The Lexmark MC2535adwe ($599) is a color laser all-in-one printer designed for medium- to high-volume use in small- to midsize offices and workgroups.
It's fast and comes with a robust feature set and expansion options.
Furthermore, it has a high monthly duty cycle, it prints well, and it offers business-friendly security options.
It leads its competition in enough areas to become our latest Editors' Choice medium- to high-volume color laser AIO.
Relatively Small and Light
At 18.2 by 17.4 by 23.1 inches (HWD) and weighing 60 pounds, the MC2535adwe is slightly smaller and lighter than several of its direct laser AIO competitors, including Brother's MFC-L8900CDW, the Xerox WorkCentre 6515/DNI, the Canon Color imageClass MF731Cdw, and the OKI MC573dn.
You can configure and perform walk-up tasks, such as making copies or scanning to the cloud, from the MC2535adwe's control panel, which includes a 4.3-inch color touch screen, a handful of buttons, and a number pad, as shown below.
The embedded web server (a common feature among business-oriented printers and AIOs), shown in the image below, also provides extensive configuration and monitoring options, including the status of consumables and every other aspect of the printer you can think of.
A peculiarity of the MC2535adwe, however, is that this is the first printer I have come across that squawks (as displayed in the red text near the top of the page in the previous screenshot) when you don't set up the SNTP (Simple Network Time Protocol) server.
SNTP synchronizes computerized device (PCs, printers, routers, and so on) clocks on a network, but it's hardly required for a printer or any other device to function properly.
Most annoying, though, is that the control panel displays a blinking red error LED nagging you to set up SNTP.
The Lexmark MC2535adwe comes with a 50-sheet reverse-duplexing automatic document feeder (ADF) for scanning, copying, and faxing two-sided multipage documents without your having to flip them manually.
Among the machines mentioned here, the MC2535adwe's 250-sheet main drawer (and one-sheet override tray just below that) is the meagerest, though you can expand input up to 1,451 sheets.
Expansion options consist of 550-sheet trays ($199) and 650-sheet locking duo trays ($199), and there's also three stands and cabinets available for between $250 and $300.
One thing to note: Unless I remembered to fan the paper a few times, when the level in the paper drawer got down to less than half, I experienced a few paper jams.
(I don't always fan a stack of paper before placing it in the tray, but in this case, it appears to be critical.)
The MC2535adwe's monthly duty cycle is 85,000 pages, and its recommended monthly volume is 10 percent of that.
On both counts, this model handily beats its competition mentioned here.
Some of the MC2535adwe's other expansion options include increasing RAM from 2GB to 6GB for faster graphics and complex page rendering, and an internal hard drive for expanding storage capacity.
Finally, the MC2535adwe emulates HP's PCL 5 and PCL 6, as well as Adobe's PostScript 3 and PDF (Acrobat), page description languages (PDLs).
The default PDL is PostScript.
Any of these languages are well-suited for graphic design and desktop publishing environments, making the MC2535adwe an excellent prepress proofing printer.
This is especially true, given, as you'll see coming up, its excellent print quality.
The MC2535adwe is also calibrated to utilize the Pantone matching system to provide spot color accuracy.
Ample Connectivity and Staunch Security
The standard interfaces on the MC2535adwe are Gigabit Ethernet, connecting to a single PC via USB, Wi-Fi, and Apple AirPrint.
Mobile connectivity is handled with the Lexmark Mobile Print app, which is adequate, but you don't get any easy-connect peer-to-peer networking protocols, such as Wi-Fi Direct, NFC, or Bluetooth.
You can also download and/or create various connectivity (for, say, cloud and social media sites) and workflow profile apps via the control panel's e-Task interface.
Important to note, too, is that Lexmark provides drivers for several different operating systems and platforms, including Windows back to version seven, macOS, several flavors of Linux, Citrix, multiple Novel OS iterations, and Unix.
If you must comply with medical HIPPAA or other stringent security protocols, the MC2535adwe is a better choice than most for meeting those requirements.
Security options are plentiful.
In fact, this AIO meets the European Union's (EU) stringent General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) requirements.
Access to functions can be controlled or denied by group, user, or IP address.
The Confidential Print Setup feature lets you set as many as 10 PINs to secure documents in the MC2535adwe's memory, allowing only those users who know a document's respective PIN to print it.
You can also keep duplicate copies of all documents on the printer, set expiration options, and restrict access to both the printer and the embedded web server by the number of failed attempts.
Fastest in its Class
Lexmark rates the MC2535adwe at 35 pages per minute in simplex, or one-sided mode.
However, since the MC2535adwe defaults to duplex mode, we also test how fast it prints two-sided pages.
(The company does not publish a duplex rating.) Of the other printers mentioned here, only the Canon MF731Cdw defaults to duplex; we don't test and record duplex print speeds on machines that do not default to that mode.
(I tested the MC2535adwe over Ethernet from our standard Intel Core i5-equipped testbed PC running Windows 10 Professional.)
See How We Test Printers
The MC2535adwe churned out our 12-page Microsoft Word test document in duplex mode at 17.2 images per minute (or ipm, where each page side is an image), and the same document in simplex mode at 39.8ppm, or about 5ppm faster than its rating.
The MF731Cdw printed the same document in two-sided mode at 5ppm faster and in one-sided mode at about 10ppm slower.
The MC2535adwe beat all the other AIOs mentioned here by at least 5ppm, and some, including the Epson WF-C5790, by more than 10ppm.
Next, I printed our set of complex color PDF, XLS, and PPT documents laden with embedded charts, graphs, and other business graphics.
I then combined that score with the results from the 12-page monochrome text document above, to come up with a score for printing our entire set of business documents.
Here, the MC2535adwe turned in a score of 16.9ppm (11.8ipm duplex).
That score beat all but the WF-C5790's 17.7ppm by an average of about 2ppm.
And, though the MC2535adwe is not a photo printer, I also timed it as it printed our test 4-by-6-inch snapshots.
It averaged about 40 seconds per image, which is about twice as long as it takes most color laser printers, but, as you'll see coming up, it's worth the wait.
Excellent Output
Most laser printers churn out near-typesetter-quality text, and the MC2535adwe is no exception.
Your text documents should be suitable for the majority of business settings.
Where some laser AIOs don't excel, though, is in printing pristine-looking business graphics and photos.
The Excel charts and PowerPoint handouts with gradients and solid fills I printed were nearly flawless, with smooth gradations from one color to the next and no other noticeable toner distribution issues.
Blacks and other dark fills and backgrounds came out uniform, and colors were accurate, brilliant, and vibrant.
Photos, too, looked good, with bright and accurate colors and excellent detail.
The drawback, of course, is that laser printers can't print borderless pages, and photos (and some other types of documents) look more finished and professional when the content bleeds to the edges of the paper.
Typical Running Costs
A drawback to midrange laser printers over some of their inkjet counterparts is that the former are usually comparatively expensive to use.
If you use Lexmark's highest-yield black (8,000 pages) and three color (3,500) toner cartridges, the MC2535adwe will cost you about 1.8 cents for monochrome pages and 11.7 cents for color pages.
In addition, after the first 125,000 pages and every subsequent 125,000 pages, you'll need new imaging drums, which add about 0.3 cents to the per-page costs, elevating them to 2.1 cents black and 12 cents color.
Compared with similar laser AIOs, these numbers aren't that bad, but higher-volume laser printers and inkjet alternatives cost significantly less to use.
For example, the Brother MFC-J6945DW, an inkjet alternative, prints monochrome pages for about 1 cent and color pages for about 5 cents.
Fast and Feature-Packed
This Lexmark MC2535adwe is an exceptional AIO with the capacity and output quality to be a real asset in a busy office or workgroup.
It's also faster than its competition and offers many attractive security features.
For those organizations that require laser output, it's our latest Editors' Choice midrange to high-volume color AIO.
The Bottom Line
The Lexmark MC2535adwe is a fast color laser all-in-one printer that offers many valuable productivity and security features that small and midsize offices will love.
