The Ricoh C125 P ($375) is a single-function color laser printer that offers excellent print quality for a low purchase price. It is solidly constructed and moderately fast when printing text documents, too. But the C125 P also has unusually high running costs, making it best suited for small offices or workgroups that are restrained by a tight acquisition budget and have low-volume needs. They’ll find the C125 P’s excellent print quality makes it an unusual bargain, until it comes time to replace the toner cartridges. From that point on, the costly toner eats away at the initial savings.Design: Weighing the AdvantagesAt 13.1 by 15.7 by 17.7 inches (HWD), the Ricoh C125 P is about average in its dimensions compared with similarly equipped color laser printers. The older HP Color LaserJet Pro M454dw is a bit shorter and deeper at 11.6 by 16.2 by 18.5 inches, while the Lexmark C3326dw is considerably shorter but less deep at 9.6 by 16.2 by 15.5 inches. On the other hand, the Canon Color imageClass LBP664Cdw is considerably larger across all three dimensions at 23.3 by 17.5 by 23.1 inches.
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You might think that the relative weights among these four models would closely parallel their sizes. Here the C125 P breaks decisively from the pack by weighing in at a substantial 55.1 pounds. That’s 7.3 pounds heavier than the considerably larger Canon LBP664Cdw, 13.4 pounds heavier than the somewhat-larger HP M454dw, and 19.6 pounds heavier than the slightly smaller Lexmark C3326dw.Is it bad for a printer to weigh more than its close competitors? It depends on your point of view. If you’re trying to lift a heavy printer onto a desk in a busy office, that extra weight might seem to be an unnecessary hindrance. The argument in favor of heavy printers posits that lightweight printers may be using plastic where metal would be needed. Plastic can wear out faster than metal when used for some mechanical functions. And a strong metal-reinforced construction could better withstand severe bumps or drops.
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(Credit: David English)
Whichever way you figure it, the Ricoh C125 P is heavy for a modern-day color laser printer. If you’re shopping for a single-function printer because the all-in-one printers are too heavy, then this may not the model you’re looking for. On the other hand, if you miss the good old days when printers felt strong and solid, then you may want to favor this particular model.Paper Handling: A Steady FlowThe paper-handling features for the C125 P are fairly typical for the category. It has a 250-sheet input tray that’s paired with a 125-sheet output bin. It also has a single-sheet bypass tray that’s a quick way to place a single sheet ahead of the paper you’ve already loaded into the standard input tray. Because the bypass tray has its own set of adjustable paper guides, it could be useful for printing odd-sized media, such as envelopes or labels. On the downside, duplex printing isn’t available when using the bypass tray.For comparison, the Lexmark C3326dw has a similar 250-sheet input tray and single-sheet override tray. However, both the Canon LBP664Cdw and HP M454dw have a 250-sheet input tray and a more generous 50-sheet override tray. If you tend to print a lot of envelopes or labels, the C125 P wouldn’t be a good fit compared with either the Canon or the HP.Ricoh rates the C125 P as having a 30,000-page maximum monthly duty cycle. That compares with 50,000 pages for both the HP M454dw and Lexmark C3326dw. Canon no longer publishes the specs for its printers’ maximum monthly duty cycle. However, the recommended monthly duty cycle for the Canon LBP664Cdw is 4,000 pages, and that matches the HP M454dw. The Lexmark has a recommended monthly duty cycle of 2,500 pages, while the C125 P has a recommended monthly duty cycle of just 1,500 pages. Within this group, the C125 P has the least-favorable print volume ratings, though it also has the lowest purchase price within this group.If you do plan to push the workload anywhere close to that 30,000-page monthly tally, you may find the 250-sheet input tray to be frustratingly restrictive. That would work out to roughly 120 tray refills per month. Ricoh does have a remedy, and it’s similar to what Canon and HP offer for their color laser printers. You can buy a 500-sheet capacity Paper Tray Extension ($174) that attaches to the bottom of the unit. That same Paper Tray Extension is also compatible with the Ricoh C125 MF all-in-one color laser printer.Setup: Open the Door to Connect the CablesSetting up this model is straightforward and proved uneventful in our experience. The toner cartridges are already loaded, though you do have to unload them briefly in order to remove some tape that secures them during shipping. At first, you may have some trouble locating the USB and Ethernet connectors. Rather than have them fully exposed at the back of the unit, Ricoh has placed them behind a protective door at the back with an open slot for routing any cables. It’s a thoughtful extra, though not immediately obvious, unless you’re looking for it.
(Credit: David English)
The unit itself feels very solid. As suggested by the heavier-than-usual weight, the exterior has ample amounts of metal, as opposed to the flimsier plastic that’s increasingly prevalent with printers. If you miss that satisfying thunk that you hear when you close up a vintage metal-reinforced printer, the C125 P could feel like a sound investment compared with its lighter-weight competitors.Regarding the onboard control panel, it’s more of a mixed bag. The C125 P does have a bright, easy-to-read LCD screen, but it’s small and monochrome, and the screen isn’t touch-capable. To navigate it, you’ll need to use an OK button that’s surrounded by four directional keys. It feels like a throwback, though the menus are well-organized and clearly labeled. At this low price, something has to be scaled back.What Ricoh doesn’t scale back is the range of connectivity options. This model supports Ethernet, USB, and Wi-Fi. It’s also compatible with Wi-Fi Direct for quick wireless setups, and with Apple AirPrint and Mofia for mobile printing. The three other printers mentioned here have those same connectivity options, with the exception of the Lexmark C3326dw, which lacks Wi-Fi Direct. The C125 P also supports NFC, which is somewhat unusual in this category. The Canon supports it, but the HP and Lexmark do not. And while both the Canon and HP models have a dedicated USB port for printing from a thumb drive, that feature is not available on either the C125 P or the Lexmark.Testing the C125 P: Your Speeds May VaryRicoh rates the C125 P at 26 pages per minute (ppm), a middle-of-road print speed for this level of color laser printer. It’s the same rating as the Lexmark C3326dw. The HP Color LaserJet Pro M454dw and Canon Color imageClass LBP664Cdw are rated a little faster at 28ppm. To see if the C125 P could match its manufacturer’s rating, I tested it over an Ethernet connection with our standard Intel Core i5 desktop testbed running Windows 10 Pro.The C125 P comes out of the box configured to print two-sided (duplex) pages. In that scenario, we time and record both a printer’s one-sided (simplex) and two-sided performance. When printing our 12-page Microsoft Word text document (excluding the first page), I clocked the unit at 26.3ppm in simplex mode and 11.9 images per minute (ipm, where each image is one side of a two-sided page) in duplex mode. That simplex result was 0.3ppm better than its rated speed.
As you might expect given their higher speed ratings, the Canon LBP664Cdw and HP M454dw were able to surpass the C125 P. The Canon and HP tested at 28.7ppm and 29.9ppm, respectively. The more interesting matchup was with the Lexmark C3326dw, because it has the same 26ppm rating. The Lexmark tested at 26.4ppm, which barely edged out the Ricoh. Looking closely at the numbers, the C125 P lagged behind the others on the first page, but was able to significantly narrow that gap by the end of the 12-page document.With our business applications suite, which consists of six files that represent a cross-section of typical business documents, the C125 P had a much harder time keeping pace with the competition. It took 171 seconds to print the entire suite. That was roughly 35 seconds longer than the 136-second test time from the Lexmark C3326dw, its nearest competitor. The Canon LBP664Cdw was able to print that same group of files in a brisk 88 seconds. And the HP M454dw took top honors with its impressive time of just 79 seconds.
While the C125 P is no photo printer, I did time it as it printed some of our 4-by-6-inch snapshots. It averaged about 7 seconds per image, which is relatively slow for a color laser printer.In summary, the C125 P is moderately fast when printing text. While it can be a bit sluggish with single-page documents, it’s able to catch up from that slow start when printing multi-page documents. The longer the document, the more it will be able to catch up from that slow start. And with documents that include graphics or photos, it may lag behind the speeds of other color laser printers, even ones with a similar speed rating.No High-Yield Toner OptionWhile speed could be an issue for the C125 P, a bigger drawback may be its higher-than-average toner costs. Ricoh offers no high-yield set of toner cartridges to help soften the blow. For black-and-white pages, you can expect to pay around 4.3 cents per page if you buy the black toner cartridge at its full $100 list price. I checked on Amazon, and that same toner cartridge has sold there for $87.53. That would lower the monochrome per-page cost to about 3.8 cents per page, which is still quite high. For color pages, you can expect to pay around 21 cents per page at full list price. Through Amazon, you may be able to lower that to around 18.2 cents per page. Again, even discounted, that’s still quite high.For comparison, the M454dw, which HP has now discontinued but is still available from some suppliers, would set you back about 2.2 cents for a monochrome page and 14.2 cents for a color page. The Lexmark C3326dw comes in at roughly 3 cents for monochrome and 15 cents for color. And the Canon LBP664Cdw would cost you about 2.5 cents for monochrome and 13.3 cents for color. Importantly, all three models also offer a high-yield set of toner cartridges to help you rein in their otherwise off-putting page costs, unlike the C125 P. The drawback to high-yield toner cartridges is the significant amount of cash that you have to spend every time you purchase them. But without that important option, your print costs can be prohibitively high.
(Credit: David English)
You will note one bright spot for the C125 P’s ongoing costs. Most laser printers require that you replace the built-in drum unit after reaching a designated number of printed pages. The C125 P is one of the small number of laser printers that integrates a drum mechanism into each toner cartridge. This won’t result in a big savings, but it could help over time to mitigate the higher-than-usual toner costs for this model.Just about any laser printer can produce near-typesetter-quality text that’s suitable for most business text documents. The C125 P is no exception. I was able to read its typical business fonts down to a very small 4-point size. The text was sharp and distinct. Each page had a clean and professional appearance with no unexpected lines or stray dots. Charts and graphics had a pleasing amount of saturation and contrast. Colors were lively without being overdone. The printed photos looked especially good, whether in color or black-and-white. Skin tones can be particularly tricky with printed photos. With color laser printers, they often come out looking natural, but a bit oversaturated. With the C125 P, Ricoh appears to have found that narrow sweet spot for both saturation and contrast. These were some of the better color prints that I’ve seen from a laser printer, which is quite remarkable for such a low-cost model.As with any laser printer, you won’t be able to print borderless pages as you can with an inkjet printer. However, the C125 P’s photo print quality should be more than adequate for casual business documents, such as newsletters, brochures, or real estate flyers.Verdict: A Cost Trade-Off That Could Be FineThe Ricoh C125 P is a good example of what you may have to sacrifice to get that lower upfront price. In its favor, this model is solidly constructed and has truly excellent print quality. Those features can be hard to find in a low-priced model. On the downside, the higher-than-usual print costs will gradually water down your original cost savings. That makes this model a better choice for companies with a limited purchase budget for situations that require only light-duty printing.Because of the high cost of its toner cartridges, especially with color pages, you might consider paying more upfront for a similar model that will be less expensive to operate over the long term. A prime candidate is the Lexmark C3326dw, which is a little more expensive to buy, but it’s both faster and has significantly less expensive per-page costs.
Pros
Inexpensive
Excellent print quality with both monochrome and color
Solidly constructed
Robust connectivity options, including NFC
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The Bottom Line
With first-rate print quality and a low purchase price, Ricoh’s C125 P is a single-function color laser printer is good for light-to-moderate-duty printing in a small office or workgroup.
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