W2023X magenta · XL

W2023X is the high yield magenta for the Color LaserJet Pro M454dw and the MFP M479fdw: 6000 rated pages at about $200.00, which is 3.33c a page against 4.52c on the standard W2023A.

Buying the whole high yield set is a $765.00 decision, against about $375.00 for four standard cartridges, so be honest about what it returns. A four colour page costs roughly 12.20c on the X set and 17.32c on the standard set. At a thousand colour pages a year the difference is real but slow; at ten thousand it is the difference between a cheap printer to run and an ordinary one. Look at how much colour the machine has actually produced, which the printer's usage page reports, before deciding.

Magenta empties fastest on photographs and warm toned artwork, so on a machine doing marketing work it is often the first colour to need the larger size even when cyan and yellow do not.

HP's dynamic security notice runs across the M454 and M479 series: a compatible that has been printing for months can be refused after the printer updates itself. Since a stranded W2023X is an expensive cartridge to have sitting in a drawer, hold updates before you commit to third party toner, and buy one cartridge at a time until you know the combination is stable.