The second star's of the compact design: The Vertical format has the advantage that the device requires very little footprint on the desk.
Third advantage is the installation: There are none. Connect printer via USB and on the Mac or PC it appears as a USB stick or other flash memory. Then there is the label printing software, even as a Windows EXE and even an app for OS X.
The software itself is limited to the essentials, but you can at least use all fonts that you have installed on the computer, for labels. Compared to printers without a PC connection with its 3 built Langweiler fonts a huge advantage. In addition, you can include graphics (logos, barcodes, etc.), of course, only to the extent in the print size (6, 9 or 12 mm tape width) are still recognizable. If you need more functionality, can download the full version of the software, which is also available for Windows and OS X and provides some features such as the integration of the system address book and store templates Dymo.
Biggest drawback for me are the printing costs. The bands are 7 feet long and cost around 13 euros. Assuming times of an average length per label by 7 cm, one comes to a whopping 13 cents per label. A bit much for a small plastic strip. But what most annoys me is that every label of house made of 2 cm margin, which also can not be reduced with the help of software. This edge is produced even during a mail merge. Since other label printer the better, I guess that Dymo here the comparatively low price of the device with this scam some subsidized.
My advice: If you print a lot of labels and attention to the small size does not wish and will not print labels in less than 12 mm wide, should draw from the Brother QL-560 or QL-570. The devices are only marginally more expensive, have an automatic knife and can deal with continuous or individual labels. On top of paper and are much cheaper (about the same price as the D1 tapes, but 30 m instead of 7)