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Lexmark Z1420 Wireless Color Printer

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Pros
Built-in 802.11g wireless antenna
Detailed manuals, friendly driver
Cons
Very expensive ink
Flimsy input and output trays

$60.98 - $92.73
From 8 Merchants

Pricing: Inexpensive: $80 (3/20/2008)
Performance: Fair: 65
Features: Poor: 56
Design: Very Good: 83

Find out how these four scores, and their relative weights, combine to produce the PC World Rating.

Pricing

Inexpensive: $80

Standard-Capacity Black Cartridge - $19.99

Standard-Capacity Color Cartridge - $21.99

Performance

Fair: 65

Text Printing (Plain Paper, Normal Settings)
Tested Text Speed (ppm)	9.4
Three-Page Word Document (secs)	57.96
Ten-Page Word Document (secs)	83.4
Text Output Quality	Good

Color Printing (Plain Paper, Normal Settings)
Tested Color Speed (ppm)	1.2
Two-Page Excel Document (secs)	112.57
One-Page Webpage (secs)	50.07
4 by 6 Color Photo (secs)	37.82
Color Output Quality	Good

Color Photo Printing (Glossy Paper, Best Settings)
Tested Glossy Photo Speed (ppm)	0.5
Sports Action Shot (secs)	118.69
Color Photo Quality	Very Good

Grayscale Printing (Plain Paper, Normal Settings)
Tested Grayscale Speed (ppm)	1.5
4 by 6 Grayscale Photo (secs)	40.35
Grayscale Output Quality	Very Good

Lineart Printing (Plain Paper, Best Settings)
Tested Lineart Speed (ppm)	3.9
300dpi Line Art Image (secs)	15.3
Line Art Output Quality	Fair

Features

Poor: 56

Dimensions
Dimensions	18.1-by-7.8-by-4.8
Weight (pounds)	7.9

Vendor Rated Speeds
B&W Pages per Min.	B&W PPM:24
Color Pages per Min.	Color PPM:18

Resolutions
Max. B&W dpi	1200-by-1200
Max. Color dpi	4800-by-1200

Interfaces
Parallel Port	No
Serial Port	No
USB 1.1	Yes
USB 2.0	Yes
Ethernet	No
PictBridge	No
Other Interfaces	802.11g

Drivers
Macintosh	Yes
Windows 98	No
Windows NT	No
Windows 2000	Yes
Windows XP	Yes
Linux	No

Power
Maximum Power Draw (watts)	23
Standby Power Draw (watts)	5.6

Multifunction Printer Specs
Fax Memory (pages)	0

Paper Handling
Number of Input Trays, Standard	1
Number of Input Trays, Maximum	1
Tray Capacity, pages	100
Maximum Sheets With Optional Paper Trays	100
Manual Feed Slot	Yes
Maximum Paper Size	Legal
Output Tray Capacity	25

Warranty & Support
Labor Warranty (years)	One
Parts Warranty (years)	One
Weekday Support Hours	15
Saturday Support Hours	6
Sunday Support Hours	0
Other Service	90 day 'next business day' replacement guarantee
Toll-Free Support	Yes

Cost of Operation Inside of Warranty
Cost per Page, Black	$0.1
Cost per Page, Color	$0.21

Vendor-Supplied Data (in Pages)
Monthly Duty Cycle	3000
Monochrome Ink/Toner Yields	215
Color Ink/Toner Yields	185

Bundled Items
Included Hardware	2 meter USB cord for wireless installation, power supply and line cord
Included Software	Installation software; Lexmark Imaging Studio software

Reliability & Service
Summary of results for all of brand's products in this category	Lexmark printers again had a poor showing, with subpar grades in six of nine reliability and service areas. Lexmark says that its internal surveys indicate that its customers are satisfied. Our readers beg to differ.

Reliability of brand's products in this category
Reports of products arriving with problems	Average
Reports of products with any significant problems	Worse than Average
Reports of problems that render a product unusable	Worse than Average
Buyers' rating of products ease-of-use	Worse than Average
Overall satisfaction with reliability of brand's products in category	Worse than Average

Service & Support Quality
Time spent holding for phone support	Average
Overall quality of vendor's phone support	Worse than Average
Reports of problems unresolved after contacting service	Worse than Average
Overall quality of service	Average

Design

Very Good: 83

What You Should Know about the Z1420 Wireless Color Printer

Inkjets Print Photos Well, And Decent Looking Text, Too

Inkjet printers like this one are commonly used in a home or student setting as well as in a small office. Printing photos is their strongest suit, although they can also print decent to good-looking plain text. For the best results, you usually need to use specially coated papers.

Inkjet printers spray ink through microscopic nozzles arrayed on a print head. Because the printhead has to move back and forth across the page, inkjets can be slow--especially when printing those nice photos.

Ink type affects print quality. Dye-based inks (color dissolved in liquid) tend to create better-looking colors, but they’re less light- and water-resistant. Pigment-based inks (solid color particles suspended in liquid) create images that are more durable but not quite as colorful. Some inkjet printers use both: a pigment-based black for crisp text quality, for instance, but dye-based colors for better-looking graphics.

Ink cartridges come in two basic designs. The colors (cyan, magenta, and yellow) can come in a unified “tricolor” cartridge or in separate cartridges. There’s always a separate black. The tricolor cartridges are more compact, but they’re also wasteful because you have to replace the entire cartridge whenever you run out of any one color. Some printers offer additional colors, such as light cyan or light magenta, to widen the color palette.

Reviewed by:

Duration of ownership:

Strengths: Price was cheap considering it's WiFi

Weaknesses: Wireless did not work at all, had customer service help advise was change printer, have had trouble with wireless with this model.

Overall Evaluation: Setup was very easy following the CD instructions. Wireless indicator never came on and next step was use USB Cable. Printer worked with USB, tried loading in different computer it failed to work wireless one more time. Finally called cust service and they decided to send me a different printer because they had been experiencing wireless conncectivity trouble in the past with other customers.
Reviewed by: sameer2000

Duration of ownership:

Strengths: Wireless (Wi-Fi), Easy wi-fi setup, quick printing, not too big, multiple color ink options

Weaknesses: Not highest quality, could be smaller, ink more expensive than some other low-end printers

Overall Evaluation: I bought the Z1420 to replace my Canon i320, which I've had for about 4 years. I just use this printer in my home for text printing (directions, airline tickets, emails, etc) and occasional color printing (maps, draft ppt presentations). I use a laptop in my living room and wanted a wireless printer that I could leave in another room to avoid clutter. This was the cheapest wireless printer I came across and it's great! Wireless set up was a breeze...followed the simple instructions on the included cd and was working within minutes, first try. Printer is about 30 feet away in another room (walls in between) and have never had a problem with the connection. Text and b/w prints are fast, quality is perfectly fine for my purposes. Prints faster and better quality than my Canon, and the paper feed should prevent paper jams better. Comes with one black ink cartridge and one color...you have the option to use two different color cartridges at the same time printing pictures. I haven't used that option and probably never will, but still a good idea. I do not recommend this if you're looking for high quality or professional prints. I gave this 4 stars based on my use of the printer and would have given it 5 if the ink cartridges were less expensive and if the printer was a bit smaller (I'm spoiled by the Canon which used very inexpensive ink and was quite small). Also, would be nice if it had a rechargeable battery pack so printer could be truly wireless (but I'm not docking the printer for that reason). Overall, great buy and best value wireless printer I could find.