Lexmark Z51 Color Jetprinter

by Lexmark

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 15 x 18 x 11.6 inches ; 9 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 15 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S. and to APO/FPO addresses. For APO/FPO shipments, please check with the manufacturer regarding warranty and support issues.
• ASIN: B00000JWAG
• Item model number: Z51
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes
• Date first available at Amazon.com: September 4, 1999

Product Description

Amazon.com Review

Lexmark calls it the "highest resolution inkjet on the planet." With 1200 by 1200 six-color printing and amazingly sharp black text, you get near-laser quality output but with all the savings and convenience of inkjet printing.

Setting up the Lexmark Z51 was easy. Following the well written, colorfully illustrated Getting Started guide, we plugged in the printer, attached the cable, turned on our PC, and inserted the printer driver disks. The printer head automatically moved into position so that we could later insert the black and color ink cartridges into their slots. The printer head is designed so that you can't put either cartridge in the wrong slot.

After the setup wizard had run, the driver software guided us through a head alignment test and printed a beautiful test page. Audible prompts tell you if there is no printer cartridge installed and tell you when printing starts and stops.

In our test of the Z51, we printed several color and black-and-white samples in Quick Print, Normal, and High quality modes. The samples included graphics with a variety of colors and shades, scanned photographs, and text in several fonts. The results: For graphics and scanned photographs, the colors were bright and clear, even for tight-register samples. Quick Print (fast 600 dpi) quality samples were noticeably faded; Normal (normal speed 600 dpi) and High (1200 dpi) quality samples were much better, warm and true to the original, but printing speed slowed dramatically.

For text, we conducted side-by-side comparison tests with output from a laser printer. Although the laser printer's output was sharper than the Z51's, we did have to inspect the samples very closely to see the differences. And for one sample, printed with a very tiny 4-point Times font, the Z51's page actually looked better than the laser printer's. We were impressed.

Given the Z51's beautiful color and razor-sharp text printing, we think it would make an excellent addition to any desktop.

Pros

• Beautiful, bright colors and sharp text
• Very quick and easy setup
• Attractive design
• Nice software bundle

Cons

• Printer cable a separate purchase

Product Description

Color Jetprinter 1200xx1200dpi, 10 ppm black/5pp colpr

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

38 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best all-around printer, November 8, 1999

By 

Eric Litwin (Thousand Oaks, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Lexmark Z51 Color Jetprinter (Office Product)

I spent many weeks researching various Inkjet printers. After printing out dozens of samples in stores and reading many reviews, I decided to get the Z51. I am not disappointed.

The black text is by far the best I saw, especially on plain paper. I looked at the Canon BJC-5100 and 6000, the Epson 740, Photo 750, 760, and a few HP printers. I was very disappointed with the black text on all these other printers.

The color printing on the Z51 is equally impressive. I have mainly done 4-color printing on plain paper at medium quality (600 x 600), and the output is tremendous. When you add coated paper (or photo paper), the optional Photo cartridge, and set the output to high-quality (1200 x 1200), the output is unbelievable. On plain paper, the Z51 output is as good as, if not better, than all the other printers I reviewed. (I cannot compare the coated outputs since the in-store demos only ran on plain paper.)

The only negatives I have experienced are: 1. You must remove the black cartridge to add the Photo cartridge for 6 color printing. 2. The print speed slows down a lot on high quality (but it is worth it) 3. The color cartridges do not have individual ink-tanks. (The BJC-6000 was the only printer I was considering that had this option.)

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Everything we wanted., January 17, 2000

By 

James F. McClellan - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Lexmark Z51 Color Jetprinter (Office Product)

Printers have been the bane of our personal computing life. Since, 1987, we've never had one that printed quality, reliably. Then the Lexmark Z51 came into our life. Installation was a snap, just followed the directions and put in the CD. The Drivers loaded and we were printing. Paper feeds reliably and envelopes are a snap. The Lexmark ink level indicators are a real plus too. As for quality, it's hard to tell the difference between this output and a color laser printer. I'm recommending this printer to all my friends.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Also had driver and USB problems, December 20, 1999

By 

Electronics fan (Tallahassee, FL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lexmark Z51 Color Jetprinter (Office Product)

This printer made a bad first impression on me. First off, I inserted the CD, and my computer (Dell Pentium III 450 with DVD drive) was unable to read it. I had to download the driver from the web. However, even after installing the driver, I had to look in the appendix of the (so-called) User's Manual to try to set up the USB connection. After following Lexmark's instructions, the printer would not support USB. I, too, had to go back to the parallel connection.

After finally getting this thing up and running, I found the text quality to be very good, and photo quality (with optional photo cartridge) to be good, not great. I also found that the Z51 REALLY grabs the paper out of the automatic paper feeder. My paper shredder treats paper more gently. I also found it difficult to avoid skew misalignments with this printer.

Shop around. There have to be better printers out there for the same price.