Lexmark Intuition S505

Lexmark has recently added a series of new all-in-one printers to its range, of which the Intuition S505 is roughly in the middle, designed for home and home-office use.

We were not keen on the printer's styling and thought the grey and black look made it appear rather dated, but the range of useful features suggests we could overlook this minor issue.

It was easy to set up and combines an inkjet printer, copier and scanner with a 100-page auto-sheet feed tray and some handy additions that will be of benefit to home users.

The S505 offers wireless connectivity as a tidy way to connect to a home PC or network, double-sided printing, and Pictbridge support, which means it’s possible to connect a camera or USB memory key containing photos to print them directly without needing a computer.

A memory card reader is also included. When using this or Pictbridge the pictures to be printed are displayed on the colour screen. The printer controls make it simple to change the configuration and print settings.

In addition, an Eco mode helps the Intuition claim green credentials by enabling duplex printing and power saving. Printing costs work out at around 4p per page for black and white prints and 7p for colour.

All of this sounds very good on paper but features don’t count for much unless speed and quality is up to scratch.

Printer makers always exaggerate speeds so we were not surprised that the Intiution didn’t come close to the quoted print speeds for black and white prints of 33 pages per minute (ppm) in draft mode or 17ppm in normal mode. Our tests gave more realistic maximums of 20ppm and 12ppm respectively.

Quality was good, though - certainly up to standard for producing professional documents. Full-colour photo prints were not as impressive though. It was fast but colour-reproduction was only average.

The device makes up for these faults by being extremely easy to use, and its ability to handle a wide range of paper sizes and fast and effective scanning makes it a versatile addition to the home.