HP DeskJet 1600CM and Lexmark Color Jetprinter 4079 Plus
Inkjet Printers for Business and Graphics Pros.
Tony A. Bojorquez
Reviews Printers/
The most-affordable color printers for business and graphics users are inkjet printers. Two recently introduced models offer major improvements over their predecessors. Street-priced at less than $2,000, the Hewlett-Packard DeskJet 1600CM is the quickest and most capable inkjet printer we've seen. Although HP has targeted business users, even discriminating graphics pros will be pleased with the quality of the new DeskJet's output. The more expensive Lexmark Color Jetprinter 4079 plus is aimed at users of graphics applications, but the printer's less than stellar output and inconvenient media-selection process detract from its appeal.
HP DeskJet 1600CM
Ideal for small to midsized workgroups, the DeskJet 1600CM produces better-looking output at a faster pace than its predecessor, the DeskJet 1200C/PS. The new PostScript Level 2 printer clearly means business -- out of the box, it comes equipped with an HP JetDirect card, which lets you connect it to either an EtherTalk or a LocalTalk network, as well as with a Centronics parallel interface. The printer also comes with 4 MB of memory and an Intel RISC processor. For mixed-platform workgroups, the DeskJet 1600CM can automatically switch between network and parallel interfaces as well as between the PCL 5C and PostScript printer languages. A simple context-sensitive one-button control panel on the front of the printer makes operation easy.
The DeskJet 1600CM prints impressively good-looking color documents at 300 x 300 dpi. There are four ink cartridges, each of which is rated for about 900 prints at 5-percent coverage. Each cartridge has a gauge, so you can easily see how much ink it contains. When a cartridge runs out of ink during a print job, two things happen: The printer completes the current page and stops, and the driver software notifies you that a cartridge is out of ink. However, there's no warning that tells you when a cartridge is running low before you start to print -- to stay on top of ink levels, you have to remember to lift the front cover and check the gauges.
We achieved the highest-quality color prints with special glossy paper, but the real beauty of the DeskJet 1600CM is that it produces very good-looking output on plain paper. A built-in heater dries the ink, so there's very little paper wrinkling.
HP's proprietary ColorSmart Technology lets the printer make smart decisions about color and dithering, based on each element on a page -- text, graphics, and photographic images. But there's a hitch: To take advantage of ColorSmart, you must have Apple's QuickDraw GX extension installed. For black text and line art, the DeskJet 1600CM prints at a 600-x-600-dpi resolution, using HP's REt (Resolution Enhancement technology), so you get nice crisp edges and smooth curves.
The paper-handling features can meet the needs of busy workgroups. The printer comes with an adjustable 180-sheet tray for letter-, legal-, or A4-sized pages. If you need more capacity, you can opt for a $379 500-sheet tray.
Color Jetprinter 4079 plus
Lexmark's new inkjet printer improves on the print quality and speed of its IBM-made predecessor, with a revamped Canon engine, a PostScript Level 2-compatible RIP, an AMD 29030 RISC processor, and 360-x-360-dpi resolution. Considering the printer's target audience -- graphics users and publishing pros -- Lexmark offers an optional internal hard drive for font storage. Graphics users will also like the Color Jetprinter's ability to handle 11-x-17-inch tabloid-sized pages, but the printer doesn't support tabloid bleeds.
Installation of the printer's four ink cartridges is simple and straightforward, and Lexmark rates each cartridge for 205 pages at 5-percent coverage. For networking, the Color Jetprinter comes with LocalTalk built-in -- an external EtherTalk adapter is optional and costs $499. Included with the printer is the MarkVision software utility, which handles basic tasks such as changing the printer's name and downloading fonts and PostScript files.
At print time, you can choose from five output-quality settings -- we got the best-looking results in Pause mode, but of course, printing with it takes the longest. One real drawback is that color pages are still visibly wet, and smearable, when they come out of the printer. And when we printed on plain paper, the ink was so saturated that the paper wrinkled. If you plan to print lots of documents that use generous amounts of color, we recommend that you use coated paper. It ensures that colors stay vibrant and minimizes the amount of ink that seeps into the paper.
One other problem with the Color Jetprinter has to do with media handling. The printer comes with an adjustable built-in flip-down paper tray that holds 100 sheets of letter- or tabloid-sized media. We printed letter-sized documents without a hitch, but when we switched to tabloid-sized documents, using our application's Page Setup command, our documents passed through the printer and came out with letter-sized output. That's because Lexmark requires you to manually change the media size by using the printer's LCD front panel. A much more convenient approach would allow users to control the media size from their Macs.
Battle of the Inkjets
To gauge how the Color Jetprinter and the DeskJet 1600CM compare in output quality and speed, we used a test suite that mirrors the kinds of documents typically printed by business users and graphics pros. For our speed tests, we chose settings that produced acceptable, although not superior, output from each printer. When we compared output quality from the two printers, we printed on coated media at the highest-quality setting for each printer. The Lexmark printer was equipped with 12 MB of memory and the HP printer with 8.5 MB. Our test platform was a Power Mac 6100/60 with 40 MB of RAM running System 7.5.1 over LocalTalk.
In terms of output quality, the HP printer clearly has the edge over Lexmark's offering, for both graphics and text. Although the Lexmark printer's color output is vibrant, it's compromised by striping. Printing in Pause mode minimizes the effect, but it's still visible, especially in solid areas of color.
In our speed tests, the Lexmark printer was considerably faster than HP's at printing a QuarkXPress document comprising several TIFF images, colored text, downloadable fonts, and clip art (8 minutes for the Lexmark and 11 for the HP printer). The HP printer's drying process contributed to its slower print speed, but because the heater lets you print very successfully on plain paper, it's well worth the speed hit.
When we printed our five-page color Microsoft PowerPoint document, the HP printer finished in 10 minutes, compared to nearly 14 for the Lexmark printer. Neck and neck at printing a complex color Adobe Illustrator document, the two printers finished in about 2 minutes.
Because the HP printer is aimed at the business market, we also speed-tested it by using a ten-page text-only Microsoft Word document -- a good indicator of engine speed. Although HP claims that the printer's engine speed is 8 ppm in normal mode, those results are based on printing a PCL file from a PC running under DOS. For printing on the Mac, our results showed the printer's engine speed to be closer to 4 ppm.
The Bottom Line
We were impressed with the HP DeskJet 1600CM -- it represents a new class of inkjet printer that offers unprecedented versatility, as well as excellent output quality, for the price. Whether you're searching for an affordable color printer for the design shop or for the office, the new DeskJet is a good buy. The Lexmark Color Jetprinter 4079 plus, on the other hand, boasts vibrant colors, but striping mars the overall quality of the printer's output.
Hewlett-Packard DeskJet 1600CM
Rating: (4 out of 5 mice) Very Good
Price: $2,479 (list).
Pros: Built-in LocalTalk and EtherTalk. Excellent output quality, even on plain paper. Good speed.
Cons: ColorSmart requires the QuickDraw GX extension. No indicators to tell you when ink levels are low.
Company: Hewlett-Packard, Santa Clara, CA; 800-752-0900 or 800-387-3867 (Canada).
Reader Service: Circle #406.
Lexmark Color Jetprinter 4079 plus
Rating: (3 out of 5 mice) Average
Price: $3,199 (list).
Pros: Simple installation. Good speed.
Cons: Striping in color output. Prints are wet and smearable. Confusing media-selection process.
Company: Lexmark, Greenwich, CT; 800-891-0331 or 606-232-2000.
Reader Service: Circle #407.
The HP DeskJet 1600CM (left) is the most versatile and affordable inkjet printer you can buy for the office or design shop. The Lexmark Color Jetprinter 4079 plus prints vibrant color, but the overall quality of its output isn't on a par with the HP printer's.
