. Text is up there with the best but the P2000 didn't cope well with more complex documents. Despite decent reproduction of detail. images, graphs and charts were covered in banding, which ruined the overall effect.
KOYCERA FS-1041
The Koycera FS-1041 was the second cheapest printer in our test, but this advantage was undermined by a price-per-page running cost of 3.8p. which was the most expensive in our test. We wouldn't mind so much if its output was superior, but its text isn't as crisply defined as the Dell and Oki printers, and shaded images were marred by coarse dithering. It didn't handle high-contrast images well, with far too little detail in either bright or dark sections. With a lacklustre print speed of 20 pages per minute, there simply isn't enough here to get us excited.
OUR VERDICT
Oki 3401d is the best laser printer. It is a great all-rounder printer. It's fast, produces fine-looking prints (on both sides of the paper) and costs just 2.2p per page to print.
There's no point in paying for a colour printer, along with the extra print cartridges, if you only ever print black and white documents. If you don't print photos, a mono laser printer could work out cheaper and will often print in better quality than a colour inkjet. Here we've tested six printers, all under £100, to see which produces the best results.
HOW WE TESTED
We printed a series of test documents and pictures, to check how well the printers reproduce text and images. These prints were compared across all the models to evaluate which ones produce the best-looking prints. We also timed how long it took each one to complete the printing test, to see which is the fastest.
The Oki B401d is the largest laser printer we tested in this group. It certainly looks like it means business, and it has the specifications to match. The printer connects to your PC via a USB 2 port. If you want an Ethernet network option, look for the B401dn - we spotted it online for the same price. To keep you informed of what the printer is doing, there's a two-line LCD information panel integrated into the lid. The chunky chassis has a 250-page internal paper tray, as well as a manual tray for printing on thicker card and envelopes. The B401d is quick. In our tests it even beat the 29ppm (pages per minute) speed quoted by Oki. We recorded an average of 31.6ppm across all our tests. Printing on both sides of paper slowed the process down to 16.7ppm. but that still wasn't far behind how long the Dell model took to print on just one side. The Oki falls in the middle of our price range but does well when it comes to long-term running costs, managing to produce pages for just 2.2p each. The print quality of the Oki is also excellent. When printing text, the characters are laid down with pinpoint accuracy. Images don't have the bold, strong blacks of other printers, and there's some banding, but this is made up for in the quality of detail. Contrast is the best of any printer in this test, with near-perfect greyscales. You can use the Oki's ProQ setting to improve print quality and significantly reduce banding, but the speed will drop to 16.7ppm.
DELL B1160W
The Dell B1160w is the only printer in this Group Test to come with Wi-Fi, but this wireless capability has led to some corners being cut, including a smaller capacity sheet feeder and no information screen. However, its print quality is excellent, if not as impressive as Oki B401d. Text looks almost perfect and photos and images also look good, with fine detail and very little banding. The 81160w prints each A4 page at a cost of around 3.2p, and this is its main weakness. In our test, only the Kyocera was more expensive to run. However, the toner cartridge costs £48 and prints 1.500 sheets, so if your printer only gets light use, you won't have to replace it for ages. Of all the printers we tested, this was the slowest to print. but if you're in no hurry, the results are worth waiting for.
BROTHER HL-2250DN
While the Dell printer was the only model in our test to include Wi-Fi. the Brother HL-2250DN is the only one with an Ethernet port, providing a fast and simple way to add the printer to your network, if you have a spare port on your router. The printer is good value for money because, despite being the second most expensive in the group, its running costs are low. Prints cost 2p each, which is the cheapest of all the models we tested. The print quality is only average, and we judged it to be around the middle of this group. From reading distance, text is perfectly acceptable, but close scrutiny shows up flaws. Images and shaded pictures didn't work so well, with obvious banding and dithering (using dots to make shades of grey). Dark areas lacked a lot of detail, too.
CANON I-SENSYS LBP6200D
The Canon i-Sensys LBP6200d is a well-designed, solid printer with a front panel that folds down to securely hold 250 sheets of A4 paper, and a transparent fold-over cover to protect it from dust. It was the second fastest printer overall, managing 25 pages per minute. Even when printing both sides, it managed 15.4ppm. It's good value to run, with prints costing just 2.6p per sheet. But the print quality fell short. Text was bold but not crisp, while shaded images and photos used too much dithering which made them look rough.
PANTUM P2000
Pantum is a new name in laser printing, and has launched the P2000 at a very affordable price. It came second from bottom in our speed tests, but it doesn't compromise on running costs, with a price per sheet of just 2.4p. Print quality is its biggest weakness, however. Text is up there with the best but the P2000 didn't cope well with more complex documents. Despite decent reproduction of detail. images, graphs and charts were covered in banding, which ruined the overall effect.
KOYCERA FS-1041
The Koycera FS-1041 was the second cheapest printer in our test, but this advantage was undermined by a price-per-page running cost of 3.8p. which was the most expensive in our test. We wouldn't mind so much if its output was superior, but its text isn't as crisply defined as the Dell and Oki printers, and shaded images were marred by coarse dithering. It didn't handle high-contrast images well, with far too little detail in either bright or dark sections. With a lacklustre print speed of 20 pages per minute, there simply isn't enough here to get us excited.
OUR VERDICT
Oki 3401d is the best laser printer. It is a great all-rounder printer. It's fast, produces fine-looking prints (on both sides of the paper) and costs just 2.2p per page to print.
2 comments:
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thanks for wireless laser printer
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