HP Deskjet 5740

With Christmas fast approaching, this latest model from HP will be competing with a tide of other low-cost printers. In the flesh, the first thing you'll notice is the slightly dour design, which looks a lot less flashy than some of its competitors.

Build quality is good considering the price though, and the control panel on the front has a firm action and is clear in operation. Styling aside, there's little that excites about this printer. Performance is in line with its price point, both in terms of speed and quality, but this is a printer in the traditional mould; unlike our current favourite, Canon's Pixma iP3000, which includes both duplexing and a second paper tray, the Deskjet 5740 doesn't offer any distinguishing features.

As standard, a black and a tri-colour cartridge are supplied. These are HP's new Gen II cartridges, which contain HP's latest ink and nozzle technology, and claim, among other things, to offer greater light-fastness (up to 100 years) and substantially faster print speeds.

Speed was oddly inconsistent, however. When printing text using the driver's default settings, our 25-page document took just under seven minutes to print - 3.6 pages per minute - which is acceptable for a printer of this price. Speeds stepped up to 17.2ppm for draft printing, although the printer was noisy as a result, and feathering and alignment glitches crept in.

We noticed a distinct drop in print speeds, however, when printing photographs. It's true that photo printing is more of a pleasant bonus than a core strength with a budget model such as this, but we were still disappointed with speed. A borderless 6 x 4in photo took 2 minutes, 26 seconds to print, and a full A4 picture on best quality didn't appear for an agonising 6 minutes, 21 seconds.

Overall quality was acceptable, but even text printing, traditionally an HP strength, fell short of spectacular. Characters were certainly a healthy, dense black, but lacked the absolute precision we're used to from other models of the range, including this model's predecessor, the previously A-Listed Deskjet 5650. Photos were surprisingly polished, though ink had a tendency to sit on the surface of glossy stock.

The black cartridge can be swapped for a photo version that boasts light cyan and light magenta, designed to smooth subtle, light gradients and create more convincing skintones on photos. Unfortunately, this swap not only added 35 seconds to the time it took to print a 6 x 4in photo, but also muted the colours in our test pictures. Also note that HP's special grey-tone cartridge won't work with this printer.

HP's 'print backup mode' is also present, which will allow the printer to finish a job even if one of the cartridges runs out half-way through a page. The driver gives you plenty of control and does a good job of prodding less tech-savvy users in the right direction without being cloying. HP's effective Photo Printing software is also included, helping to create an assortment of photo layouts for print.

Students and others on particularly tight budgets will find much to like about this printer. It's neither blisteringly fast nor of the highest quality, but the decision to keep some higher-end features, such as automatic paper sensing, is welcome. Before you buy though, consider a cheap laser device such as Kyocera's FS-1020D, or the extra flexibility of Canon's Pixma iP3000. Otherwise, accept the Deskjet 5740's limitations, and bag yourself a bargain.

Author: Christopher Phin