The focus of the Brother HL-2140 is clear, and as a good little text churner this laser packs the goods. Use it extensively and, in the long-term, you'll end up paying considerable amounts. But for the typical family, this is an excellent complement to a quality inkjet and thus an ideal way to arm your home with strong text to go along with great colour graphics.

The R290 is an inexpensive and efficient low-end addition to Epson’s Stylus Photo range. Although quality isn’t always up to scratch, the printer will suit basic photo printing needs.

The Pixma MP470's design shortcomings should be easy for many people to forgive, considering everything the MFP offers for the price. Its print, scan and copy functions are sound, and its software gives you lots of options.

It's too bad about the inks, because the Dell V305W is a nice printer in many ways. But even if you don't print all that much, you'll notice the dent in your wallet fairly quickly. And unfortunately, this printer doesn't print money.

If blistering print speed is crucial--particularly if you're looking to make regular use of the lower quality settings--you'll find this a stunning printer.

A reasonably quick model which provides excellent print quality for text. As the name indicates however, stay away if you want a graphics printer.

For the average family, the X4650 should suffice. Wi-Fi connectivity is an advantage for shared printing and print quality is adequate, but poor printing speeds will deter many people.

Good at text printing, and the memory card slots are welcome; but for graphics, it's a slow printer and scanner.

The C4580 continues HP's trend of improving the quality of its low-end inkjets. Though there's still room for improvement, the C4580 is good value for money.

The P4350 is an improvement on previous Lexmark models, but there are still some concerns over its print and scanning quality. For the price though, it does combine all the multifunction features into a pretty good looking and easy to use printer.

HP’s LaserJet P1005 puts its best foot forward. But it’s crippled with slower performance and a more expensive price point than the Brother HL-2140. It’s a good printer, but it simply isn’t competitive enough.