Samsung SCX-4600

The SCX-4600 is an entry-level all-in-one laser printer, that offers the 'laser quality' so important to business users and also produces black-and-white copies.  But at this price, it doesn't do much else.

That means it's not compatible with either wired or wireless networks.

In reality, we didn't actually receive an SCX-4600, but its doppelganger, the Dell 1133.  The American manufacturer adds its logo and fiddles about with a few details in the driver, but apart from that, there are no major differences between the two products.

What we know about the Samsung 4600 from the Dell 1133

Don't expect a miracle: just like the Dell 1133, the Samsung 4600 reaches the quoted speed of 22 pages per minute, but the first page keeps you waiting for up 14 seconds if the printer is warmed up or 21 if coming from standby.  Shades of grey end up too dark in normal mode, and the scanner is pretty bad, leaving a negative impact on the quality of your copies.

That said, the printer doesn't use much power, requiring just 260 W to print, but 7 W on standby is a little too much for our liking.  It's pretty quiet at 51 dB, and well below average for laser printers, although still louder than inkjet printers which sometimes get down to 45 dB.

What might change: cost per page

Because both manufacturers can set their own prices, both Samsung and Dell can adjust the price of the cartridges to suit their own needs.

They both start off in the same place though, with what printer manufacturers euphemistically call a 'starter cartridge', which means one that's more than half empty.  Here, you only get enough for 700 pages, but replacement cartridges have enough toner for 1500.  Note that while Dell offers a high capacity cartridge with a lifespan of 2500 pages, Samsung doesn't mention that in the spec of the 4600.

Toner	Price	ISO Lifespan	Cost per page
MLT-D1052	£41.53	1500	2.8 p

For more information about this printer:

> Test: Dell 1133