PRINTING. The Samsung ProXpress C3010DW prints using laser technology, which picks up powdered 'toner' on a roller and fuses it to the paper with heat. It prints photos poorly, like early color laser printers. Its text quality is Excellent, as we've come to expect from a laser printer. Text printing was very quick, 16.7 pages per minute, costing 2.8 cents per page. Its color graphics printing is Very Good for reports, newsletters and web pages, at 5 pages per minute, costing 14.4 cents per page. If any color ink runs out, it stops printing—it can't be set to just use the remaining black ink. If the black ink runs out, it stops printing—it can't be set to just use the remaining color ink. The capacity of the main paper tray is 250 sheets, a generous size. There's a second tray for full-size paper, allowing you to load letterhead paper, for instance.
CONTROLS and DISPLAY. The printer has a medium-size 2.4-inch display screen.
CONNECTIVITY and NETWORKING. You can connect directly to a PC with a USB cable, or to your network router either wirelessly with WiFi or with an Ethernet cable. There's a WiFi Auto-connect feature that makes it easy to link to your wireless router. Apple AirPrint and Google Cloud Print are built-in, to print wirelessly from smartphones, tablets and PCs. You can also install Samsung's app on your smart phone or tablet, as another option for printing over your WiFi network.
COST OF OWNERSHIP AND TONER. When this section was last updated, the printer's purchase price was about $255, typical for a color laser printer. Printing uses up toner. Over time, as you print, the costs add up. This printer uses 4 cartridges. The Samsung toner cartridges used in testing were the CLT-K503L, CLT-C503L, CLT-M503L, and CLT-Y503L. At the time, their prices were $106, $116, $116, and $116 respectively. We estimate the cartridges to last an extraordinarily long time: around 2.5 years. After 2 years of typical use, we estimate the total cost to be $435, low for a color laser. The estimated yearly cost is $90, also low for this printer type. So the 3-, 4- and 5-year estimates are $525, $615 and $705 respectively.
NOTE. The printer takes up a lot of space and might be more suitable for an office than a small desktop.
PRINTER FIRMWARE. Firmware is software that exists inside the printer. All models are evaluated using the latest firmware version available at the time of testing.
SOFTWARE. The collection of software accompanying the printer may include: the printer driver, printer applications, electronic user manual, (and for all-in-ones:) scanning, faxing, and OCR apps. These get installed on your personal computer. All models are evaluated with a Windows 10 PC using the latest version of printer driver and printer support apps available at the time of testing. The software version was 3.0.8.1.
