Oki MC573dn
Great output quality and access security at a low price – as long as you can live with limited cloud support
“Oki’s free web server is an easy way to restrict access to colour printing, set page limits and control scan, copy and fax operations”
SCORE ✪✪✪✪✪ PRICE £344 exc VAT from okidirect.co.uk
Oki’s MC573dn colour MFP offers a lot of features for a low price. Along with 4-in-1 print, scan, copy and fax operations, its LED-based engine is rated at a true 1,200dpi resolution and claims a speedy 30ppm print rate.
The recommended monthly duty cycle of 6,000 pages makes it a great choice for print-hungry workgroups, and you get a free warranty extension to three years if you register it within 30 days of purchase. The printer’s flat paper path means it can handle heavy 220gsm media, and if you open up the front multipurpose tray and rear output slot you can even print banners up to 1.32m long.
The classy output quality of the LED engine makes the MC573dn a great choice for producing marketing material, delivering the vibrancy and high levels of detail we’ve come to expect from Oki. Text is razor sharp, even for very small fonts, while colour photos and graphics benefit from good contrast and detail.
For photo printing there’s also a Photo Enhance setting, which visibly increased the sharpness and contrast of our test photos. Our only complaint is that with this setting enabled, large areas of single colour showed a slight cross-hatching effect.
Although there are quite a few consumables to keep track of, overall printing costs are within the expected range for this market sector. The four high-yield toner cartridges and individual drums plus belt and fuser add up to a total cost of 1.7p per mono page and 9.1p for colour.
Performance for general office printing is impeccable, with our 30-page Word document despatched in bang on 60 seconds, at both 600dpi and 1,200dpi resolutions. The MC573dn had no problems with our challenging 24-page colour DTP document at 600dpi, either – although when we upped the resolution to 1,200dpi we encountered frequent pauses in printing while large colour photos were processed, dropping the overall average speed to 18ppm.
The scanner produced top-quality copies of colour reports and glossy magazine covers, but note its ADF can only scan one side of a document at a time. If you switch it into duplex mode, each page goes through the mechanism twice, resulting in copy speeds dropping to 6ppm – a far cry from the promised 30ppm.
Walk-up operations are easy thanks to the big flip-up 17.5cm colour touchscreen. Its handy job macro feature combines groups of scan, copy or fax settings for quick two-tap selection.
Connection options include USB 2 and Gigabit Ethernet; Oki also offers an optional wireless module that plugs easily into a side panel and costs around £33. AirPrint is enabled out of the box, but only Google Cloud Print is supported, and Oki’s Mobile Print iOS app doesn’t offer any remote scanning features.
The Windows Configuration Tool remotely manages the printer’s fax speed dial and email address lists, while PCs running the ActKey utility can be accessed directly from the printer’s panel as scan destinations. 3GB of built-in eMMC Flash memory, can be used to store custom forms and logos uploaded from the Storage Manager desktop plugin.
The driver allows a PIN to be assigned to protect confidential prints but for greater access security and printing controls try Oki’s free smart PrintSuperVision web server. We tested this on a Windows 10 desktop and found it an easy way to restrict access to colour printing, set page limits and control scan, copy and fax operations for selected users and hosts.
Busy SMBs that demand the best output quality and tight access security will find Oki’s C573dn a worthy contender. Though cloud support is minimal, and wireless costs extra, this LED MFP delivers a lot of document management features at a very good price.
SPECIFICATIONS
1,200 x 1,200dpi A4 colour LED MFP 600dpi colour flatbed A4 scanner 1GB RAM 3GB eMMC Flash 30ppm mono/colour 17.5cm colour touchscreen 2 x USB 2 Gigabit Ethernet 33.6Kbps fax/modem 2 x RJ-11 duplex 250-page input tray 100-page MPT 50-page ADF monthly duty cycle: 6,000 pages 427 x 576 x 472mm (WDH) 31kg 3yr on-site warranty on registration. Options: 802.11n wireless, £33 exc VAT
RUNNING COSTS (EXC VAT)
High-yield cartridges: K (7K pages), £79 C, Y, M (6K pages), £147 each K, C, Y, M image drums (30K pages), £32 each fuser (60K pages), £56; transfer belt (60K pages), £56. Overall cost per A4 page: mono, 1.7p; colour, 9.1p