HP LaserJet Pro 400 Color MFP M475dn

The HP LaserJet Pro 400 Color MFP M475dn ($699 direct) has an awkward name, and nobody is going to give it any awards for speed. But it has a good feature set and above-average output; it?s especially strong in graphics. This makes it a very respectable choice as a color laser multifunction printer (MFP) for a smaller office.

The M475dn prints, copies, faxes, and scans; it can fax either from its 3.5-inch color touch screen or from a computer (PC Fax). You can scan to a USB thumb drive, email, or a network folder. It has a 50-sheet automatic document feeder (ADF) for faxing, scanning, or copying multi-page documents without you having to feed each page by hand. It can scan at up to legal size using the ADF.

This MFP measures 19.7 by 16.5 by 19.0 inches (HWD) and weighs 65 pounds, too big to share a desk with, and moving it into place is a 2-person job. The M475dn has a 300-sheet standard paper capacity, split between a 250-sheet input tray and 50-sheet multipurpose tray; a second 250-sheet tray is available as an option ($137 direct). It has an automatic duplexer for printing on both sides of a sheet of paper, which can save you a lot of paper.

The M475dn is capable of running HP?s Web apps and comes with a generous selection of them pre-installed. Their printable content ranges from forms to news feeds, coloring book pages, Sudoku puzzles, and more. The M475dn is also ePrint enabled; HP assigns an e-mail address to the printer (which you can later customize), you can send documents to that address, and the printer will automatically print them out (as long as it?s connected to the Internet).

The M475dn offers USB and Ethernet connectivity. (An otherwise identical WiFi-enabled version of the printer, the M475dw, is available for $749 direct.) I tested it over the Ethernet connection with a PC running Windows Vista.

Print Speed

I timed the M475dn on the latest version of our business applications suite (using QualityLogic's hardware and software for timing), at a rather sluggish 3.2 effective pages per minute (ppm), even considering its relatively low rated print speed of 21 ppm?which should be about the speed you would get if you were to print text only. The Editors? Choice Dell 2155cn ($549.99 direct) finished the same tests at a much faster 5.9 ppm clip, while the OKI MC561 ($750 street) was even faster, at 7.2 ppm.

Print Quality

Overall output quality for the M475dn was slightly above average, thanks to very good graphics quality. Text was slightly below average for a laser, which still translates to very good?fine for any business use except those requiring very small fonts, like some desktop publishing applications, or documents like resumes that need to make a good visual impression.

Graphics were of good enough quality that I wouldn?t hesitate to hand them to clients I was seeking to impress, or?for that matter?use for marketing materials. The only issues I encountered were minor, some blotchiness in a couple of color backgrounds due to uneven toner distribution and some mild posterization.

Photo quality was a little on the high side of average. Photos generally showed very good color, although a couple of them had modest tints. Several showed dithering, and there was a loss of detail in several bright areas.

The Editors? Choice Dell 2155cn is considerably faster than the M475dn, and has slightly better overall output quality and a lower price tag. It lacks an auto-duplexer, and although they both have 250-sheet main trays, the Dell 2155cn?s multipurpose feeder is limited to a single sheet. The OKI MC561has blazing speed and even has a duplexing ADF, letting you copy, fax, and scan 2-sided documents. Its output quality isn?t up to either the HP or the Dell 2155cn, however. The OKI MC561has slightly lower color costs that the other two.

Unless print speed is a strong consideration, the HP LaserJet Pro 400 Color MFP M475dn is a good choice as a color laser MFP to anchor a small office. It has a very solid feature set, including HP Web apps and ePrint capabilities, and good output quality highlighted by beautiful graphics.

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