Epson Stylus Photo 890

The Stylus Photo 870 was introduced to us at £203, so it comes as a slight surprise that its latest successor only costs a mere £169. Strangely enough the mono cartridge also costs £3 more than the five-colour unit, but neither of them are exorbitantly priced. The only issue is that the cartridges only contain ink, so unlike the HP and Lexmark models, once the print-head fails you're likely to be looking at a new printer, although this should be a few years off.

Otherwise, at £169, the Stylus Photo 890 offers incredible value for money and the best photo quality available from any current inkjet printer in this class. The ability to print full-sized edge-to-edge A4 prints has brought us another step closer to realistic photo printing, and, so long as you use reasonable quality coated paper, you can expect professional graphics and DTP results too. The plain paper black text printing isn't brilliant, but it's still usable if you apply the high-quality detail settings. This shouldn't be an issue if photo printing is what you're after though, and if that's what you want then the Stylus Photo 890 is easily the best route to take.

Author: Ben Hardwidge