Computer Shopper - UK (2019-12)

PRINTERS

ISSUE 382|COMPUTER SHOPPER|DECEMBER 2019 81

T~Eι̋ɝSpart of Xerox’s new B200 series
of mono devicesforhome offices and small
businesses. This is thetopMFP modelof the
bunch, distinguishedby asleek colour
touchscreen and duplex printing capability.
The cheaper B205 MFP has no screen and
makes do with simplex (single-sided) prints,
while the B210 single-function printer has
duplex printing, but no scanner or display.
The B215 has mostof the features asmall
office could need. In its base there’s a
250-sheet paper input withasingle-sheet
manualfeed slot. Ontopthere’s a40-sheet
automatic documentfeeder forthe scanner,
although this can only scan one sideof
original documents; duplexing is onlyfor
printing. Connectivity is particularly good: you
can use it withaPCv ia USB, wired Ethernet or
Wi-Fi. As with the Epson EcoTank ET-M3180,
there’s alsoafax modem, although the B215
goes even furtherby includingafront-panel
USB portfordirect printing or scanning.

CHECKONLINE
This MFP’s uncluttered control panel and
touchscreen lend itatouch of class, but the
system isn’t quiteperfect. While there are
apps to manage the mainfeatures, you can’t
install more as you can with some more
expensiveXerox devices. There’s also a
surprisingly narrow rangeof configuration
optionsavailable,mostly limitedto simple
network and time-out settings.Forthe

XEROX B215

★★★★★

£199•From http://www.printerbase.co. uk

VERDICT

TheXeroxB215isadecentmonoMFP,ify ou
don’tminditsheftyrunningcosts

B215’s more advanced options you’ll needto

delve intoits web admin interface.That’s also

the only place where you can disable the

banner pages–designedto separatemultiple

jobs in abusy office –which print before

each job.This is the only printer we’vetested

where they’re onby default.

Banners banished, the B215 turned outto

be afast printer.Xerox claimsaprinting pace

of up to 30ppm, and it reached 26.3ppm on

our test, which includes job preparation. This

took longer on our 24-page mixed graphics

job,but the printer still reachedacreditable

21.8ppm. Duplex speeds were impressive,

the B215 printing 10 sides onto five pages in

one minute. Print quality was generally very

good, with justacouple of subtle artefacts

in our test presentation slides and some mild

banding.Text printed with thePostScript

driver was consistently perfect, but on some

documents printed with the default PCL

driver it wasn’t fully black, making it appear

jagged under magnification.

HIGH RISK

The B215 usesasimple scan interface that’s
easy to operate. Scanning was quick, with A4
scans at either 150 or 300dpi, each completing
in just 11 seconds.We encountered problems
when attempting our higher-resolution scans
of aphoto, however,with the TWAIN interface
crashing at 600 and 1,200dpi.We switchedto
the supplied Easy Document Creator software,
which worked fine at 600dpi but doesn’t
support the maximum 1,200dpi optical
resolution. Whileacouple of scans seemed a
touch overexposed, generally their quality was
more than good enoughforoffice work.
Overall, the B215 isafast MFP,producing
decent results, but it’s let downby high
running costsof 2.5p per page.While we’ve
seen worse,the Epson EcoTank ET-M3180
inkjet printsapage forjust 0.2p,while still
having comparableoffice credentials. The B215
is abetter MFPforlow and medium-volume
use,but if you’re likelyto print more than
14,000 or so pages, the ET-M3180 will prove
⬆Neither the desktop software nor onboard UI are as fleshed-out as the web interface better value over time.