Back To School: Fresh Tech For A Fresh Start

9. Canon Pixma MG5320 Wireless Inkjet Photo All-In-One Printer

These new products are sure to please students at the high school, college, and grad-school levels.

The most important thing about this printer is how finely it prints text. This isn’t a laser printer but pages of Times New Roman pretty much look lasered. It’s quick about it, too. Canon promises 12.5 such pages per minute. Photos aren’t the highest quality we’ve ever seen, but they’re better than average, and Canon says the printer will spit out a 4x6-inch print in 20 seconds. Not bad.

There are three other useful features worth mentioning that make this printer one of the most valuable in its price-class (under $150). The first is duplex printing: it’s easy to print on both sides of each piece of paper, and you should always do this because it saves money and trees. The second is the fact that the printer uses five ink tanks. Basically, that means you save money on black ink because there are two black ink tanks. One of them gets used to photos, the other for text and image docs. If you don’t print a lot of color, you’ll find yourself replacing each tank individually and infrequently. We’re always glad not to have to spend a week’s worth of dinner money on a new full-set of ink. The third cool feature is the ability to print directly onto CDs and DVDs (there’s a built-in tray for this).