The Canon ImageClass MF4270 is a basic and inexpensive mono multifunction machine intended for individuals or small offices. Unlike the sleeker Samsung SCX-4500, this $299 Canon multifunction features office-friendly features including an automatic document feeder, networking, and a duplexer. It lacks some of the more advanced features, however, such as fax forwarding and onboard scanning found on more expensive mulitfunctions such as the Lexmark X342n and the Dell 1815dn that some busy offices may require. If you need a multifunction for only basic print, scan, and fax needs, you’ll come to appreciate the affordable Canon ImageClass MF4270′s speedy task speeds and consistent output quality.

The Canon ImageClass MF4270 is quite compact for a multifunction laser. It stands 15.4 inches wide, 17.4 inches deep, and 17.9 inches tall, and weighs 27.6 pounds.

The ImageClass MF4270′s feature set is fairly standard for office-oriented multifunctions. The machine comes network-ready with an Ethernet port on the back, so it can be easily mounted on a home or office network for printing from various PCs. The ADF is great for batch scanning, copying, and faxing. And the autoduplexer makes it easy to make double-sided prints and copies, thereby saving paper. It has a toner-save mode that reduces the amount of toner used for printing. Obviously, the output quality declines, but this mode is great for prints that will be used internally, as it conserves both toner and money. Similarly, the Imageclass MF4270 has a power-save mode: the printer goes into a low-energy standby mode when it hasn’t been used for a certain period of time (you can adjust the amount of time that triggers the power-save mode).

The Canon ImageClass MF4270 uses Canon 104 black laser toner cartridge, which costs about $80 each.

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The Canon ImageClass MF4270’s task quality was decent across the board, performing more evenly than some of its competition, but it wasn’t the bestr. The black prints were nicely dark and consistent, but we noticed jagged edges where we expect to see clean, sharp lines. The grayscale graphics print showed a lot of cross-hatching and the photo elements can afford to be sharper. The grayscale scan revealed a good amount of compression in the dark end of the grayscale, making the scan a bit murky, but we liked the sharp details and the great pattern reproduction. The color scan was the best of the lot, with great color reproduction and sharp details. Although it wasn’t the best at anything (except for color scanning), we liked its consistently good performance.

Scrap bookers, who often use 12×12-inch paper, will probably welcome the Stylus Photo 1400, since it lists for $150 less than the Stylus Photo R1800, which is the next step up in Epson’s 13-inch line. Sleek silver-and-black styling keeps the Stylus Photo 1400 from becoming an eyesore in your home office. Epson does include the ability to print onto CDs and DVDs, both full size and their smaller 8cm cousins used in camcorders. The driver for Epson is same as included on its other Stylus Photo printers, though it doesn’t include the fancy black-and-white driver that comes with the R2400.

The Epson Stylus Photo 1400 cheap cartridge offers 5,760×1, 440dpi, with a minimum ink droplet size of 1.5 Pico liters. As usual, Epson offers a wide array of photo papers for use with the 1400, and even has some strange options, such as its Iron-on Cool Peel Transfer paper and Photo Quality Self Adhesive Sheets.

Each of the six cheap ink cartridges will set you back about $20. Colors are generally accurate, and the printer did a fine job of preserving detail in both very bright and very dark areas of our images. Of course, the brightness of the whites and the depth of black will vary based on the paper you choose.

The quality of the print obtained from HP Officejet 6000 cheap cartridge is of good quality. Full color graphics document printed on HP’s Premium Presentation Paper came out bright and clear. The extreme clarity of facial colors and construction are perfect. It can be said that HP 6000 cheap ink cartridge can produce near “laser-quality” text. Photos printed out with HP 6000 cheap cartridge are accurate and pleasing. We should note that this printer is definitely office-oriented, so don’t expect the highest quality prints (some of the photo elements were washed out, for example), but you won’t be disappointed if you plan to use it more for text, with the occasional snapshot printout.

The CLP-315W uses three color and one black cheap toner cartridge. These cheap cartridges are lightweight and easy to remove and replace using the color-coded tabs. Each cheap cartridge only comes in one capacity of 1,000 pages. These cartridges can by cheaply purchased for about $40. Since the black and color cartridges cost the same, we can estimate that each page will cost about 4 cents to print. Samsung is also limited by the number of pages it can print per month. The CLP-315W’s duty cycle number is about 20,000 pages.

Relative to other similarly priced color laser printers, the CLP-315W is significantly slower than the pack in both black and white and especially color prints. It scored 13.15 pages per minute for plain black speed, slightly faster than the Dell 1320c. The CLP-315W also takes the longest to spit out any kind of color document, scoring a measly 3.64 pages per minute for color graphics and 4.07 pages per minute for color text. The rest of the units in the comparison lineup finished printing in less than half the time in both categories.

We tested the printer using our standard text, graphics, and photos and the HP model No. 564 cheap ink cartridges delivered crisp lines and smooth transitions between varying colors. The overall gradients of color in photos appear evenly shaded with appropriate level accuracy. Since this is a photo-specific printer, we also focused on its capability to produce a dynamic range of contrast between colors. While most photo printers seem to suffer from chronic line banding and a lack of sharpness, the HP cheap ink cartridge consistently produces very pleasing images with hardly any trace of jagged or muddy graphics.

The Epson AcuLaser CX11NF packs in printing, scanning, paper faxing, and multipage photocopying in both color and grayscale. The control panel is well laid out, and its backlit LCD is legible even in the dark. One set of buttons switches between copy, fax, and scan modes, another navigates menu items, and the third is a numeric keypad. But in an odd penny-pinching measure, Epson made the right-arrow button double awkwardly as the Enter button.

Though the Epson AcuLaser CX11NF lacks built-in double-sided printing, its print driver makes it easy to print duplex jobs manually. The driver also allows n-up printing and watermarks, and it can collate multiple copies (which its photocopier can’t do). The driver even displays how full your toner tanks are and can automatically order supplies online from Epson as they run out.

Epson’s copious software bundle works for Mac and Windows PCs, unlike that of the Windows-only Canon MF 8170c. You get utilities for making and correcting scans, managing photos, and scanning business cards. You also get document templates and an OCR utility, which converts scanned text pages into live text and stores their images in a database.

The Epson AcuLaser CX11NF’s 25-pages-per-minute (ppm) engine zipped through plain black text. When CNET ran benchmarks over a USB connection, the AcuLaser churned out text at 18.4ppm–almost five pages faster than the comparable Oki C5510n. This Epson also printed grayscale pages at an impressive 19.1ppm–nearly six pages faster than the Oki. However, performance on color printing dropped off, likely due to the engine’s multipass design. Still, the AcuLaser beat the Canon ImageClass MF8170c and the HP Color LaserJet 2840. Fortunately, unlike many other carousel-based printers, the CX11NF is mostly free of annoying clank and rattle as it cycles through the colors. It made black photocopies at a workgroup-friendly 5.2ppm.

Because the Epson CX11NF uses a multipass engine, color pages pass through the imaging components four times–once for each color–so color printing takes longer than grayscale printing.

Epson CX11NF uses Epson S050190 black laser toner cartridge at about $100 each and Epson S050187, Epson S050188, Epson S050189 color laser toner cartridge at about $120 each.

According to Epson’s figures, a page of black text uses 1.9 cents’ worth of supplies, and a color page uses 10.1 cents’ worth; throw in the other consumables for an estimated 3.1 cents per black page and 12.9 cents for color, which ranks on the average to high end for a color laser printer.