Performance
Unsurprisingly, £60 doesn't buy you the
world's faster printer, but it held its own against comparably priced
competitors and even against slightly more expensive all-in-ones. It
printed black text at 6.85ppm, just edging out its competition. It took
about 2 minutes (or 0.48ppm) to print a 100x150mm (4x6-inch) photo,
which, impressively, is on a par with the more expensive photo printers
and all-in-ones we've tested, though it was soundly trounced by the
quick-printing Canon Pixma iP1700.
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
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Photo speed | |
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Text speed | |
The print quality was far from the best we've seen, but again, given the £60 price tag, we're not surprised or terribly disappointed, either. The text doesn't reach the deep black we prefer, and the characters aren't remotely smooth, but overall, the text print is serviceable for printing directions from the Internet or the online article you want to stash away.
Surprisingly, the Z845 turned out a better colour graphics print than text print. The colour blocks were nicely saturated, gradients were smooth, and it handled barcode graphics better than some of the more expensive machines we've seen. The photo elements were on the ruddy side and looked a bit faded, but overall, the quality was quite surprising for a £60 printer.
Finally, the 100x150mm (4x6-inch) colour photographs were not of a quality that you'd want to frame and display on your mantlepiece, but again, they were serviceable. The details could be sharper, the colours were a bit washed-out, and we noticed some graininess in flesh tones, but again, you can't expect perfection from such a cheap printer. On the other hand, the Canon Pixma iP1700 provides all-round better print quality, though no improvement on text print speeds.
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
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Photo | |
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Graphics on inkjet paper | |
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Text on inkjet paper | |
Edited by Matthew Elliott
Additional editing by Kate Macefield
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