If you have a small to medium sized business that needs an efficient, fast and good quality workhorse of a printer, then you could do a lot worse than Epson's latest AcuLaser C3800N.

When a printer comes in a box that needs dismantling around it and two people to lift it, you know you're getting something substantial (the base unit weighs 25.8kg). Yet despite the weight, it's remarkably compact, with user-friendly controls, and is one of the quietest printers in its class; in standby mode it's silent.

Four large imaging cassettes have to be front-loaded before you start and the CD-based manual describes every step carefully. 700 pages can be loaded immediately (150 in the Multi-Purpose tray plus a further 550-Sheet Paper Cassette) and you can opt to pay extra for a second 550-sheet Paper Cassette as well as a Duplex Unit so you can print on both sides of the paper.

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If you want to print more complex, graphics-intensive documents, then the supplied 128MB DIMM memory can be expanded to 1GB by replacing the existing one with 512MB and then installing an additional 512MB.

The top-mounted controls are easy to operate, with diagrams and instructions on the backlit LCD panel which include information on how to fix common faults such as paper jams and also how to change the toner.

The AcuLaser C3800 has a high toner capacity, which translates to a lower cost per printed page, and if one of the colour toners runs out before the print job has finished, the machine will automatically convert from colour to monochrome to finish the job.

Epson's Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) technology has resulted in a fine-tuned engine performance and the result is a fast processing time. The first A4 page is out in 15 seconds with print speeds up to 25ppm mono, 20ppm colour and 17.3ppm in Duplex, though these are quoted speeds for draft mode and so actual print times will usually be longer.

The printer has a rated duty cycle of 60,000 pages per month, printing at resolutions up to 4,800 RIT (Resolution Improvement Technology - a type of interpolation that smoothes the edges of text and lines).

The printer control system recognises at least nine print languages including ESC/Page, IBM Mode I239X, Adobe PostScript 3, PDF 1.3 and PCL6. A USB connector near the back links to your PC, network connections can be established via the 10/100Mbps Ethernet interface and a separate, front-mounted, high-speed USB port (2.0 compatible) is designed to allow printing directly from USB memory sticks.

Security is a major priority with this printer, as Epson has added its USB Memory Print Maker to ensure confidential documents remain secure, and PDF documents can also be password-protected.

Solid yet compact, the AcuLaser C3800N is a powerful, speedy, high volume printer for small to medium sized businesses. It has a friendly interface and controls allied to a comforting emphasis on security.