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What would you expect, if you were going to pay ?,000 for a monolaser printer? At that sort of price, you'd probably want a goodspeed, several feed trays, a duplexer, networking, PostScript aswell as PCL and a lot of expandability. HP ticks all those boxeswith the LaserJet P4015x, part of a new range of printers aimed atworkgroups of 10 to 15 people.

This printer is a lot taller than most mono lasers we've tested,but mostly because it comes as standard with a second paper tray.Since both trays can hold 500 sheets, it makes the machine quitehigh off the desk. There's a 100-sheet multi-purpose tray, too,which pulls down from the front of the printer.That's all of the standard paper sources but, optionally, theprinter can handle up to six trays, and one of these can be amassive, 1,500-sheet bulk tray. Other options include astapler/stacker, an envelope feeder and a special media tray, aswell as more memory and a hard drive for document storage.The control panel is neat and straightforward, with a key pad forsecure printing and a 4 line by 16 character, backlit LCD display,which includes access to tutorials on printing techniques, printedout from the machine's own firmware.One feature we've seen on quite a few recent lasers is a USB socketon the front, so you can print files from a flash drive. Sadly,there's nothing like this on the HP machine, though you can printsecurely by sending a file through its Gigabit Ethernet link andprinting only after you've reached the machine and entered a PIN.As well as the network interface, there's a standard USB 2.0 socketfor local connection to a PC.Given the 225,000 page-per-month duty cycle of this printer and thecapacity of its drum and toner cartridges, it's surprising howdiscreet they are. Fold up the front cover of the printer and youcan slide in a cartridge with a minimum of fuss - and it doesn'tdisappear deep inside the machine's mechanism.Software installation is also straightforward, with the drivers andsupplies monitoring utilities loading easily from CD. The driversupports duplex documents, booklets, watermarks, multi-pages persheet and prints at both 600dpi and 1200dpi resolutions.