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From: Ian McCall on 31 May 2010 15:21
Sadly, my old dinosaur of a colour laser started showing motor errors -
things too expensive to economically repair for it. So fair well
Lexmark Optra SC 1275 EN, whose thunder used to (literally) shake the
floor when it printed and whose weight was the stuff of Herculean
legend, and hello Samsung CLP-315W.

Now, to be honest I wasn't expecting that much as this is about the
cheapest colour laser on the market. On the other hand, I don't
actually -need- that much either - I'm a light user of print, Caz a
little more so than me but still not drastic. What we need is quality
text output and reliability, what we'd like is some colour too. With
needs like that, the Samsung seems to fit the bill.

I needed a new one today, which meant I was limited to printers
available from standard retailers. Had I had more time I might have
looked at the Dell 1320CN as reviews seem to slightly favour it, but
not by enough to make me pause. Given I needed one straight off, I got
mine from PC World. I have a new trick with them now - I go, look at
the stuff and get a demo, then if I like it I look at their online
price on the iPhone and get them to match it in-store. Never had anyone
say no, since I point out that if they -do- say no I'll just click
'reserve in-store' and take it anyway. Never had to, everyone involved
has always seen sense. Was briefly tempted by a reduced HP CP1215
(<http://www.amazon.co.uk/Color-LaserJet-CP1215-Colour-Printer/dp/B0015RRYZ6>)
at �100, but some quick research showed no network and faff to get
working under OS X so I ignored it and went for the Samsung at �135.

The Samsung has 802.11g built-in, but I'm currently using it wired so
haven't really anything to say about its wireless abilities. Reviews
tend to indicate it's a little odd to set up the wireless, but for me
setup went like this:

1. Connect power and ethernet cable (ethernet cable supplied, no USB
cable supplied. Odd).
2. Turn on machine and wait about 30 seconds to allow it to find an IP address.
3. Print something from the Mac

That was it. When I selected 'Print', I was offered the choice of my
old Lexmark or 'Nearby Printers - Samsung CP310 series'. Didn't have to
install any driver of any kind (in Snow Leopard at least), was already
provided and recognised. The driver offers a link to the printer's
built-in web server, and from there I could print a test page too.

Speed...not the fastest, but a long way from awful and comparable to my
1275. A -hell- of a lot more quiet than the 1275, but then again herds
of mammoths would have been more quiet than the 1275. I'm actually
going to miss the noise - I could print from downstairs and be certain
of when my print had finished because the ceiling had stopped shaking
(true) and the council's noise abatement officer had gone away (maybe a
little false). For me - print quality and reliability trumps speed and
here I'm not let down - the text is nicely crisp, the colour fine too
if perhaps a little redder than expected. I'm not going to be doing
photos on this though, so I'm really not terribly fussed about accurate
colour matching - it's available if I want it, but I'm fine with the
defaults. The one unexpected thing is that the printer gets hot fast if
using colour - will keep an eye on this.

Looks? Well, it's a hell of a lot prettier than the epically ugly 1275.
It's a third the size and much shorter too - this is an instant black
mark, after all where am I going to put my feet up now? This one is
actually small enough that I might consider putting it on the desk
itself - previously my printer was banished to underneath the desk (I
wasn't kidding about the feet remark - made an excellent foot stool).
The only thing to spoil the look is hat it's actually so small that A4
sheets stick out a little from the base. They're covered with a
see-through plastic shield, but it does look slightly odd. On the
bright side though, means I can see at a glance how much paper is left
in the device.

Features? Flip-up LCD screens, options for direct printing off USB
sticks, cropping software to print direct off the latest digital
cameras...none of these are present here. Can't ever imagine myself
using those features anyway - I'd want to do any image editing directly
on the Mac. I'm fine with the rather minimal four LEDs on the top,
though half a mark lost for yet another thing that thinks the best way
to tell me it's on is to shine a bright blue light at me, even when not
in use. Meh.

Overall and bearing in mind this is a -short- short term review of only
owning for an afternoon, I'm happy. It's no office workhorse but for
what it's meant to be - a home-office colour laser - it's a good buy.
My Lexmark is now at the local tip, which is a rather sad end to a
machine that's done me well for ten years, but the Samsung will take
over its duties fine


Cheers,
Ian

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