Review Smartfish reckons our mice, and other peripherals, don’t have enough life of their own, so it has successfully produced a mouse that wobbles in the interests of reducing RSI.
Twisted thinking: the Smartfish Whirl Laser Mouse
The premise of Smartfish’s “Ergomotion” technology is that the static nature of our wrists is what causes pain, and ultimately damage, to our hands. So the Smartfish Whirl mouse teeters atop a post, enabling it to tilt into the linear and lean into the curves too, in order to provide a bit of variety for the propelling wrist. It works too, though it’s a bit small and plasticky for the price. Read the rest of this entry »
Review If you’re running a large workgroup, you need a printer that is fast, cheap to run and has enough flexibility to handle a variety of media and to grow with the tasks it’s asked to perform. Endeavouring to address all these needs, while also offering colour, duplex and walk-up direct print, is Lexmark’s C736dn.
For a large workgroup laser, Lexmark’s C736dn is surprisingly discreet. It has a smaller Desktop footprint than many, because its colour laser engine is vertically mounted, with each of the four, colour drum and toner combinations placed one above the other. It also has a main paper tray, which can take 550 sheets of office paper at a time, lifting it still further off the Desktop. A pull-down, multipurpose tray offers space for 100 sheets of special media.
Yet this is just the start of the printer‘s paper handling capabilities. You can add three more 550-sheet trays and a 2,000-sheet motorised bin, giving a total expanded capacity of 4,300 sheets, with plenty of flexibility for letterheads and follow-on sheets, as well as plain pages. Oddly, there are no equivalent expansion options for output, such as stackers, collators or staplers.
The printer‘s two-tone grey case isn’t particularly photogenic, but should fit in most modern offices, without glaring. Paper feeds out from front to back and a single, flip-up paper stop at the rear is all that’s needed to capture printed jobs. The control panel is functional and well laid out, with a four-line by 16-character, backlit LCD display also capable of full bitmap display, which is used to good effect by Lexmark in displaying help messages diagrammatically, for tasks such as correcting paper jams. Read the rest of this entry »
Review First a confession: we have always been troubled by the concept of black-and-white multifunctional devices (MFDs). Being able to scan in colour but print only in mono seems rather like being given a punnet of strawberries that you are only allowed to smell. However, Oki clearly feels there continues to be demand for this level of product and, given the company’s long history in the MFD market, we were willing to be won over by its new MB290.
Oki’s MB290: mono Printing keeps it compact compared to colour equivalents
It is, after all, a proper MFD that provides extensive multi-user fax features in addition to scanning, 20ppm LED Printing and copying. It also has a network port for workgroup use, a built-in web-based management utility and an automatic document feeder (ADF) as standard. Even without the luxury of colour Printing, that’s not bad for £210. Despite the large overall dimensions of 412x447x386mm, the MB290 is a compact device with a relatively small footprint and weighing just 13kg.
A single 250-sheet paper cassette is loaded into the front at the base of the unit. Although the front of the cassette sits flush with the front of the machine, the rear end of the cassette sticks out a few centimetres at the back – uncovered and steadily collecting dust. There is no paper level indicator. Above the paper cassette is a single-sheet manual feeder slot with smooth-sliding width guides. Envelopes pass through unfettered and without wrinkling. Read the rest of this entry »
Review In a Printing market awash with colour products, here comes HP with an A4 black-and-white business laser. But far from seeming dull, the LaserJet P3015d serves to remind us of how good HP lasers are – and how much better they can be than much of the flashier competition.
Compact in its plain casing, but not particularly small at 316x400x448mm, this 15.9kg printer is well-built and designed to withstand plenty of use. It might look boring but the absence of detail and irregular mouldings should make it easier to find a home for in a cramped office. Thankfully, HP also designed the case to incorporate a pair of cut-ins on either side of the base to make the printer safer to pick up and carry.
The ‘d’ in the product name indicates that this model supports automatic double-sided (duplex) Printing. A 500-sheet paper cassette slots into the front of the unit at the base. The entire cassette fits flush with the main body of the printer: nothing sticks out the back. A paper level indicator at the front warns you when to add more stock.
The front of the case, above the paper cassette, folds down to form a multipurpose input tray with a capacity of 100 sheets. Inevitably, this tray needs to be extended with a combination of hinged and telescopic flaps, which are, altogether, more fragile than the rest of the machine. Read the rest of this entry »
Review Dell’s 2145cn is a mid-range multifunction device, designed for small office and modest workgroup use, but includes several, big-machine functions. Unusually, it’s also built around a colour laser engine.
Dell’s 2145cn: multifunctional with duplex Printing and scanning
There’s only one thing you can be pretty certain of with a Dell printer – it’ll be black. It could come from a variety of sources – Lexmark and Samsung are favourites – and be either good or poor value, but it’ll not have coloured covers. The 2145cn is tall enough to be slightly awkward on the desk, particularly if you add the optional, 500-sheet paper tray.
In fact, you’re probably going to need this, as the machine comes as standard with capacity for only 250 sheets, which is barely enough. Even with the 100-sheet multipurpose tray, which swings down from the front, you’ll still be filling the main tray too often. Read the rest of this entry »
