Since my home is now also home office it was time to make (long planned) purchase of printer/scanner combo. I had no particular needs except decent print and scan quality and not getting in my way too much.
After skimming through internet shop I usually use – Samsung SCX-3205 seemed like a fit. Decent specs and compact footprint for smaller/home offices.
Looks
Device is done completely in black with very uniform proportions. The top is only slightly larger than bottom. Black color also makes it look more solid that it is – not that heavy and plastic feels slightly flimsy on the sides.
samsung_scx-3205
Controls are copier-like with central copies quantity selector and display, power button is nicely on top with the rest (no need to dive for it).
Printing quality is good (monochrome laser) and it is very snappy.
There is special Eco mode button that (when enabled) formats everything you print to two pages on one. Very convenient for drafts.
Paper input takes 150 pages, output is only 50. More than enough for me, but you might want larger device if you aim to print a lot of long documents.
Scan and copy
Scanner quality is decent at 1200dpi real and 4800dpi interpolated. Definitely improvement from multi-function devices I remember from several years ago.
Copier snaps perfect copies of purely textual content, but with default settings something more complex comes out not that good. Sadly there are no hardware controls for source type and printout brightness – need to select those in driver’s settings.
There is special ID Copy mode to copy two sides of something on halves of same page. Highly convenient.
The one feature I really miss is automatic two-sided copy. I guess there simply isn’t enough space for such complex mechanics to fit in this one.
Overall
Device seems to fits its niche precisely – it is compact, unobtrusive and performs core functions well. But home or small office is its only turf. For anything larger and more active you will probably want something more functional and easier to control without computer.