Review - Epson Cx5500 Multifunction Printer/scanner

The Age

Thursday August 23, 2007

Terry Lane

Epson CX5500 multifunction printer/scanner

Price: $100

Frustrating

The low-down: This is one of Epson's under-$100 units that includes a printer and scanner and functions as a colour copier. The printer uses the DURABrite resin-coated pigment inks that promise a print life of 120 years. Claimed resolution of the printer is 5760dpi. The unit comes with a good software suite to control all the functions. Ink comes in four separate cartridges, which is good news for economy because only the depleted colour needs to be replaced.

Like: The best thing about this unit is the scanner/copier. Scans are reasonably fast and the software controls provide a high level of management of colour, exposure and, most importantly, descreening of images scanned from magazines and books. Colour copying is surprisingly quick and of acceptable quality for the price.

Dislike: Let's be realistic. What can we reasonably expect for $100? You get sharp and detailed prints but with dull, under-saturated colours. You also get visible banding showing the tracks of the print head. And it is slow. A 10 x 15 cm top-quality photo print takes five 1/2 minutes to come from the printer. Text printing in black is reasonably fast but the output will never be mistaken for laser. Construction is flimsy and doesn't bespeak durability.

Verdict: Epson, Canon, Brother, Hewlett-Packard and Lexmark all offer these cheap multifunction units that seem irresistible, but we suggest that you think before you buy. Epson's best domestic printer and scanner together cost more than $2000. For that you get fast A3+ format printing, flawless prints, superbly accurate and fast scans and robust construction. It is an act of self-delusion to imagine that can be had for $100. But there are intermediate A4 multifunction units costing a few hundred dollars that come close to being comparable with the best. These are the genuinely amazing bargains that will do the job without the frustrations. -- TERRY LANE

© 2007 The Age

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