There are many color laser printers available at low prices nowadays. Some are older versions selling for less than they did originally, while others are small and only one year old. Now each small firm can have a high-volume printer other than an inkjet, because each seller has a stock of color laser printers at a price good enough for a single user workplace, not to mention one with multiple employees.

The Phaser 8400 printer uses not laser but solid-ink technology to deliver gorgeous, smooth color at superior speed, plus PostScript compatibility and color-tweaking you can't get from an entry-level color laser. It's something of a compromise. No match for a laser for cranking out lots of black and white pages, and not quite up to an inkjet for photo-quality images, but it's a very cool one.

As a Phaser 8400 solid ink also known as wax-jet or phase-change printer, the Phaser 8400 ink works something like an offset printing press, or a cross between an ink-jet and a laser. It's yellow, cyan, magenta, and black ink come not in liquid or powdered form, but in waxy chunks or small cubes. Actually, not cubes but four slightly different, drop-in shapes, and carved toddler-toy-fashion to fit into the proper slots underneath the hood of the printer.

The fact that Phaser's software driver and front-panel LCD don't have a gauge to show the ink remaining can be uncomfortable to people used to regular ink and toner cartridge. The LCD does have a low-ink warning light. However, you can see the ink level by simply lifting the front hood of the printer, and can add more ink at any time without the uncertainties that come with newly installed cartridges.

Phaser 8400 ink is friendly to the environment because there are no waste tanks or consumable cartridges to discard. Instead, a single plug-in imaging-drum lubricator or plug-in maintenance kit supplies all the ink that the printer will use for 10,000 to 30,000 pages. There is also a waste tray that needs to be occasionally emptied and replaced.

The crayons are melted within the printer. It draws up to 1500 watts. The Phaser 8400 however, claims that the printer averages less than a fifth of that into an ink reservoir. There is a rotating drum inside which gets heated. The print head, which is a 1,236-nozzle, 600 by 600 dpi, sprays the ink onto the heated drum. Where low-priced color lasers print the matter in four passes, this requires just one pass to print the same matter.

The ink will have no seeping or blotting which are characteristic of inkjets. It will not smudge or smear. Also, it hardens almost immediately on the paper page, although it may be scratched off with a fingernail. This results in a page of print that looks as if it were painted. Shades and tones are rich in color and quite glossy. You will see none of the banding typical of many inkjets.