Review: Hi-Touch S400 photo printer

With a stylish and unconventional appearance, the Hi-Touch S400 is a standalone 6 x 4in photo printer. It uses a detachable wired controller with a built-in colour LCD to enable printing with or without a PC.

However, it's not a case of form without function. The design gives you easy front access to the print ribbon while retaining a small desktop footprint.

Meanwhile, the 10-button hand controller lets you access all of the printer's many functions quickly and comfortably.

The S400 uses dye-sublimation to print at a resolution of 403dpi. Unlike inkjet printers where each dot can only be one of the supplied ink colours, dye-sublimation allows continuous tone printing, which means any of 16.7 million colours are available for each dot on the page resulting in the equivalent photo resolution of a high-end inkjet.

Each print is coated with a protective layer making prints resistant to fingerprints, water and UV rays.

Many of the S400's functions are aimed at using it as a standalone device.

If you have pictures stored on a memory card or Pictbridge compatible camera, the hand controller can be used to perform sophisticated print jobs away from the PC.

If you are hooked up to a PC, the supplied Photodésirée Deluxe software helps you format your photos quickly for printing in a variety of ways including index calendars, ID cards and more.

Unfortunately, the printer's controls, and therefore direct printing from memory cards, are disabled while the printer is connected to your PC via USB.

We also found usability to be hampered a little thanks to the short length of the coiled lead and the fact that it emerges from the bottom rather than the top of the hand controller.

At 70 seconds and an average of 50p per print there are faster and cheaper options available, including other printers from Hi-Touch, but the S400 produc es exceptionally good, robust prints that would be a tough challenge for any photo inkjet to beat.