Hackensack, NJ – Concluding the announcements of its prestigious Spring 2007 “Pick of the Year” awards for the best products tested during the past six months, Buyers Laboratory Inc. (BLI) today announced the winners in the Segment 5 and 6 and digital duplicator categories. Twice each year with its “Pick” awards, BLI, the leading global provider of intelligence on document imaging products, gives special recognition to the products that gave the best performances in their respective categories after being subjected to the company’s exhaustive suite of in-house laboratory tests.

Sharp was honored in Segment 5 and Segment 6

Sharp MX-M850 And MX-M950 Give Herculean Performance
A phenomenal performance by Sharp’s MX-M850 and MX-M950 have earned these two models BLI “Picks” in the 81- to 90-ppm range of Segment 5 and Segment 6, respectively. Each underwent a 500,000-impression durability test with exemplary results. “Between them, these two models produced 1 million pages with just one misfeed,” noted BLI’s Emory. “But reliability is just the beginning,” he added. “These models also excelled in a wide range of other performance areas and their prices make them the best values in their speed ranges.”

“We are extremely pleased to have won the prestigious BLI ‘Pick of the Year’ award for both the MX-M850 and MX-M950,” said Ed McLaughlin, president of Sharp Imaging and Information Company of America. “BLI’s rigorous testing procedures re-confirm the confidence we have in the outstanding performance and reliability of our new high-speed MFPs.” Shane Coffey, associate director with Sharp, added, “These latest awards complete a product line that now features a ‘Pick of the Year’ winner in every speed class from Segment 1 through 6.”

About Buyers Laboratory
For 45 years, Buyers Laboratory has been the leading independent office-equipment testing lab and business consumer advocate. In addition to publishing the industry's most comprehensive and accurate test reports on office document imaging devices, each representing months of exhaustive hands-on testing in BLI's 10,000-square-foot lab, the company has been the leading source for extensive databases of specifications and pricing on copiers, printers, fax machines and multifunctional products. The company's databases cover more than 6,000 products and have a long-standing reputation for being the industry's most trustworthy and complete. They are available to BLI subscribers in the form of printed specification guides and online via the company's bliQ competitive information service. This encyclopedic resource also provides quick and easy access to BLI's First Look Reports, Field Test Reports, Lab Test Reports, Solutions Reports, Digital Imaging Review and Business Consumer's Advisor newsletters and OEM library.

In addition to the testing of office equipment for its subscribers, Buyers Laboratory provides a vast array of confidential for-hire private testing services that includes document imaging device beta and pre-launch testing, performance certification testing, consumables testing (such as paper, toner, ink, photoconductors and print controllers) and print media testing (including virgin and recycled papers). Buyers Laboratory's consulting division, the Buyers Alliance, provides comprehensive purchasing support services to business consumers in the process of acquiring office equipment, which includes the creation of customized RFPs, user needs assessments and analyses of vendor responses.

This article was published on June 29, 2007.