HP Color LaserJet 2550L

Priced at less than £300, the HP Color LaserJet 2550L is a real bargain. Although it prints slowly and boasts little in the way of initial connectivity or paper capacity, the 2550L's output is impressive. Given that you can always add a networking module and optional paper trays after purchase, the 2550L is an excellent choice for a small business that does volume colour printing and has big plans for future growth.

Design
The boxy HP Color LaserJet 2550L looks like your average workgroup laser printer, with a curvy two-tone grey casing, a 125-sheet paper-output tray on top, and the usual cluster of buttons and indicator lights on the top control panel. For a colour laser, however, it's very lightweight, weighing only 21.7kg and compact, measuring 48.2cm wide by 45.2cm deep by 32.5cm high -- its economy is due in part to the space-saving carousel configuration of its four toner cartridges. The top control panel buttons include Power, Cancel Print Job and one that rotates the toner carousel, along with indicator lights that show, among other things, which cartridge is on top or which is low on toner. Notably absent is a control-panel LCD; you'll have to make all adjustments to printer settings on your PC through the 2550L's software. Those who plan to do high-volume or complex printing may want to opt for a higher-end model with an LCD, such as the Color LaserJet 3500. We reviewed the base model of HP's 2550 series, which includes only a 125-sheet multi-purpose tray that flips open from the front panel of the printer. You can add either a 250-sheet input tray for £90 or a 500-sheet input tray for £182 (ex. VAT). The back panel of the 2550L also flips open to create a straight paper path for printing heavier paper stocks. For connectivity, the 2550L provides only a parallel port or a USB 2.0 connection (cables not included). If you want internal networking, you should buy either the HP 2550Ln or HP 2550n models. If you don't need networking now but suspect you might in the future, the 2550L is compatible with several HP Jetdirect external print servers that range in price from £107 to £255 (ex. VAT) from HP. The printer comes with HP PCL 6 and HP PostScript 3 emulation built in, so documents print looking the same way they do on your computer monitor.

Features
As we mentioned earlier, the Color LaserJet 2550L has no control panel LCD. To change print settings, you'll need to use HP's LaserJet Toolbox, software that installs on your computer along with the drivers. Toolbox uses a simple Web browser interface and gives you or your network administrator access to printer status information (including toner levels and usage data), troubleshooting tips and demos, and an alerts feature that you can set to send email. The 2550L's drivers are quite basic and easy to use. A series of tabs control such settings as paper size and orientation, document scaling and the ability to print all text as black. The colour tab lets you change the composition of neutral greys between black and four-colour as well as half-toning, RGB colour and edge control. For colour experts, such as designers and photographers, the 2550L's colour settings may be a bit rudimentary compared with those offered on Samsung's CLP-550, for example, but the average user should be satisfied with the available tweaks and the printer's native colour-matching capabilities. The HP 2550L's printing costs are quite reasonable. New 2,000-sheet cyan, magenta, and yellow toner cartridges cost £46.80. A 5,000-sheet black cartridge costs £52.76 (ex. VAT). Estimating 5 percent coverage, this works out to 1p per page for black ink and about 8p per page for colour -- about average for a colour laser printer.

Performance
Overall, the HP Color LaserJet 2550L was a smooth performer in our labs tests. The test unit was also very quiet during operation. For monochrome printing, the HP Color LaserJet 2550L performed well, averaging 12.1 pages per minute (ppm) for text and 9.8ppm for graphics. These scores are above average for a bargain colour laser printer. Colour print speed, on the other hand, was rather disappointing. It averaged only 3.9ppm for text and 3.1ppm for graphics -- a surprise, since one of our fastest colour laser printers is the HP LaserJet 3500, with a score of 7ppm for colour text and 8.8ppm for colour graphics. Making up for its not-so-great speed, however, the Color LaserJet 2550L offers excellent monochrome print quality. Both text and graphics looked perfect in our tests, with no flaws at all. The colour print quality, although not perfect, was very good as well. Our only gripe was the contrast, which was a little too soft in colour text and a little too harsh in colour graphics. The printer was tested at the factory default settings, which you can adjust to improve the output and performance.

Service & support
HP provides the HP Color LaserJet 2550L with an industry-standard one-year return to base warranty, which you can upgrade to various levels of on-site service. Phone support is available during the warranty period. HP's Web site offers top-of-the-line customer service and support options targeted to your specific product, including instant chat with a tech-support representative, email support, an extensive database of FAQs, documentation and tutorials on graphics troubleshooting, how-tos, and maintenance.

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