Lexmark Optra C710n

Lexmark has consistently held a strong position in the workgroup mono laser market - a fact borne out in the last laser printer Labs (see issue 70, p122) when its Optra W810n received a well-deserved entry on the PC Pro A List. Although not so impressive, its colour laser products distinguish themselves mainly due to the unique features on offer. The OptraColor 1200n (reviewed issue 70, p140) delivers fast A3 and A4 print speeds for a modest price. The C710n is the latest member of the family and targets workgroups looking for high-quality, low-cost colour printing. Three models are available, with the C710n on review coming equipped with Lexmark's MarkNet dual-speed Ethernet print server card.

The C710n is a remarkably compact unit, but even though it doesn't take up much desk space, you won't want it anywhere near you as it's one of the noisiest printers around. The toner cartridges are mounted in an internal carousel similar to that found in laser printers with Canon-based engines. This is a simple system, but the carousel mechanism emits alarmingly loud clunks and bangs as it moves each cartridge around to the transfer roller when building up the page image. Overall running costs take some of the sting away as they're among the lowest around. The cartridges last for 10,000 pages with cyan, magenta and yellow costing £144.01 each and black adding a further £68.39. Bring in the 100,000 Page Transfer Kit (£187.34) and it all adds up to a very respectable 5.2p per colour page and only 0.9p for a mono page.

Performance for mono printing was on the button, with the C710n delivering a 15-page Word document in only 55 seconds. Colour printing at 600dpi was also good as a complex 23-page DTP document dropped into the output tray in 423 seconds for an average speed of 3.3ppm. Curiously, selecting the 1,200dpi setting from the PostScript 3 driver options delivered the same print in 428 seconds. High-resolution prints using the PCL6 driver will require a memory upgrade as the same DTP document failed after seven minutes with a memory overrun error.

Overall print quality proved to be a mixed bag. Initially, testing was halted by a faulty cyan cartridge, but a call to Lexmark's warranty division resulted in the delivery of a new cartridge the following day. The C710n then proceeded to deliver pin-sharp text, but only average colour prints. The PC Pro colour chart showed hardly any stepping across colour fades. 0.1pt and 0.2pt gaps between black blocks were clearly discernible, but grey mixes using equal amounts of cyan, magenta and yellow revealed a slight magenta tinge. General detail in photographic images was a little hazy and large shaded areas had a blotched effect. Generally, the C710n lacked the vibrancy and sharpness of the HP Color LaserJet 4500DN (reviewed issue 70, p137) that played a big part in its elevation to the PC Pro A List.

The C710n is equipped with a speedy 200MHz RISC processor which is helped along by 32Mb of memory. Three spare 100-pin DIMM sockets are provided, but Lexmark charges £215 for an extra 32Mb and a painful £410 for 64Mb. Paper capacity begins with the standard 250-sheet base tray partnered by a 50-sheet multipurpose tray at the front. Capacity can be augmented with a second tray, with two 250-sheet drawers and an optional duplex unit bringing double-sided printing onto the menu. The controller board has three PCI slots with one taken up by the MarkNet card and other options include a 2.1Gb hard disk and adaptor card for downloading and storing fonts and forms locally.