Product Reviews

There's a distinct need in many small to medium workgroups for a reliable workhorse mono printer that will also handle occasional colour work, be it for presentations or colour proofs. On the face of it, the TallyGenicom 8008 is the answer to many small firms' prayers.

Quoted print speeds are up to 31ppm in mono and 8ppm in colour. The fastest we saw was a little under 27ppm, with our 50-page mono-test document taking just over two minutes in the swiftest mode available. It's still quite a rate though, and won't be an issue unless you're printing hundreds of pages. We had no complaints with the quality either.

Our batch of 50 colour letterheads began appearing after 21 seconds

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of processing with the last page completing after six-and-a-half minutes - a rate of 7.9ppm.

A 12-page Excel spreadsheet caused a processing delay of 40 seconds and finished in just over two minutes. The 8008 passed this tough test with flying colours; both colour and positional accuracy were excellent, resulting in crisp white text on a coloured background and strong lines on graphs. A 20MB PDF file was delayed for 34 seconds before printing, continuing at a rate of 7.3ppm, again with good results on graphics and text. Even our test photomontage produced a presentable image, with neutral greys and strong tones.

TallyGenicom's web browser interface supplies information about print jobs, including history, and consumable status. There's also an embedded SMTP client, allowing it to send email alerts. In fact, there's very little missing - just be warned that there's no parallel port.

TallyGenicom is offering free black toner, up to a maximum of one a month for the two-year warranty period. The rental option is also worth looking into. Details of both these offers can be found on TallyGenicom's website.

All told, the 8008 is a capable and reasonably flexible, no-nonsense workhorse printer; the price and current special offers also work in its favour.