Pros: Great quality images, low cost purchase price
Cons: High cost of consumables, slow color printing and single paper tray
The Bottom Line: I have to give this printer only 3 stars because of the cons. I would still recommend it because the quality images out weigh the cost.
opinionated3's Full Review: Hewlett Packard LaserJet 2550L Printer
It recently became necessary for us to pick up a new color laser printer for one of our departments. My boss went in search of one at our local CompUSA and he returned with a HP Color Laserjet 2550L. Since it was a HP printer I had no doubt that it would perform the needed tasks.
After about a month of use it has worked wonderful for them. This the normal break period we have for new printers that we haven't used before and if the printer survives the first month we usually have has good luck with it, especially our HP brand laser printers.
A couple of things that made this color laser printer perfect for our needs is that it has created really high quality images even on plain white paper. Even though the print resolution is 600 x 600 which is lower than HP higher end color laser printers but using the HP ImageREt 2400 technology it still provides high quality color prints. For what this printer was going to be printing it really didn't have to be fast it just needed to print nice.
That is fortunate because it is only capable of up to 4 pages per minute in full color and 20 pages per minute B&W text. The other thing is the size of this printer; it is small in comparison to most of HP's color laser printers (like the HP Color 3500) and that allowed us to put it on the user's desk without taking up their entire desktop.
Installation and setup of this printer was made fairly simple because of the user guide that HP included was very easy to follow. Each of the four colored toner cartridges (cyan, magenta, yellow and black) were individually packed in plastic and they were packed in a box together. HP made sure that the toner cartridges were protected from accidental damage by covering vital parts with orange plastic removable covers and toner canister within the toner cartridge is sealed by a plastic strip that you simply pull out before you load each of the cartridges into the printer.
You will also need to open the black plastic bag that holds the imaging drum and it also has orange plastic covers protecting the vital parts from being damaged. This imaging drum will need to be replaced every 20,000 pages and it is consumer replaceable.
The toner black cartridges are rated at 5000 pages each based on 5% coverage and the standard color toners are rated at 2000 pages. What that means is that if the image you are printing only covers 5% of the paper you should get 2000 pages color printing out of each set of toner cartridges. The toner cartridges have a smart chip built into them and this allows the printer to track number of pages that are being printed from the toner cartridges. It is also used to verify that you are using genuine HP cartridges.
The actual loading of the toner cartridges and image drum unit is very easy to perform by plugging in the printer and pushing the power button in that is located on the left hand side of the printer. Once the unit is powered on you just simply open the top cover and slide the imaging drum into the slots that are clearly marked and push it all the way down. Then you start loading the toner cartridges into their proper location based on the color of each toner that is in the cartridge. You will rotate the carousel in between each color you load and you do this by pushing the button that is on the top of the printer. It has four colored dots coinciding with the color of the toners. You will need to close the top cover in between loading each of the toners to get the carousel to rotate.
Once you have all of the consumables loaded into the printer and it is ready to go you need to decide whether you are going to connect this printer to your computer using a parallel or USB cable ( neither one is included in the box). Once you have decided on which cable you will need to connect the cable to the back of the printer and to your computer.
Then put the CD that contains the driver and software to run the printer into your CD drive and follow the instructions. For you Linux users you will be happy to hear that HP included Linux drivers on the CD so you can take advantage of this color laser printer. Along with Linux, HP included the drivers for Win 98, 2000, Me, XP and NT 4.0 as well as Mac OS 9.1 and later. It is a very easy to follow procedure and it really doesn't take all that long. It will go through and test the printer driver from your computer and as long as it prints it means you have successfully installed your printer.
One of the negative points of this printer is the unusually long time it takes to warm up; it has to recalibrate the toner carousel and it takes time. For anyone that is familiar with HP color laser printers like this already know that they will take time to warm up. If this is a concern for you I would recommend you think about selecting a different printer.
Another negative point of this model that we purchased is that it doesn't include a lower paper tray and that severely limits the paper capacity of this printer. The only paper tray installed in this printer is a small capacity (150 sheet) tray that folds down in front. This tray really isn't that sturdy and it sticks kind of far out from the printer and it tends to get in the way.
The operation of this printer is pretty straight forward since it doesn't have a LCD display to let you know the status of the printer you must use the indicator lights to tell you what is going on with this printer. There is a blue light to tell you that the printer is online and ready to go and it has 4 indicator lights with a corresponding color code on the printer for each of the four color toners.
Final Thoughts and Recommendation
I think HP has created a great little entry level color LaserJet printer that can be used as a home or small office color printer that is much more economical than most inkjet printers. I really like the two tone gray (light gray on the sides and part of the top and the rest of the top is a dark gray color) it really makes it look pleasing to the eye.
Once you decide where you are going to put it on your desk I would recommend you keep moving it since it is relatively heavy for its size. It isn't nearly as heavy as HP's other lines of Color LaserJet printers (3500, 3700 and 5500 Series) but it isn't light by any means.
Some of the negative points of this printer are substantial and others are minor. So you might want to consider these negatives points before you purchase this printer:
1) High cost of consumables- four individual color toners that are approximately $80.00 each and an imaging drum which is $175.00
2) Single low capacity paper tray
3) Somewhat loud due to the rotating toner carousel
4) Long warm up time as compared to other laser printers
For our usage the positive points well out weigh the negatives and that is why we are very happy with it so far and with the relatively low cost $499.00 it was definitely worth the price. I would recommend this printer for a small office that needs a color printer but has found an inkjet printer to be far too expensive (ink consumption) and is looking for a far more economical option.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 499.00 Operating System: Windows and Macintosh
This Refurbished Printer carries 3 Months Warranty~~ Usually Shipped within 72 hours ~~ Experience the HP Color LaserJet 2550L laser printer that’s ...More at i-Market
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