The HP Color LaserJet CM1312 MFP Printer

by adam on February 11, 2010

The HP Color LaserJet CM1312 MFP printer using HP Color LaserJet CM1312 MFP toner is Hewlett-Packard’s lowest-priced multifunction printer, though it certainly doesn’t deliver low-rated features or functions. In actuality, it’s print results are probably close to being print shop quality. It is able to take on most tasks and finish them with a speed and accuracy not usually seen in many printers — let alone multifunction printers — in this price range.

This print shop quality comes with a slight trade-off in terms of writing speeds, so keep that in mind if being for a printer is to produce lots and lots of product in a short amount of time. At 12 pages per minute in black and white and 8 pages per minute in color, it’s no speed demon but if the aim is very good looking and high-quality printing, then this particular Hewlett-Packard should fit the bill nicely.

Print resolution in both black-and-white and color is more than fine, coming in as it does at 600 dots per inch resolution. Everything that emerges will look sharp, clean and clear and there will be little if any problem ever presented due to smearing or smudging. As a copier, it is able to enlarge documents up to 400% or shrink them down to 25% of original size as well.

From the time a print task is sent to the 1312 until the time the first sheet emerges will be about 25.5 seconds for something being done in black-and-white. Color print jobs emerge about 6 seconds after that, in 31.5 seconds. Neither speed is quick, at least in terms of the typical workgroup printer, but this particular unit doesn’t seem to be designed for that sort of duty. Rather, print quality looks to be its forte.

Keep in mind that this is a multi-function printer, meaning that also can scan, copy and print. As a compromise, when it comes to doing all three functions, this particular Hewlett-Packard LaserJet-type machine does it all very well, especially when one considers its low price. It can scan at 1200×1200 dots per inch resolution, which will deliver extremely sharp documents when final rendering is completed.

Standard memory is also fine — especially for a multifunction printer — at 120 MB. There is no capability for memory upgrade, but that is usually the case for most multifunction units sold by this company in this particular market segment. It’s easy enough to hook the printer up to either a PC, Mac or even to a small network, as it uses a high-speed USB connection port. No other wired connectivity capability is available.

It’s a fairly robust machine in that it has a monthly duty cycle of 30,000 impressions. When talking about a multifunction printer, “impressions” refers to its printing and copying capabilities the. The 1312 will be able to hold around 150 sheets of paper and it can handle a wide variety of media types, including envelopes, labels, transparencies and most sizes of paper. There is almost no Mac or Windows-based operating system the 1312 can’t run off of, by the way.

Taken altogether, the HP Color LaserJet CM1312 MFP printer does it all and at a price ($350 for a fresh, refurbished unit) that’s sure to make the owner of a small office/home office business stand up and take notice. It isn’t the fastest printer on the market, but that’s not the rule this particular unit was built to take on. It is very durable and produces high-quality product, which actually is the role it’s meant to fill. You will need to have extra toner on hand.  This will allow you to keep printing when ink runs out.  You can either get your HP Color LaserJet CM1312 MFP toner from a store, or online.  Regardless, just make sure to have enough HP toner on hand if you have a big print job.

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