One of the least expensive printers here, Canon’s Laser Shot LBP 5200 is designed specifically for Windows users who want a no-nonsense printing solution at a low price.

Its relatively compact body displays a distinct lack of fiddly control buttons and confusing status panels. It’s a basic design that conveys an air of easy-to-use simplicity rather than a lack of features.

Four LED indicators keep status information to the bare essentials, and the single ‘Toner’ button is used only when consumables need replacing.

The toner cartridges themselves slot into a drum that rotates automatically to provide convenient access to the correct cartridge from the front of the printer.

The small input paper tray has no cover and offers a rather paltry 125-sheet capacity. In operation it’s rather like using a large inkjet printer that happens to use laser technology and print at a far higher speed.

While the device itself may be simple, the supplied driver software is rather sophisticated with a large selection of print options.

The more complex options are kept safely behind an advanced settings button, keeping day-to-day operation simple and decision-free.

Rated at 19ppm (pages per minute) in monochrome and 4ppm in colour, the Laser Shot LBP 5200 is the slowest colour printer in this round-up. You also have a relatively long wait before the first page is printed.

However, if you print a lot of mono documents and use colour less frequently, you’ll find it a better performer than HP’s Color Laserjet 2600n which, despite being around twice as fast in colour, at 8ppm, is also limited to this speed in mono.

The Canon Laser Shot LPB 5200 is a great choice for low-volume users who print only from Windows and want to retain high-speed mono printing with the minimum financial outlay.

This is part of a group test on budget colour laser printers. Other articles are:
Introduction and editor's choice
Canon Laser Shot LBP 5200
Dell 3100cn
Epson Aculaser C1100N
HP Color Laserjet 2600n
Konica Minolta Magicolor 2430DL
Lexmark C510n
Oki C3200
Xerox Phaser 6120
The Real Cost of Printing