Whilst not a powerhouse of printing, the Xerox 203A offers a solid and above all affordable option for people printing a mass of documents. Print speed is above average, the quality is all but flawless and it has a very manageable footprint making it ideal for a small office or even home situation.
The first thing to note is this printer is labeled as a document model and our tests confirmed this is where its strength lies. It reeled off just under 20 pages a minute, which for a model in this price range is above average. The quality of these prints was exceptional. There was no noticeable feathering or warping of the characters at all. The colour saturation was consistent and the pages were easy on the eyes. Anyone after consistent, high quality document printing this is one of the premiere choices.
Graphic printing was of a slightly lesser quality however still quite reasonable. There was a lack of contrast in most of our prints, so anything dark wound up with a fairly uniform black colour lacking definition between areas. The prints were crisp and clear apart from this and printed at a very speedy 15 pages a minute, but we'd recommend other models if you print a lot of images.
The 203A offers a 250 sheet tray for standard paper, which is right on the average for a small laser model, but requires manual feeding of more exotic paper types which will slow down your print process considerably. Imagine trying to print 500 envelopes manually. Tiring yes?
Installation was a breeze. The front opens up to reveal a slot for the drum unit which clicks easily into place. It comes with a large, clear manual with accompanying graphics and software installation took less than two minutes. Even the most computer illiterate person should have no trouble with this unit. Network installation follows this trend as well, offering a simple wizard to get your printer connected to multiple PCs.
Xerox rate their ink cartridge at 2500 prints, which is right on the average, and the drum will need replacing after roughly 12,000 prints. This equates in total to a cost of about 3.5 cents per print, which is quite competitive if not stellar.
