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MFU (Multi Function Unit) sometimes called an 'All in One' are more common with inkjet technology but there are units available using a laser and the Samsung SCX-4100 is one such offering.

It is a mono laser so all printing and copying can only achieve grey scale, however the scanning unit is colour so you can scan to a file or application on the PC and work with colour images.

The main advantage of a laser is that a text page will print at the manufacturers claimed speed and this does not just mean the 200 word document that probably has a Dear Sir and a couple of short paragraphs surrounded by huge areas or virgin paper.

Reviews : Laser printers

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It is 42x40x24cm and weights around 9.5kilos. It has a two line LCD that is enough to allow you to copy pages when the PC is off or not connected, there is also reduction and enlargement capability.

It is USB 1 (works fine with USB 2) but somewhat surprisingly it can still be used as a parallel printer. With the latter in mind it will therefore work on Windows 95 or later, it is also stated to work on various incarnations of Linux but only with USB. It has a monthly printing cycle of up to 10,000 pages. The cartridge is stated to cover 3,000 pages.

It prints 14 PPM for A4 pages (15PPM if you use letter) and this will continue for as long as you have paper in the tray. The main cassette will take up to 250 sheets and there is also a manual feed just above ideal for letterheads. Paper is placed face down in the tray and face up on the manual feed.

Paper is delivered face down on the output shelf that is said to accommodate up to 150 sheets, I certainly would not be happy with that number of pages lying there and would move them long before that. It can also print multiple pages on a single page I tried 2, 4 and 9 it offered to do more but I think that would be unacceptable.

I found that there was about a twelve second wait for the first page out, a cold switch on takes around 35 seconds. The on/off switch is located at the rear of the unit in a fairly inaccessible position.

The scanner has optical resolution up to 600x600 but it can be enhanced up to 4800x4800. There is a suite of software that includes a rather nice SmarThru package to allow the novice to be helped through basics to give good results, however the more experienced user will probably achieve quicker output by using Twain from within their choice of application. There is a recent copy of Paper Port SE and this includes OCR software that works quite well.

As with most devices of this type they have to be jack of all trades, if you need to do occasional scanning and copying but do not need colour printing (or copying) this has the advantage of taking up much less space.

Link www.samsung.co.uk now select multi function and then scx-4100