Inkjet printers

We’ve reviewed six multifunction inkjet printers, testing and comparing them for speed, quality of printing and running costs

Inkjet printers have become increasingly affordable, with PC retailers and even supermarkets piling them high and selling them cheap. However, the bargain you take home might not seem such great value for money when you realize how often the ink needs to be replenished and how much that costs. In this Group Test, we’ve reviewed six multifunction inkjet printers, including two older models that are currently available at heavily discounted prices. As well as looking at how well the printers perform, both in speed and print quality, we also scrutinized how much ink the printers consume and the cost of replacing their cartridges.

Canon Pixma TS9050 Review

This unassuming box is well designed and has a large 12.6cm screen, which makes it slick and simple to operate.If photo quality is your priority, this is definitely the printer to go for. It wasn’t that brilliant on plain paper but it comes into its own when printing on glossy paper. However, it’s expensive to buy and run, and by the time you’ve printed out your 5,000th page. Most of this cost is due to its color printing, which costs 8.7p per sheet. Mono printing come out at a more reasonable 1.4p per sheet.

TEST-RESULTS CHARTS

OUR VERDICT

We awarded our Gold Award to the Brother MFC-J5330DW because it’s got what it takes in all the right places.Crammed with features, from a sheet feeder to A3 printing, it’s excellent at printing photos, prints at a very reasonable speed and offers good value for money, both in the asking price and the long-term cost of printing. Anyone looking for an affordable, waste-free printer should seriously consider the Epson EcoTank ET-2600, which is significantly cheaper to run than the other printers we reviewed here. However, it’s not as quick or as good at printing as the Brother. Our Bronze Award goes to the HP Envy 7640, because it produced great-looking prints and has many of the extras you’ll want from a multifunctional printer and scanner. However, it’s not ideal if you print a lot because the running costs are high.