BROTHER HL-2140 DRUM

Brother HL-2140 Review

Overview:

The space saving, affordable Brother HL-2140 is a bare bones solution for those looking for a monochrome laser printer that is suitable for any budget and any workspace as well. This stripped down device has no expandability options and conservative specifications, but is a great buy for those with moderate print demands.

Pros:

The Brother HL-2140 has dimensions of only 14.5 x 14.2 x 6.7 inches (W x D x H), making it one of the more manageable laser printers on the market, and also one of the shortest. Without paper, the device weighs a mere 15 pounds, also making it one of the lightest.

With a maximum monthly duty cycle of up to 10,000 pages, the Brother HL-2140 may be priced like an inkjet, but it has the print volume possibilities of a laser. Brother recommends printing only 250 to 2,000 sheets per month for maximum product life, but if problems do arise within the first year Brother’s limited warranty will cover it.

On top of the Brother HL-2140’s standard paper drawer that can hold up to half a ream of regular paper, the printer is equipped with a single sheet bypass slot that not only allows special media to be loaded through the device but also doing so without unloading the standard paper supply. When using the bypass slot, special media types such as envelopes, card stock, and transparencies can be printed to directly.

Standard paper compatible with the unit’s paper tray can have thicknesses ranging from 16 – 28 lbs and the manual feed slot accepts paper from 16 – 43 lbs. The output capacity of the Brother HL-2140 is a very respectable 100 sheets.

The Brother HL-2140 is equipped with a 181 MHz processor and is, of course, Energy Star qualified. It also has a reasonable maximum printing volume of 51 dB which further adds to its appeal as a desktop unit, as this is quieter than most inkjet units. Setup for the printer is intended to be extremely easy, and toner replacement is as well thanks to a very simple drum and toner setup and high yield toner cartridges that carry up to 2,600 page yields a piece.

Cons:

While the Brother HL-2140 comes with an attractive price tag, the unit underperforms other printers it its category, both lasers and inkjets. The device’s maximum print speed of only 23 pages per minute would not be seen in a more current printer, and this discontinued model certainly shows its age with low performance specs.

The device is also entirely non expandable, coming standard with an acceptable paper storage capacity of 250 sheets that cannot be added to. Unlike the vast majority of laser printers on the market, the Brother HL-2140 does not accept additional paper trays. The unit’s memory is also not only un-expandable, but also very limited to begin with. With only 8 MBs of standard memory, the printer will certainly experience trouble when dealing with complex print projects, and without an additional memory card slot the problem has no hope of being rectified.