Samsung CLP 775ND review

The Samsung CLP 775ND isn't the cheapest printer on test, but it's one of the best performers and one of the cheapest to run. Ifs a sizeable unit, but it isn't unattractive as printers go, and it feels pretty sturdy.

Print speeds are very fast. The Samsung is advertised at 30ppm, and in our tests it rarely fell below 27ppm. lt's also quiet in operation, and has only a short warm-up time if you're printing single pages. This can be useful if you want instant results from pupils' work.

Print quality is equally good, with high-quality mono text and colour graphics. When printing photographs, the Samsung doesn't quite reach the heights of the HP or Oki printers, but it does a good job, with no banding or blurring. Our biggest complaint would be that colours aren't quite as accurate as we'd like.

The CLP 775ND's toner cartridges aren't cheap - a set of four will set you back up to £300 - but each one contains enough ink for 7,000 pages, putting running costs at approximately S.Sp for colour or 0.92p per mono page. The CPL 775ND also has a duplexing unit, which can help to keep paper costs down.

Impressively, the Samsung is capable of holding up to 500 sheets of paper in its tray; another feature that makes it a great choice for a centrally located printer, as you don't need to keep topping it up. lt's a slight shame that there's no wireless connectivity, but Gigabit Ethernet ensures it performs well over the network, and we had no problems hooking up the printer using Samsung's drivers and utilities.

The Samsung is an excellent colour laser printer. While it may be too large to be the ideal classroom companion, it's fast, quiet and cheap to run. Add to this its excellent build quality, and you have a printer for which it's worth paying that little bit extra.

Author: Ian Marks