The Lexmark T420d is a surprisingly lukewarm laser printer, especially coming from a world leader in printing. As with most personal, monochrome laser printers, setting up the T420d is quick and easy. The T420d provides a standard parallel port and a USB 2.0 port for local PC connections, but you can also easily share the printer across a home or small-business network through a PC. The T420d does not include an Ethernet port for direct network connections in the standard product
The input paper tray holds as many as 250 sheets, and you can install an optional 500-sheet tray, as well. However, the shallow output tray holds a puny 150 sheets, which means that you’ll need to remove your finished print jobs promptly, especially if you’re sharing the unit among network users. Overall, the printer’s construction is as sturdy as that of any general-purpose laser printer in the market–and it may be even more so since the paper tray fits well into the printer’s body–there’s no tray sticking out to bump or dislodge
Printer includes 16MB of RAM which can be upgraded to 272MB for the most complex print jobs. According to Lexmark, the $128 standard cartridge produces up to 5,000 pages, which is about 3 cents per page, while the $222 high-yield cartridge delivers up to 10,000 pages, representing a better value at about 2 cents per page. The T420d is good for quick-and-dirty printing, but users who a top-quality laser for speedy, crisp printing need should look somewhere else.