High time for high-resolution - 10 600 dpi laser printers are evaluated - includes related summary article - Hardware Review - Evaluation

Home Office Computing, Oct, 1994 by Stephen W. Plain

The OL410e is neither a true 600 dpi unit nor a laser printer. It uses an array of LEDs to produce images; the lower cost of the proprietary LED technology is part of the reason the printer is so affordable. Another reason for the low price is that instead of using a pricey 600 dpi engine, Okidata achieves a 1,200 dpi vertical resolution through software interpolation and maintains a 300 dpi horizontal resolution. You get the same number of dots per page as you do with 600 by 600 dpi output; therefore, the quality closely resembles that of a 600 by 600 dpi printer as well. Close, but still just short of the higherquality 600 dpi printers.

Nevertheless, we were mostly impressed. Line art and text were crisp and smooth, but a scanned test photograph was not in line with output from its peers. Its performance was admirable, just a shade faster than the 4-ppm HP 4MP in both PCL text and graphics modes.

The Okidata delivers good-looking output at an unsurpassed price, but it's not as sturdily built or as people friendly as some other models. The input drawer capacity is a scant 100 sheets, and it uses a closing mechanism that will probably not stand up to the most aggressive office worker. The control panel is oddly situated at the rear at a fixed, almost flat angle, so it's difficult to read without standing directly over the printer and looking down. Another concern is that it takes the printer a minute or so after you power on to warm up and cycle the toner before you're ready to go.

Overall, the space-saving OL410e earns its biggest kudos for delivering near 600 dpi--class output at a 300 dpi price.

TI microLaser Pro 600 PS23

Rating: ***

WIN / DOS / MAC

With such features as excellent paper handling and Adobe PostScript level 2, Texas Instruments's microLaser Pro 600 delivers a lot of value for its $1,250 street price. The standard configuration comes with an 8-ppm engine and 23 Adobe Type 1 scalable fonts. (For about $200 more, you can get 65 fonts.) The microLaser's Achilles heel? It lacks PCL5e support, so PCL jobs are limited to 300 dpi.

The microLaser comes standard with two 250-page drawers. And unlike most competitors, the microLaser uses a separate imaging cartridge and drum. Although these consumables are quite accessible, the drum unit is exposed during insertion and may be easily damaged.

The 600 dpi PostScript output was excellent, as was the speed at which the printer delivered it. At 300 dpi, PCL files were no slouch in the looks department, though not as smooth when compared with other printers here. But we noticed that 300 dpi PCL text files took almost twice as long to print as they did at 600 dpi on other 6- and 8-ppm printers. (The same was true of the LaserWriter 360 as measured against its class--this may possibly be attributed to the use of PCL5 rather than PCL5e.) An upgrade option that doubles the clock speed of the printer's RISC processor from 20 MHz to 40 MHz should improve processing speed on jobs that include graphics or TrueType font-filled documents.