At $209.89 list, the Pantum M7102DW mono laser all-in-one (AIO) printer is only a moderate step up in price from the Pantum M6552NW we recently reviewed, but it delivers far more capability and a lower running cost. In some important ways, including speed and text quality, it's nipping at the heels of the Canon imageClass MF452dw, our Editors' Choice pick for a mono laser AIO for a small office or workgroup. That's not to suggest it's fully competitive with the MF452dw, which offers higher paper capacity, among other strengths. But if you don't need the Canon printer's extras, and particularly if you'd rather have a smaller, lighter printer, the M7102DW is a strong candidate.

Personal Printer Size, Small-Office or Workgroup Capability

Somewhat bigger than the M6552NW, but still small and light enough for one person to easily move into place for setup, the M7102DW measures 13.8 by 16.3 by 14.4 inches (HWD) and weighs 24.8 pounds. Physical setup is straightforward. Simply remove the packing material, and optionally connect a USB or Ethernet cable if you prefer a wired connection to using Wi-Fi. As with other Pantum printers we've reviewed, the software installation is even easier and worked without problems in my tests. Load the installation routine, chose the connection type with a single click, and wait for it to finish.

Paper handling for printing is suitable for personal printing or light-to-medium-duty printing in a small office or workgroup, thanks to a 250-sheet paper drawer, automatic duplexing (two-sided printing), and a one-sheet bypass tray. The last lets you easily print on a different type or size of paper without having to swap out the paper in the drawer.

For scanning, the printer pairs an 8.7-by-11.7-inch flatbed with a 50-sheet automatic document feeder (ADF) that can handle up to legal-size sheets. The ADF is limited to single-sided scanning only, but it supports manual duplexing for both scanning and copying.

The M7102DW also supports printing from and scanning to both Android and iOS mobile devices, and it offers NFC support to launch the app automatically and bootstrap to a Wi-Fi Direct connection. As discussed in our M6552NW review, getting the Android version of the app to work can be tricky, since the printed instructions don't mention that you have to use the phone's Wi-Fi connection utility first to establish the connection—a one-time step. However, once set up, it worked as promised in my tests. Pantum says the Apple version of the app does not require this step and that a new version of the Android app, which will address this issue, should be available on Google Play soon after this review is published.

Pantum's recommended monthly duty cycle for the printer is 750 to 3,500 pages, which at the high end of that range would mean reloading paper more often than three times a week. A more reasonable maximum would be about 1,000 pages a month, or about one full tray per week.

As always, the more you expect to print, the more the running cost matters, but when comparing prices between printers, what matters most is the total cost of ownership—the initial cost plus the running cost. Based on Pantum's high-capacity cartridge, which offers a 6,000-page yield, the cost per page is 2.8 cents, including drum replacements. That's lower than the cost per monochrome page for most cartridge-based inkjets and in the typical range for mono laser AIOs in this price class.

Testing the Pantum M7102DW: Speedy, Solid Text

For our performance tests, I connected both the M7102DW and our standard testbed to a network by Ethernet. I compared the results among it and three other models. These are the Pantum M6552NW (which has a much slower rating) and two mono laser AIOs with speed ratings that are within 1 page per minute (ppm) of the M7102DW's 35ppm rating: the Canon imageClass MF452dw mentioned earlier, and the Lexmark MB2236i.

Not surprisingly, on our test that comes closest to measuring raw engine speed—our 12-page Word file, not including the first page—the three printers with similar ratings delivered similar speeds, at 34.7ppm (19 seconds) for the M7102DW and MF452dw, and 36.7ppm (18 seconds) for the MB2236i. The M6552NW trailed, at 22.8ppm (29 seconds).

With the first page included, the M7102DW came in third, at 24.8ppm (29 seconds), albeit just a rounding error behind the second-place MB2236i, at 25.7ppm (28 seconds). The Canon printer offered a faster first page out (FPO) time, which gave it a slight edge, and first place, at 27.7ppm (26 seconds), while the M6552NW was in last place, at 19.5ppm (37 seconds). The differences among the first three aren't enough to matter even with long files. Keep in mind, also, that the longer the file, the less advantage the Canon printer will gain from its fast FPO time.

On our business applications suite, which includes the full Word text file along with documents that add graphics and color, the M7102DW was again in third place (1 minute and 33 seconds, or 16.1ppm), just behind the second-place MB2236i (1:29, or 16.9ppm). Predictably, the Canon printer's fast FPO time gave it a significant advantage for printing the collection of short documents, and a more convincing first place (1:12, or 20.8ppm). Here again, the M6552NW was in last place (1:46, or 14.2 ppm). For printing 4-by-6-inch photos, however, the M7102DW was the slowest in the group, averaging 13 seconds, compared with 9 seconds for the fastest.

Print quality from the Pantum model is best described as good for text and some graphics, and serviceable for other graphics and for photos. All of the fonts we test with that would likely be used in business documents were easily readable, with sharp edges and well-formed characters, at sizes as small as 5 points. All but one earned the same description at 4 points. One highly stylized font with heavy strokes was easily readable at 8 points. A similar font that's more challenging to render well needed 12-point size for easy readability.

Graphics with white backgrounds looked reasonably professional, though a close look showed subtle banding and even more subtle dithering patterns in fills. Graphics designed with edge-to-edge color, rendered in shades of gray, mostly showed what they were meant to show, but they suffered from obvious banding, as well as gradients that looked more like smudges. On a line graph that used a black background, a single-pixel-wide line didn't show at all, while a line of twice the pixel width was barely visible as unconnected dashes.

Photos printed with default settings showed banding that was subtle to obvious, depending on the photo. However, they were better than newspaper-quality, making them more than acceptable for monochrome laser output, though still well below top-tier. Switching to a higher resolution than the default made photos look worse, having little effect apart from reducing the shadow detail.

Verdict: A Fine-Value Mono Laser AIO for the Right Office

Each of the printers mentioned here offers something the others don't, so any one of them could be your preferred choice. The M6552NW is the smallest and lightest in the group, making it a good choice for a home office, as a personal AIO, or if space is tight. With the small size is low paper capacity, though, which limits it to strictly light-duty use. The MB2236i offers cloud-based faxing, which can save money over using phone lines if you fax enough, but its ADF is limited strictly to simplex (one-sided) scanning.

If you're looking for more capability, the MF452dw scores highest overall, with its fast FPO time and the best paper handling in the group. Its high paper capacity and its single-pass-duplexing ADF (for scanning two-sided documents) is a big part of why it's our top pick for a monochrome laser AIO for a small office or workgroup. It may be bigger and heavier a printer than you want to deal with, however. The M7102DW is a much more manageable size and weight, and comes in second on overall capability for personal or small-office use. That balance could easily make it your preferred choice for anything from a heavy-duty home-office printer to a light-to-medium-duty printer for a small office or workgroup.