Samsung CLP-550N Colour Laser Printer Review

If you know anything about printers, you know that the laser printer is an essential tool for business. Sure they are anywhere from twice to many times the price of a typical ink jet printer, but when you factor in the all-important cost per page statistic (the estimated cost of each page printed based on ink use and other consumables) laser printers come out far ahead in terms of value.

Inkjet printers, especially the low end ones, run through ink very quickly and are very expensive to reload, when they get gunked up with dried ink they are practically useless. A typical low end laser printer can run through at least 2,500 pages of text, and often many more without needing new toner cartridge.

In the last few years, black and white laser printer prices have dropped to the point where they are easily affordable for home users and small businesses. Colour laser prices however, have only recently dropped out of the stratosphere into the realm of affordability.

For example, the Samsung CLP-550N colour laser printer PCstats is testing out in this review is one of the new breed of networked colour laser printers, offering efficient colour and black and white laser printing over a wired or wireless network, USB or parallel interface, for about $600 USD flat. It even comes with its own set of starter toner cartridges.

Samsung CLP-550N Colour Laser Printer Includes: Users Manual, Syncthru manual, drivers and networking software, power plug, 1 black, 1 magenta, 1 cyan, and 1 yellow toner starter cartridge, imaging drum, and transfer belt cartridge. *No USB, network, or printer cables are included. Further Technical Details: 1200dpi (600dpi default resolution) 21ppm black / 5ppm colour 128MB of onboard memory, 384MB maximum Automatic duplex printing mode (works with A4/letter size only) Weight: 70.5 lbs Dimensions: 20" x 18" x 16" high Power consumption: 450 watts printing, 45 watts idle. Font support: PS3, PCL6, SPL-C, 136 PS3, 45 PCL5CE Standard interfaces: USB 2.0, IEEE 1284 parallel, 10/100 Base TX Ethernet, optional wireless 802.11b adaptor Operating systems: Win9X, NT4.0, Me, 2000, XP, Linux OS, Mac OS 8.6 Paper: 250 sheet cassette paper tray for a4/letter size, 100 sheet multi-purpose feeder for A4/letter/legal and postcard (105x148 mm). 350 sheet total capacity (optional 500 sheet tray). Works with transparencies. Consumables: - Starter cartridges rated for 2000 sheets/1500 sheets colour at 5% coverage. - Standard cartridges rated for 7000 sheets/5000 sheets colour at 5%. - Imaging drum rated for 50,000 images/12,500 colour images. - Waste toner tank capacity 12,000 sheets at 5% coverage.

Intended as the printing hub of a small office, or to provide colour documents over the network to a larger one, the Samsung CLP-550N represents the middle-end of colour laser printers on a whole. This 1200 dpi, 21 page-per-minute (black and white), 5 page-per-minute (colour) laser printer comes with several nice features, not to mention the option of wireless networking and expandable onboard memory.

Samsung's CLP-550N runs at a default resolution of 600dpi, but when printing colour images it is advisable to select 1200dpi for the best results. To manage the large files quickly, the CLP-550N is equipped with 128MB of on board memory. There are also two memory expansion slots for an additional 256MB to be installed (for a total of 384MB).

Included in the package are a starter set of colour and black toner cartridges (left), and the transfer belt cartridge and imaging drum (right).

The printer supports PS3, PCL6, SPL-C, 136 PS3, 45 PCL5CE fonts, and Win9X/2K/XP through to Linux and Mac operating systems. Automatic duplex printing works with the 250-sheet tray of 8.5/11" A4/letter size paper only. Transparencies can also be used with the CLP-550N for creative colour, or black and white printing. Environmentally speaking, power consumption sits at a hefty 450 watts whilst printing, and just 45 watts when idle. One of the CLP-550N's most endearing features is its ear-friendly printing. Chalk this up to a technology Samsung are spinning off as "NO NOIS."