OKI's C3200 is a fast, one-pass, sub-£250 desktop colour printer that is ideal for the small to medium sized office - if you can find the space for it, as it's a big beastie. It has a 1,200 x 600dpi resolution and uses a USB 2.0 interface, although there is an Ethernet-equipped version, the C3200n (£279 +VAT), which would be more suitable for workgroup use.

Although at first glance it looks like a colour laser printer, and is often described as such, it does in fact use LED technology to print, which gives it faster print times than conventional laser printers but with slighter poorer image quality.

Both LED and laser printers work in much the same way apart from the first stage of printing. With a laser printer, the beam sweeps the page for each line using reflections from a faceted pivoting mirror, a complex and time-consuming process. LED printers, on the other hand, use an array containing thousands of diodes to sweep an entire line at the same time which ensures faster print times. Because LED printers have fewer mechanical parts than lasers they also tend to be more reliable.

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Single-pass engines also tend to weigh less than their multi-pass counterparts but it would be difficult to know with the C3200 as it weighs a hefty 20kg without any cartridges in it. Its 34.2 x 40.0 x 52.8cm bulk is down to the way in which the four toner cartridges and drums are installed; one behind the other, which makes for easy installation and replacement.

As standard the C3200 comes with 32MB of memory but this can be expanded up to a maximum of 288MB by using additional 64MB or 256MB modules. The printer has a quoted duty cycle of 35,000 pages per month.

Unlike most inkjet printers, where the manufacturers' print speeds are often wildly exaggerated, when it comes to actually printing mono text, some laser printer figures are close to real life speeds. OKI quotes 20ppm for the C3200, a speed confirmed under test conditions, while an A4 colour test print took just 28 seconds.

When it comes to cost of ownership, a hotly contested subject for printers these days, OKI has made a small effort to try to keep prices down. Each of the four toner cartridges has its own drum which, if it has to be replaced, is expensive (£68 + VAT). To set against this cost, OKI supplies a low capacity toner cartridge with each drum.

Two sizes of toner cartridges are available for the C3200, the standard one offering 1,500 pages at 5 percent coverage and costing approximately £36 + VAT for each colour and £20 + VAT for the black cartridge. Then there's the high capacity option (3,000 pages at 5 percent coverage) costing £53 + VAT for colour and £22 for the black.

The C3200 is compatible with Windows only and won't operate under Linux or MacOS as it uses the GDI printing language.

If have the space for it, OKI's C3200 offers a good balance of speed between black and colour printing at a good initial price. However as with all printers, look carefully at the cost of ownership before buying.