Ricoh Color Laser Printers - Ricoh Aficio SP C222SF

Ricoh is well known in the big business printing department and virtually unknown in the arena of small offices. However, seeing how lucrative the niche is, they decided they wanted a piece of the pie. The result: the Ricoh Aficio SP C222SF.

 

The Aficio SP C222SF is an all-in-one color laser that can scan, print, copy, and fax documents. It is part of Ricoh’s new line for small offices – an area previously ignored by Ricoh. With the C222SF, you’d have to make sure your office can handle it, since it measures 18.7 x 16.5 x 19.4 inches (HWD) and weighs in at a considerable 66 pounds. It is neither compact nor portable. The C222SF can handle media of up to legal size, or 8.5 x 14. The standard media capacity is set at 750 sheets while the document feeder capacity at 35 sheets. The C222SF can print up to 2400 x 600 dpi for black and why as well as color.

 

Setting the C222SF involves very little. Once you found a place to put it, all you have to do is put in some paper, plug the necessary cords and cables and you’re off. It can be used as a standalone copier and fax machine. Setting up the C222SF to scan over a network is a breeze. However, the TWAIN driver is not intuitive. You would have to manually input the IP address assigned to the C222SF in order to start scanning. If you don’t know the IP address or where to put it, you’d be left in the dark as to why your scanner isn’t scanning. Scanning from the PC is the same story – you would need to enter information through built-in Web pages using a browser. While this may sound like a cinch, the Web pages aren’t instinctive enough, making the whole setup procedure unnecessarily difficult.

 

Once you do get over these difficulties, it’s all downhill riding from there. Printing a whole business applications suite took 13 minutes 17 seconds – average for this class of AIO. Printing a 4 x 6-inch photo took 48 seconds and 1 minute 17 seconds for 8 x 10-inch prints. The quality of the prints weren’t spectacular, but it will get you by. The fonts were well formed and easily readable. For graphics, the C222SF produces prints that are good enough for internal business use. However, others may find the flaws to be enough to not use the output to give to clients and potential customers. Nonetheless, for internal business use, the quality and speed of the Ricoh Aficio SP C222SF more than satisfies.