New York, NY -- Though it was released a while back, the Lexmark C543dn is worth mentioning again at this point Amazon is currently offering it for about $314, which is a savings of almost $75 from its retail price of $399. The C543dn is a single-function, color laser printer that will suit even busy SMBs. Due to its price and maximum monthly print volume of 35,000 pages, homes or offices with light printing needs can find a more suitable printer.
It is fairly compact for a laser printer, measuring just 11.5 x 16.7 x 15.7” (HxWxD), though it weighs over 50 lbs. It does come network-ready right out of the box, so it can be placed in a central location and shared amongst employees. It can also be connected to your PC, Mac, or Linux box via USB 2.0 cable (not included). The C543dn prints at a maximum resolution of 1200 x 1200 dpi at speeds of up to 21ppm. It comes with an EcoMode that is both energy and ink-efficient and offers first page out times of about 12 seconds.
This Lexmark device comes standard with 250-sheet paper tray as well as a 1-sheet capacity manual feed option. However, if that is not enough for you, an addition 550-sheet drawer can be purchased along with a 100-sheet multipurpose tray. At the time of this writing, the item was out of stock and a price was not listed. The C543dn has a maximum output capacity of 100 sheets. One nice additional paper handling feature is the automatic duplexing which also comes standard with the printer.
To help its customers out, Lexmark ships this unit with the high-yield toner cartridges in the box to get you started. There is one cartridge for black, cyan, magenta, and yellow with the colors yielding 2,000 pages and the black yielding 2500 pages. It should also be noted that these are the return program cartridges which Lexmark offers at a lower cost to the purchaser if they agree to use it just once and then send it back for recycling. To replace the black cartridge will run you $69.99, so the cost per page is 2.7 cents. For each color, it costs $82.99 or 4.1 cents per page. A full-color page then would cost about 15 cents.
Overall, the C543dn should make most SMBs with color printing needs fairly happy. The cost of the consumables is very reasonable for color printing at this price point. If you can deal with monochrome printing only, you could take a look at the Lexmark E260DN.
