A ppm rating of 16 or higher is a good place to start when buying a workgroup laser printer. Be aware, however, that printers are seldom as fast as their ratings because manufacturers typically test by printing the same page over and over to achieve the highest possible rating. IBM's Network Printer 17 has a 17-ppm rating and a monthly duty cycle of 65,000 pages. For quality of text output, monochrome laser printers provide the best bang for the buck, especially if text-only printing is required at resolutions of 300 dpi or 600 dpi. For high-quality graphics output, the manufacturer's bundled enhancement software comes into play, as does the inherent quality of the printer itself.
Network management is generally a function of software provided by the printer manufacturer.
Most bundled software is compliant with the Simple Network Management Protocol and allows remote management of print jobs and printer functions from stations anywhere along the network. The ability to print on both sides of the paper is a handy feature to have and can be installed as an option in most of the printers listed. Installation and setup. All of the laser printers here come bundled with the manufacturer's installation and setup utilities. Most of them install the drivers automatically, but in some cases you may have to enter the path to the driver on the CD-ROM installation disk before you can successfully install the unit.