IT Pro Verdict
Although Kyocera’s HyPAS tech isn’t so easy to use as Xerox’ ConnectKey, it does add a lot of extra features to the Ecosys M6230cidn. It’s also cheaper to buy and run than rivals, matches them for output quality, offers good print security and probably has the biggest operator panel in town.
Pros
- +
Great app selection; Good value; Excellent print quality and speeds
Cons
- -
Apps are fiddly to install; Print speeds drop at higher resolutions
Targeting medium to large workgroups, Kyocera's Ecosys M6230cidn aims to streamline their workflows as this A4 colour MFP is HyPAS (hybrid platform for advanced solutions) enabled. This feature augments its print, copy and scan functions with the ability to run a wide range of onboard apps.
The M6230cidn claims a good 30ppm print speed and unusually at this price point, offers a top true 1,200dpi resolution. Paper capacity can be expanded with three extra 500-sheet feeder trays and Kyocera offers a selection of optional add-in cards - although 260 for its IB-51 11n wireless adapter is a bit steep.
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Printer maintenance is minimal. The drum and developer are covered for 3 years or 200,000 pages so the only things to monitor are its four toner cartridges and maintenance kit. Once you've replaced the half-empty starter cartridges, you'll be seeing low print costs of 1.2p and 6.2p for mono and colour pages.
HyPAS support puts the M6230cidn up against Xerox' VersaLink MFPs as their ConnectKey feature also allows them to run a wide range of extra apps. However, installing HyPAS apps isn't so easy - Xerox has its slick App Gallery web portal for direct app download, but there's more to do on the M6230cidn.
To enable HyPAS, you insert an SD card in the slot below the printer's Gigabit port. Apps are supplied as PKG files and installed from a local USB stick by accessing the system menu from the printer's impressively large 17.8cm colour touchscreen and adding the displayed apps.
We used a 1GB SD card which was enough for three apps and we recommend a 25GB card which costs around 38. This supports the maximum of 16 HyPAS apps with room left over for Kyocera's integral Document Box secure print feature.
We tested the Cloud Direct apps for Dropbox and Google Drive which allowed us to log in to our accounts, browse our cloud repositories and print selected files. We also tried the Cloud Connect app which we used to print documents from and scan directly to our Google Drive and Evernote cloud accounts.
The HyPAS apps are reasonably priced with one-off fees of 30 for Cloud Connect and 100 per provider for Cloud Direct. Xerox is now charging for all its ConnectKey apps, and the latest Connect 2.0 cloud versions cost around 76 per year for each provider.
Print speeds depend on the resolution selected with a 30-page Word document at 600dpi completed at 30ppm but dropping to 13.5ppm at the driver's High Quality mode. It was the same story for our 24-page colour DTP print which returned 30ppm and 11ppm for each resolution.
It's worth the wait though, as output quality is superb with pin-sharp text down to 6pt fonts and highly detailed mono photos. For colour printing, our test reports were very eye-catching while colour photos also had a zing about them.
The flatbed scanner delivers great output quality while its 75-page ADF performed a single-sided copy of 10 pages at a speedy 23ppm. The ADF isn't the single pass variety so has to pull back each page to scan the other side resulting in duplex-to-duplex copies returning only 6.7ppm.
Mobile users will like Kyocera's free Mobile Print and MyPanel apps as they both provide an impressive range of remote printing and scanning features. Admins will also approve of Kyocera's security features as they can enable job accounting and control print, scan and copy operations, block colour usage and apply page limits. The printer driver also allows users to verify multiple copy print runs with Print and Hold and assign a PIN to confidential jobs.
Although Kyocera's HyPAS tech isn't so easy to use as Xerox' ConnectKey, it does add a lot of extra features to the M6230cidn. It's also cheaper to buy and run than the VersaLink C405DN, matches it for output quality, offers good print security and probably has the biggest operator panel in town.
Verdict
Although Kyocera’s HyPAS tech isn’t so easy to use as Xerox’ ConnectKey, it does add a lot of extra features to the Ecosys M6230cidn. It’s also cheaper to buy and run than rivals, matches them for output quality, offers good print security and probably has the biggest operator panel in town.
1200dpi A4 colour laser MFP
600dpi colour flatbed A4 scanner
1.2GHz dual-core ARM Cortex A9 CPU
1GB RAM (max 3GB)
30ppm mono/colour @ 600dpi
17.8cm colour touchscreen
2 x USB 2
Gigabit
SD Card slot
Duplex
250-page input tray
100-page MPT
75-page DADF
475 x 558 x 616mm (WDH)
35.4kg
1yr standard warranty on printer/3yrs on drum
Options: IB-51 wireless, £268 ex VAT
RUNNING COSTS
Mono (8K pages), £83
C, Y, M (6K pages), £99 each
Maintenance kit (200K pages), £327
Overall cost per A4 page:
mono, 1.2p
colour, 6.2p
