Product Reviews

Despite the fact that colour laser printers have fallen in price dramatically over the past few years, the cost of the technology itself has restricted them to a niche option for consumers, and even small offices.

Ricoh's gel-based ink technology is an attempt to bridge the gap between the inkjets and lasers by combining quality colour output, speed and reliability.

The Aficio GX 2500 approaches the affordable initial outlay of a quality inkjet at £99, and is capable of producing cheap, quick prints, like a laser.

Dubbed GelSprinter, it uses thicker ink than water-based inkjets, and it dries quickly, eliminating the need for drying time that some inkjets require between prints. The ink is waterproof and sunlight-resistant - so Ricoh claims - and more economical to run.

Despite these assertions, we weren't impressed at all with the GX 2500's print quality. In draft mode, documents were churned out with myriad flaws: text and graphics exhibited a slight blue hue, and letter alignment was appalling.

Quality improved at normal settings, although we're still not entirely convinced of the GX 2500's merits. Text was still wonky and, although the blue hue almost vanished, lettering wasn't as crisp and clear as we'd like. In fact, we were only happy with text printed at the highest quality settings, where the blue hue and inconsistent alignment issues disappeared.

Results were similarly varied in our colour tests. Draft mode produced pale, lifeless images, blotchy graphics and gradients entirely lacking in smoothly blended transitions. Photographs were particularly dire, with any detail and definition lost amid jagged edges and blurring.

Again, things did improve with normal settings. Colours were livelier, and graphs, charts and photographs began to look presentable. With the top quality options selected, we were impressed with the sharp, defined text, although gradients and areas of solid colour were still pretty poor.

Photographic prints on glossy paper were more impressive, with relatively high detail throughout and decent colours too. Overall, though, the output was no match for the stunning quality offered

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by top inkjets, such as the A-Listed Canon Pixma ip4500. And though photographic output is better than the cheapest of colour lasers, for text and document use it lags sorely behind.

In terms of pace, the GX 2500 again sits awkwardly somewhere between inkjets and lasers. Our draft mono document was churned out at 18ppm. This is perfectly adequate for a study or small office, the equal of cheap colour lasers such as the Brother HL-4040CN, and faster than most inkjets. But if you want decent quality you'll have to put up with much slower speeds: the GX 2500 printed our mono document in normal mode at a sluggish 8ppm.

Colour printouts were swifter, but again at top quality the GX 2500 still lags behind the best inkjets. Our A4 photo montage test appeared in 2mins 10secs - a full 38 seconds slower than the cheaper Canon ip4500.

In terms of running costs, things are more clear cut. Consumables are very reasonably priced, with mono reservoirs coming it at around £22 and each of the three colour cartridges - cyan, yellow and magenta - costing around £28.

Yields for these cartridges are low compared with most laser printers at 1,500 for the mono cartridge and 1,000 for each colour cartridge (at 5% coverage) and the start cartridges only last for 400 pages each, but this is offset by the fact that you don't need to replace image drums or transfer belts periodically as you do with lasers.

The only replaceable part in the Ricoh machine, aside from the cartridges, is the ink collection unit at the rear of the printer. It's only used when the print heads are cleaned and has a quoted yield of 16,000 pages - so the £39 replacement goes a very long way.

It's also worth bearing in mind that the Ricoh, at £99, is far cheaper to buy than most lasers, which range in price from £179 to £317. In fact the GX 2500's running costs are very economical indeed - on a par with the most economical of lasers. Amazingly, at this price you also get an automatic duplexer for two-sided printing.

So it's a relatively sound economic purchase, but despite that, we can't really recommend the GX 2500 unless monetary factors outweigh all others. The highest quality settings are the only ones we'd be happy using - draft and normal settings are too inconsistent - and these are much slower than a laser. Conversely, photo quality, while quick, can't match the best inkjets' vibrant colours and crisp, sharp detail.

In short, the GX 2500 sits in a rather awkward position. It's an inkjet that wants to be a laser printer; however as a result of the proprietary gel-based inks, it fails to match either format's key strengths.