Projectors Reviews, price and comparision: June 2011

HP Wi-Fi Mobile Mouse

Review:

Those who travel for work with a small laptop know the value of a spare USB port. With Bluetooth still a rarity on mobile PCs, Hewlett-Packard's Wi-Fi Mobile Mouse offers an alternative way to free up some extra connectivity. For $49.99 when it debuts this June, the Wi-Fi Mobile Mouse will connect to your Windows 7 laptop directly via your wireless networking adapter, no USB receiver dongle necessary. In testing, we found the mouse easy to set up, and we were impressed by its robust connection strength, at least on newer laptops. We would make a few tweaks ... Expand full review

Aside from its unique connection method, the Wi-Fi Mobile Mouse isn't all that extraordinary. Its small size tells you that it's designed for travel, and its ambidextrous design invites anyone to use it. You will find the button on the side opposite your thumb difficult to press without changing your grip, but we like the four-way scroll wheel that lets you easily navigate up and down and from left to right through larger documents.

Wi-Fi connectivity is really the primary selling point for the Wi-Fi Mobile Mouse. HP says the mouse is meant for use with Windows 7-certified wireless adapters, which you'll find listed on Microsoft's Web site. That means the mouse works only with Windows 7-based PCs (we checked, and the drivers won't install on Windows XP or OS X), and only with certain wireless adapters.

We tried the mouse on Intel-based Windows 7 laptops from Sony and Lenovo and had no problems. The connection was far less reliable on a Dell XPS 8300 desktop with a Dell-made wireless adapter not listed among Microsoft's certified Wi-Fi devices. We had similar difficulties with a Gateway desktop that also lacked a Microsoft-certified adapter. Microsoft's list does mention all current Intel laptop-chipset wireless adapters, which covers a broad set of current systems.

Hide Review Next page

Setting up the Wi-Fi Mobile Mouse involves nothing more than installing the drivers from the included CD and following the onscreen prompts. There's a brief pairing process, but it only requires pressing a button on the bottom of the mouse once. You need to have your wireless receiver enabled to detect the mouse, but your PC does not need to be connected to a network.

Once we installed the mouse, we had no difficulty maintaining a steady connection. The signal held up when we connected each laptop to the Web over a wireless network, and stayed just as strong while we browsed around and simultaneously downloaded a multigigabyte file. HP promises a 30-foot connection range for the mouse. We found the connection held up when we used it from more than 38 feet away in a large conference room. We were not able to test the battery life, but HP promises the two included alkaline AA batteries will last for nine months.

The Wi-Fi Mobile Mouse involves a few peculiarities. As mentioned, you lose the connection to the mouse if you disable your PC's wireless adapter. That's perhaps not surprising on paper, but it might be if you use the mouse while troubleshooting a network connection. And while we appreciate the mouse's responsive laser sensor, adjusting the sensor's sensitivity requires an awkward, poorly described process of pressing multiple buttons on the mouse simultaneously for 3 seconds to cycle through the various sensitivities. Why HP didn't employ a simple drop-down menu or a slider for selecting the sensitivities in the driver software is a mystery. Also, given the laptops out there without an optical drive, we'd encourage HP to make the mouse drivers available for download in addition to including them on a DVD.

Conclusions
We don't expect the HP Wi-Fi Mobile Mouse will replace wireless mice that use USB-based RF wireless or Bluetooth connections, but as an alternative for those who need more USB inputs, this mouse makes sense. Just be sure to do your homework before making a purchase, because the connection using non-Windows 7 certified wireless adapters can be frustratingly irregular.

06:34 | Labels: mobile, Mouse | 0 Comments

BenQ XL2410T Monitor

Review:

The BenQ Xl2410T is the third 3D monitor I've reviewed in the last two weeks, but unlike the other two, the XL2410T is the first to include a W-LED backlight, instead of CCFL. Now, don't get too exited. All that indicates is the probability of less power consumption than other 3D monitors, and while it should also point to a thinner panel, unfortunately, that's not the case here. Ergonomic options it has aplenty, but what sacrifices had to be made to include such options? Keep reading to find out.

Design and features
The 23.6-inch BenQ XL2410T ... Expand full review

Design and features
The 23.6-inch BenQ XL2410T sports a clean design with a dark gray chassis and rounded corners. Its only standout design flourish is the "lip" that extends downward from the bottom right bezel where the onscreen display (OSD) array resides. We've become accustomed to seeing LED-based monitors with thin profiles, but the XL2410T has obviously had one too many snacks. While the panel's depth is a thin 0.9 inch initially, it extends another 1.5 inch to encompass the connection options, bringing its full depth to 2.4 inches. The bezel measures 0.9 inch on the right and left sides and the full panel is 22.4 inches wide; slightly above average compared to other 23-incher.

On the right side of the panel is a headphone jack; video connection options include DVI, VGA, and HDMI. The XL2420T comes with plenty of ergonomic features, including 90-degree pivot, 10-degree back tilt, 5-inch height adjustment, and 30-degree left and right swivel. At its lowest height, the bottom of the bezel measures 3.7 inches from the desktop and can be adjusted by a full 5 inches. The monitor's wide 10-inch-by-7-inch foot stand affords it great stability; even when fully extended, it didn't wobble too precariously when knocked from the sides. If foot stands aren't your thing, the panel can be unscrewed from the stand and attached to the wall, VESA-style.

The OSD array includes five buttons: Auto, Menu, Left, Right (doubles as the Display Mode shortcut), and Enter, all located on the underside of the bezel. Each button convincingly presses and depresses with an audible pop. To the right is the power button, and above that, an LED that glows light green when the device is powered on.

The OSD follows BenQ's typical design. At the top are five tabs, with each tab containing different OSD options: Display, Picture, Picture Advanced, Audio, and System. If using an analog connection, phase and auto adjustment become adjustable options as well. Picture options include Brightness, Contrast, Sharpness, Gamma, Color and BenQ's version of overdrive, AMA. Gamma can be adjusted from 1.8 to a value of 2.2.

The XL2410T's OSD preset modes are Standard, FPS, Movie, Game, Photo, sRGB, and Eco. Each preset changes the color temperature and brightness of the display in a manner intended to be appropriate to the task; for example, Eco lowers the brightness significantly to save on power. Additionally there are Normal, Reddish, and Bluish color temperature options and the monitor's RGB values can be changed individually. Two additional customizable presets are also included, User Game-1, User Game-2. These allow the user to set the brightness, contrast, RGB color balance or any other attribute and save it as a preset.

The Picture Advanced tab includes options for Dynamic contrast, Display mode (aspect ratio), Instant on and PBP (picture-in-picture). Audio includes a mute and volume adjustment. System includes options for changing the source, auto powering off the monitor after a set time, and basic OSD settings.

As simple as the OSD is to navigate in concept, it feels antiquated. There are still too many steps to get anything done. Press menu, select the tab, press enter, navigate to feature, press enter, then use the arrow buttons to adjust feature. Compared to Dell's much more streamlined OSD seen in any of its monitors like the Dell UltraSharp U2711, and BenQ's OSD really starts to show its age, design-wise.

The monitor has a plasticky, hollow quality to it and feels more cheaply made than the Samsung PX2370--possibly a sacrifice made to get so many ergo options and 120Hz support on a monitor at a decent price. Fortunately, at 14.3 pounds, the XL2410T, which includes a metal plate under its foot stand, is heavier than most LED-based monitors and its weight provides some substance to what is otherwise a fairly flimsy-feeling chassis.

10 degree back tilt, height adjustment, pivot, swivel

Performance
We tested the BenQ XL2410T through its DVI input, connected to a Windows Vista PC, using the included DVI cable. The display posted a composite score of 89 on CNET Labs' DisplayMate-based performance tests.

The Extreme Grayscale Bars test, which evaluates both the monitor's ability to display very dark and very light grays, proved too taxing for the XL2410T. In the Standard preset at default settings, the monitor only displayed dark gray down to a level of 8, with 2 being the lowest possible.

Increasing the contrast made lower levels grays visible, but unfortunately made light grays indistinguishable from white. After spending some time tweaking, we got the monitor to display down to a level-6 dark gray while mostly maintaining the integrity of light grays, but it was difficult to find a great balance. This lack of balance indicates that dark details would be difficult to see on the display without washing out the colors.

Color tracking and other color tests fared better, especially after some tweaking of the RGB balance. We got colors to rival the PX2370's output, but not quite match it. Backlight bleeding, especially along the bottom edge of the screen was bright and pervasive and we saw it rear its head in a few tests below.

Text:
In text, we saw no color problems with black text on a white background. Fonts were clearly visible down to a 6.8 size. We did see a lot of blooming around text with both blue and pink fonts on a black background.

Movies:
We tested the BenQ XL2410T using the Blu-ray version of "Avatar." When using the Movie preset we saw fairly deep blacks, and near accurate color that didn't have the green push we've seen in so many monitors. Dark gray got crushed in dark scenes, making dark detail difficult to see. Also, we could have used a bit more red in the faces.

Using the Standard preset, we improved slightly on the Movie preset and with the following settings were able to see more dark detail without sacrificing the depth of black.

Hide Review Next page

Games:
BenQ asserts that it conducted R&D with two professional gamers in designing the XL2410T. The result of this research was the FPS preset, which, as it implies, is tailored for first-person shooters. To evaluate just how well it handles FPSes, we used Call of Duty: Black Ops.

While the FPS preset was bright and allowed the user to see lots of detail, it still pushed an overabundance of green, and some lighter colors were washed out. After adjusting the settings for a while, we found better settings for gaming, using the Standard preset.

Brightness: 100 (or to desired brightness)

With these settings we got a better color balance with plenty of detail still visible, which is great if playing FPSes competitively. If you play games more for their aesthetic appeal, however, we recommend taking the gamma to 2.2 and turning the contrast down to 64.

The pervasiveness of the backlight is a constant problem with the XL2410T. During our Black Ops sessions, backlight bleeding would noticeably rear its head along the bottom of the screen when in dark areas, appearing as a distracting glow.

As for input lag, we filmed ourselves firing a rifle in Black Ops with both our finger and the muzzle of the virtual gun in the video frame. When we played the video back in super motion, we noticed no input lag with either AMA on or off.

To test refresh rate, we used DisplayMate's motion graphics tests and watched a bunch of graphics fly around the screen, looking for evidence of streaking. With AMA on we saw some color distortion in the form of halos that trailed the blocks as they moved around the screen. With AMA off, the halos disappeared, but there was still more streaking than on the PX2370.

Photos:
The BenQ XL2410T delivered photos with deep colors and accurate skin tones. The settings we used above for movies worked much better than the Photo preset.

Viewing angle:
The optimal viewing angle for a monitor is usually directly in front, about a quarter of the screen's distance down from the top. At this angle, you're viewing the colors as the manufacturer intended them. Most monitors are not made to be viewed at any other angle. Depending on its panel type, picture quality at nonoptimal angles varies. Most monitors use TN panels, which get overly bright or overly dark in parts of the screen when they are not viewed from optimal angles. The XL2410T uses a TN panel, and indeed gets very dark when viewed from below, and it shifts colors when viewed from about 6 inches to the left or right.

Power consumption:
The BenQ XL2410T achieved fair power consumption, with a Default/On power draw of 31.3 watts, compared with the Samsung PX2370's 25.01 watts in the same test. In our Sleep/Standby test, the XL2410T costs 1.28 watts and the PX2370 pulled a lower 0.27 watts. Based on our formula, the XL2410T would cost $10.23 per year to run, compared with the PX2370's lower $7.65 per year.

Brightness (in cd/m2)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
Contrast ratio
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
DisplayMate tests
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

Find out more about how we test LCD monitors.

Service and support
BenQ backs the XL2410T with a standard three-year parts-and-labor warranty that also includes support for the backlight. As long as you're under warranty, BenQ provides free phone support weekdays from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. PT. Currently, the monitor's user manual, drivers, and additional software are not available on BenQ's Web site.

Conclusion
The BenQ XL2410T is being marketed to gamers, but aside from the 120Hz refresh rate and 3D support, it won't necessary make you more competitive online. The monitor has multiple ergonomic options, a very robust OSD, and, once you've spent enough time with the settings, very good performance. However, the pervasive backlight is one of the worst offenses of clouding we've yet seen and even with all its extras, $400 may be a bit too high for gamers looking strictly for a fast TN display. That said, at the right settings, games and movies can look fantastic on it.

General users will find a good monitor here with lots of extras, but with IPS monitors like the Dell UltraSharp U2410, available for only $100 bucks more, a lower-quality TN is a tough sell at what would otherwise be a fairly reasonable price. We recommend it if you can find if for $350 or less, otherwise, there are better options available.

02:09 | Labels: Monitor, XL2410T | 0 Comments

Epson WorkForce 635 Wireless All-in-One Inkjet Printer

Review:

The $200 Epson WorkForce 635 proves itself a capable performer for small offices that want a do-it-all device that can print, fax, copy, and scan without any fussing around with a clumsy touch-screen control panel. Epson also continues to outgun the competition in print speed, leading its category in our document printing tests. We recommend amateur photographers seek out alternative devices, but office-friendly features like an autodocument feeder, an autoduplexer, and inexpensive ink replacement cartridges earn the Epson WorkForce 635 our full endorsement.

Design and features
The WorkForce 630 fits in tight spaces thanks to its compact design that measures ... Expand full review

Design and features
The WorkForce 630 fits in tight spaces thanks to its compact design that measures just less than 18 inches wide, 14 inches deep, and 9 inches tall in storage mode with the moving control panel, autodocument feeder (ADF), and paper trays all folded flush into the rectangular unit. The standard color scheme for Epson's WorkForce multifunction printer line is an office-appropriate matte black, with a dot-patterned scanner lid and minimal gloss to prevent dust from gathering on the device.

A robust control panel folds out of the printer's middle section and can rotate up and down for optimal visibility on your desk space. A 2.5-inch LCD is your hub for controlling the printer's multiple functions. With many modern printers insisting users interact via touch-screen LCDs and virtual LCD buttons, we're glad to see that not every printer has adopted this trend.

In this case, the control panel bundles several tactile shortcut buttons you need to increase workday productivity with specific action functions like toggling double-sided prints with the rear-mounted autoduplexer, a hard reset button, and individual buttons for fax and scanning features. You also get a standard four-way directional pad and an OK button for navigating through the menu settings.

The controls are comprehensive and easy to use in conjunction with the Epson driver that comes on the CD included in the box. Other physical features of note include a media card reader on the front panel that supports Compact Flash, MS (PRO), xD, and SD memory cards, and a PictBridge USB port for direct printing and saving images directly off a PictBridge-compatible thumbdrive.

Just above the control panel, you'll find two hinged bays that expose the 2,400-by-2,400-dpi scanner glass and four-ink repository for separate black, cyan, magenta, and yellow cartridges. The scanning functions let you save an image to a specific file folder, as a PDF document in a folder, or as an attachment to an outgoing e-mail message. The WorkForce 635 also benefits from a 30-sheet ADF on its top that automatically picks up individual sheets from a stack in the tray.

Any multifunction or all-in-one printer for businesses should include an ADF, but keep in mind that feeders always add bulk to the printer. When you're not copying or faxing stacks of paper, consider keeping the ADF folded up and storing the extra sheets of paper in the ample input tray, which can hold up to a considerable 250 sheets of plain 20-pound white paper or 10 envelopes. Finally, an extendable lip on the bottom of the printer corrals all outbound prints.

Two hundred dollars seems to be the least amount of money you'll pay for an Epson WorkForce printer with wireless connectivity. The WorkForce 635 features a built-in 802.11 b/g wireless print server that took about 5 minutes for us to set up and start printing. Unlike other printers that require you to set up a proxy network, the 635 prompts you to establish a direct wireless connection right out of the box, without the help of USB or Ethernet cables to muck it up. There's also an Ethernet port on the side of the device for a wired connection to a network.

Hide Review Next page

The Epson WorkForce 635 printer ships with four separate ink cartridges for cyan, magenta, yellow, and black. To factor the most cost-efficient price per page, we're using Epson's XL black and color cartridges that cost $20 and $17, respectively. Based on Epson's posted ink cartridge yields, we determined the cost of printing to be an affordable 2.5 cents per page of black ink and 3.2 cents per color.

Performance
We're pleased with 635's hardware offering, but we're also impressed with Epson's continued effort to push the speed of its inkjet printers. The WorkForce 635 dominated the four other competitive printers in our speed tests in all but the photo speed tests, where it was still able to print a respectable 1.3 snapshot photos per minute. It didn't print quite as slowly as the Canon Pixma MG6120, although we wouldn't recommend either if you're planning to print a large volume of photos. For all other jobs, you can see in the chart below that the WorkForce 635 makes a strong effort.

Speed test (in PPM)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

We're confident recommending the WorkForce 635's output quality for professional documents like slide shows, spreadsheets, and handouts. The internal driver settings let you choose between Photo or Best Photo mode, but keep in mind that you'll wait longer for the finished product with Best Photo. Text quality offers a similar choice between simple Text and a more complex Text and Image mode. We noticed subtle differences between the two, but not nearly enough in our snapshot photos and graphics documents to warrant the use of extra ink for the "Best" modes.

We're generally satisfied with the printer's color reproduction and text character formation, but many of the color blends in our snapshot photos are marred by color blocks and an undersaturated haze. Bright colors in prints don't seem to pop as much as they should, but that's usually the case with business-oriented printers.

Service and support
Epson backs the Epson WorkForce 635 with a limited one-year warranty that includes toll-free customer support weekdays from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. PT. Further support is available online through a model-specific troubleshooting guide, FAQs, e-mail support, driver updates, and document downloads. You can also purchase additional coverage at $20 for an extra year or $30 for two years.

Conclusion
The Epson WorkForce 635 caters to the office crowd with the ability to automatically print on both sides of a sheet of paper while still keeping ink replacement costs relatively low. It registers competitive print speeds and our only critique is its sluggish print output. That said, the rest of its buffet of features will leave any business user satisfied with its performance.

Find out more about how we test printers.

21:31 | Labels: AllinOne, Epson, Inkjet, Printer, wireless, WorkForce | 0 Comments

Altec Lansing IML247 Orbit USB stereo

Review:

Altec Lansing already offered a single housing monaural speaker in its Orbit line of portable speakers. But now it's doubled up with the latest model, the Orbit Stereo--a pair of USB-powered speakers that snap together into one long tube when not in use, so you can tuck them smoothly into a suitcase or laptop bag.

While the Orbit Stereo speakers aren't tiny, they are fairly lightweight, weighing in at 12.8 ounces, and you don't have to carry around any sort of extra power adapter. They also cost an affordable $49.99, which is $15 to $30 ... Expand full review

If you're looking for something truly compact that sounds OK and puts out more sound than your typical laptop speakers, those single-speaker USB Orbits may be a better bet. But if you want a little bit more punch to your presentations or travel entertainment and true stereo for watching movies or music in your hotel room (or wherever), the Orbit Stereo is the way to go.

To be clear, these are computer-only speakers--the only audio source can be a Windows PC or Mac with a free USB port. There's no auxiliary input for plugging in a music player or smartphone.

Hide Review Next page

We've been playing around with a pair of Orbit Stereo speakers, and they sound decent enough at close range. While they don't exactly fill up a room with sound, they sure play a lot bigger than most internal laptop speakers.

The sweet spot for these guys is about 3 to 4 feet away (about where you'd sit at a desk in front of your computer) and they do best at low to mid volumes. Really crank the volume and the sound gets pretty crunchy. There's some bass, just not a whole lot, so they do sound on the thin side compared with bigger, less portable laptop speakers.

The long and the short of it is the Orbit Stereo speakers sound significantly better than most laptop speakers and aren't too heavy to carry around. That said, don't expect them to blow you away with their sound. They're decent enough for their intended purpose (presentations, multimedia watching), but if you're hoping to really pump up the jam, you'll probably want to pick up something a little bigger that offers more oomph and is powered by an AC adapter, not USB.

16:59 | Labels: Altec, IML247, Lansing, Orbit, stereo | 0 Comments

Logitech Couch Mouse M515 mouse

Review:

With a few key design tweaks, Logitech has created a sensible living-room computing accessory with its Couch Mouse M515. The sealed-in sensor will remain free of obstructing dirt and hair, and grip detection technology provides insurance against unintended clicks. For $50, the M515 might feel like a luxury product compared with more affordable wireless mice, but it's also a less expensive option than some higher-end media mice. We recommend it to living-room-computing enthusiasts who don't already have a reliable input device.

The Couch Mouse M515 is smaller than a standard desktop mouse, but a little larger than a ... Expand full review

The Couch Mouse M515 is smaller than a standard desktop mouse, but a little larger than a typical laptop mouse. That's probably a wise design decision by Logitech, in that a full-size mouse could feel cumbersome in the living room, but a smaller design might be easily lost.

A wireless mouse, the Couch Mouse M515 is also a member of Logitech's Unified Device family, which lets you use multiple devices from a single Micro-USB wireless receiver. Logitech offers a number of Unified keyboards that could also work on the same adapter used by the Couch Mouse, but none of them are small enough to qualify as living-room keyboards. Even if there are no obvious other products that would accompany the Couch Mouse and its Unified receiver, you will likely appreciate that the receiver is so small that it essentially disappears into most USB ports.

The hallmark feature of the Couch Mouse lies in its underside. Unlike most mice that use an optical sensor to track your movement, the Couch Mouse has no hole for the sensor to shine through. Instead, the plastic covers the sensor to keep out dust, pet hair, crumbs, and other living-room detritus that can become lodged inside the mouse and disrupt the sensor's accuracy.

Hide Review Next page

The benefits to such a design are clear, but Logitech has also addressed the negatives, designing the plastic covering over the sensor in such a way that scrolling is as smooth as with a standard mouse. Logitech does recommend using a mouse pad if you intend to use the Couch Mouse on a glossy surface, but we had no problems using it on a wooden desk with a shiny polyurethane finish.

Also unique to the Couch Mouse is its hand detection technology. If the idea is that you will use this mouse on a soft surface that you and others might be sitting on, it's reasonable to assume that the mouse might end up on a blanket, a pillow, or otherwise mixed up in your seating arrangements. With the hand detection technology, the mouse won't activate unless someone is gripping it, which ensures that it won't accidentally click and disrupt whatever you might be watching or listening to. That feature also conserves battery life. Logitech claims that the pair of standard AA batteries included with the Couch Mouse will last for around two years. Remind us in 2013 and we'll try to report back.

We also like that Logitech has added its HyperScroll wheel to the Couch Mouse. Normally a feature reserved for Logitech's higher-end mice, the HyperScroll wheel offers the best scrolling experience on the market. In its standard mode, the wheel has the same ratcheted scrolling action of any typical mouse. Press in the scroll wheel, and the wheel spins freely, letting you zip down long Web pages almost instantly. Throw in the side-to-side tilting feature that lets the wheel act like forward and backward buttons, and the Couch Mouse gives you an impressive array of options for navigating Web pages, lists, and documents quickly.

Conclusion
Logitech's Couch Mouse M515 isn't the most innovative living-room product out there. It doesn't have a gyroscope or a built-in keyboard, and you can't use it as a universal remote control. What it lacks in high-end features, it makes up for in functionality and sensible design. You can certainly get away with using a standard wireless mouse in your living room, but the Couch Mouse M515 will offer a significantly improved, sensor-obstruction-free experience for a reasonable cost.

13:58 | Labels: Couch, Logitech, mouse | 0 Comments

Dell V715w All-in-One Wireless Printer

Review:

The Dell V715w All-in-One Wireless Printer offers the standard array of print, fax, scan, and copy features with a useful 50-sheet autodocument feeder and an Eco Mode button that encourages you to cut down on consumables. Out of the box, the V715w shows physical flaws and a bulky design with frustrations that include frequent paper jams, unreliable wireless connectivity, and expensive ink cartridges. Placed next to the full-featured Lexmark Prevail Pro705, which flaunts a much easier installation process, top-tier image output quality, and a five-year warranty, we see little reason to recommend the Dell V715w.

Design and features
At 19. ... Expand full review

Design and features
At 19.2 inches wide, 16.1 inches deep, and 9.9 inches tall, the Dell V715w will take command of your workspace, so make sure you have room for the device before running out to make a purchase. You likely won't move the V715w once you situate it in your work area. The hefty printer weighs 21 pounds, just 1 pound less than the Epson WorkForce 840, a $300 printer that can hold up to 500 sheets of paper in its dual paper input trays. The V715w tops out at 200 sheets total: 150 in the standard input tray and another 50 sheets in the ADF.

The V715w doesn't feature a typical tiny two-line LCD display. Instead, you get a 2.4-inch color LCD that lets you preview imported photos from the accompanying computer, and you can also access files through the media card reader and PictBridge USB port on the lower-right side of the machine. Shortcut buttons surround the display on three sides, and there's also the standard array of buttons including a directional pad for scrolling through menus and a number pad for dialing numbers on the fax side.

The first problem we have with the V715w's design is the control panel that sticks out of the middle of the unit. Prior to installing the driver, Dell instructed us to position a clear strip of plastic on top of the panel that adds text labels to the Copy, Scan, Fax, and Photo buttons. We're unsure why those labels weren't already printed there as on the rest of the buttons, but the extra layer and the cheap plastic finish take away from the otherwise streamlined design.

The flatbed scanner lives just underneath the V715w's autodocument feeder and can handle up to 1,200x2,400-dpi resolution, another feature we normally see on multifunction devices. However, Dell deserves recognition for including a copy of ABBYY FineReader Sprint on the included driver installation disc that provides basic optical character recognition (OCR) and will do its best to "read" and import the text of a scanned document into a word processor of your choosing, typically Microsoft Word. In our testing, the software was fairly accurate, although we definitely suggest you check for inaccuracies after the scan completes. Additionally, be sure to hold onto the driver installation disc, as ABBYY FineReader Sprint isn't available for download on Dell.com.

We also like that Dell includes an Eco Mode button marked with a green leaf on the right side of the control panel that triggers two-sided printing, copying, and faxing using the duplexer on the back. The button dims the LCD if you leave the printer dormant for an extended period, and the printer has an Energy Star certification. We welcome those green-minded touches, but Lexmark goes a step further and in addition to these features saves you money by bundling XL-capacity black and color cartridges in the box. To our knowledge, Lexmark is the only printer vendor to do this, and we hope Dell and others will consider adding this incentive in the future.

The V715w uses four individual ink cartridges for black, magenta, cyan, and yellow colors. Dell also sells high-capacity ink cartridges on the company's Web site, but the page yield numbers are no longer listed on the site so we can't accurately calculate the cost per page. We can tell you that the standard cartridge didn't even last long enough for us to finish our quality and speed test, and the customer complaints on our own CNET user reviews as well as the Amazon purchase page echo our experience.

Like many modern all-in-one printers, the Dell includes an 802.11b/g wireless card that's supposed to help you cut the cord and free up USB ports you might otherwise use for connecting to the host computer. The wireless installation disc that comes in the bundle does an adequate job of walking you through the Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) using your wireless router's SSID and WPA password, but our connection kept giving us an error message that said "Cannot Print over a Wireless Network," despite the green notification light that supposedly indicates a solid connection.

Performance
The Dell V715w registered average scores in our speed tests, in which we compared it with four other printers. That's not to say it isn't fast enough to keep up with the output of a small to midsize office. In fact, it did fine in the text speed and presentation speed tests, just edging out the Canon Pixma MG6120 for second place behind the quick-printing HP Photosmart Premium e-All-in-One C310a. Hide Review Next page Printer performance (in ppm)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

We weren't quite as impressed by the image quality put out by the Dell. While our full sheet of plain black text looked presentable at first glance, a closer inspection showed several jagged lines at the corners of text in small fonts, specifically in italicized text, and white text on a colored background became unreadable at less than 5 points.

Even on the high-quality setting, we wouldn't recommend using this printer for printing PowerPoint presentations or any document to be used in a professional environment. Furthermore, the color graphics page is marred by an overall faded look with a slightly yellow overcast, significantly departing from the color palette of the original image.

We can't find many positive things to say about the image quality, and despite several ink head cleanings and calibrations, the image just doesn't come out as sharp or accurate as we'd expect from a $200 printer.

Service and support
Dell backs the V715w with a one-year warranty, but you can pay to upgrade to two or three years of coverage. Toll-free phone support is available 24-7, and Dell's site offers e-mail support and user forums. Dell's Web site also has product-specific support in the form of online user guides, drivers and software downloads, and a troubleshooting tool.

Conclusions
The Dell V715w neglects to deliver extra features beyond the standard print, fax, scan, and copy functions, which ultimately ranks it behind competitive devices like the Lexmark Prevail Pro705, which saves money and boosts office productivity with XL-capacity cartridges, interactive Productivity Studio and Imaging software programs, and a useful onscreen toolbar that tracks your print jobs and acts as a troubleshooting aide should you encounter any snags in the process. Since you get all these additional features for the same price, the Lexmark Prevail Pro705 would be our choice over the spotty Dell V715w.

Find out more about how we test printers.

09:25 | Labels: AllinOne, Printer, V715w, wireless | 0 Comments

Epson WorkForce 840 All-in-One Printer

Review:

The Epson WorkForce 840 is the flagship model of the company's line of WorkForce all-in-one printers for small and home businesses. As such, it costs more than the average all-in-one at $299, but it also serves up a buffet of features. In addition to the usual menu of print, copy, scan, and fax functions, the WorkForce 840 features Ethernet and Wi-Fi networking, two-sided printing, an automatic document feeder (ADF), and the ability to print directly from your mobile device. And it performs all of these functions in an impressively compact package that can hold a full ream of paper. ... Expand full review

Design and features
The Epson WorkForce 840 is impressively compact for a multifunction device that has two immense 250-sheet input trays and a 30-sheet automatic document feeder (ADF). It measures 17.6 inches wide by 14.5 inches deep by 11.8 inches high and weighs 22 pounds, which, combined with its convenient indented handles, make it one of the more portable MFPs; in comparison, the HP Officejet Pro 8500A Plus weighs 28 pounds. The WorkForce 840's 500-page paper capacity is convenient for high-volume office printing, and you can stock two different types of paper in a pair of size-adjustable trays.

An ample 13-inch-wide fold-out control panel sits prominently in the middle of the unit. A narrow output tray resides below the panel with two removable input trays on the bottom. To the left of the output tray on the front are two media card slots and a USB port for direct printing from your camera or its media card.

We connected the printer to our Windows 7 test bed and installed the drivers from the bundled CD, along with Epson's Easy Photo Print and CreativeZone applications and a scanner app. Easy Photo Print attempts to help with printing photos, though we doubt you'll use it over your preferred photo management app. CreativeZone is a fun app that lets you design invitations, letterhead, and other page templates. The drivers installed within 5 minutes, and the additional app added another 5 minutes to the setup procedure. All in all, the installation process is straightforward, and we can say the same about connecting the WorkForce 840 to your network via Ethernet or Wi-Fi.

After establishing a direct USB connection, we tested the Wi-Fi setup procedure and found it to be a snap. You have the choice to either establish a temporary USB connection to set up the printer on your Wi-Fi network, or forego the USB cable and use the printer's touch panel to add the printer to your network. We chose the latter for our tests because it seemed more adventuresome and also because, like most printer vendors, Epson does not include a USB cable. (You won't find an Ethernet cable in the box either; the only cable included is a phone cable for faxing.) Using the setup wizard on the included CD, we followed the instructions to navigate the printer's touch panel, where we found our Wi-Fi network listed and entered its password. Within minutes, the drivers were installed and a test page was printed, giving proof that we were up and running on the network.

Once installed, it is easy to navigate the printer through its large control panel. You can fold it out and adjust it to your desired angle by pressing a button on its back. At the center of the 7.8-inch touch display is a 3.5-inch color LCD with a number of buttons for functions such as home, page forward, page back, and move up a menu level. Buttons that are inactive for a particular screen aren't illuminated, which helps minimize command confusion.

When connected via Wi-Fi, Epson offers a handful of free mobile printing apps for wirelessly printing directly from mobile devices. Epson's PrintJinni app enables you to print documents, Web pages, and e-mails. The setup for PrintJinni is a bit mysterious, but we did manage to print a Web page from an iPhone with the app. However, Gmail could not find the printer when we tried to print a message from a Gmail account set up through PrintJinni on the same iPhone.

Epson's iPrint app worked flawlessly, though it prints only photos. The software takes you to your phone's camera roll, where you can simply select a photo and the printer to send it to, and hit print. You can choose bordered or borderless prints, and from among four different paper types: 4x6 inches, 5x7 inches, letter, and A4.

When you're not on your phone but in the office, you'll find the copy and scan functions useful. The A4-sized scanner bay features 1,200x 2,400 dot-per-inch (DPI) resolution, and you can send your scans to your PC, or to a memory card inserted in the printer, or attach it directly to an e-mail. You can also use the ADF to produce double-sided copies and scan double-sided prints.

Hide Review Next page

The Epson WorkForce 840 printer ships with four separate ink cartridges for cyan, magenta, yellow, and black. To factor the most cost-efficient price per page, we base our cost per page on Epson's extrahigh-capacity ink cartridges. The extrahigh-capacity black cartridge costs $28.49 for a vendor-estimated 945 pages, which works out to just over 3 cents per page. For color, the extrahigh-capacity three-pack for cyan, magenta, and yellow costs $54.10 for 7.2 cents per page. Both costs fall just below the mean for an all-in-one printer of this size.

Performance
The Epson WorkForce 840 turned in a strong performance in our tests on the whole. It pumped out 12.48 pages per minute (ppm) on our all-black text speed test, which was nearly the same score as the Epson WorkForce 520 and the HP Officejet Pro 8500A Plus. The WorkForce 840 performed just as quickly when printing graphics, especially in our presentation speed test, in which it outpaced the competition by printing 10 color PowerPoint slides at a clip of 6.79 ppm. Unfortunately, it struggled in our photo speed test, taking roughly 70 seconds to print a 4x6-inch photo on glossy photo paper for a time of 0.86 ppm. Competing models were two to three times faster at printing photos.

Print speed tests (in PPM)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

The WorkForce 840 proved a bit speedier than average on our scan and copy tests. It scanned a 10-page color document at 5.59 ppm, and copied a 10-page monochrome text document at 5.48 ppm.

We reviewed its output quality in side-by-side comparison with the HP Officejet Pro 8500A Plus and found that the WorkForce 840 produced slightly crisper text and brighter, more vivid color. It almost looked like the Officejet Pro 8500A Plus used too much ink in printing text, particularly with smaller fonts, resulting in slightly blurred edges. The WorkForce 840 produced razor-sharp edges and finer-looking text than the Officejet Pro 8500A Plus.

Lastly, we appreciate the WorkForce 840's low operating noise levels. Any small office can feel claustrophobic when you're trying to get work done next to a loud, overbearing printer, and the WorkForce 840 barely made its presence known during spooling, scanning, and printing.

Service and support
Epson backs the Epson WorkForce 840 with a limited one-year warranty that includes toll-free customer support weekdays from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. PT. Further support is available online with a model-specific troubleshooting guide, FAQs, e-mail support, driver updates, and document downloads. You can also purchase exchange/repair coverage at $39.95 for one year or $59.95 for two years.

Conclusions
It's not the fastest photo printer, but for all other jobs the Epson WorkForce 840 excels. We recommend this multifunction inkjet for its high-quality prints, rapid text and graphics speeds, easy-to-navigate control panel, and abundance of features that include autoduplexing, an ADF, wired and wireless networking, and support for mobile printing.

Find out more about how we test printers.

05:49 | Labels: AllinOne, Epson, Printer, WorkForce | 0 Comments

Acer GD235HZ

Review:

3D is still touted as the missing ingredient that will enhance our entertainment experiences, be it in movies or games. I've yet to be persuaded of this, but it doesn't stop many companies from dipping their toes into the 3D waters. On the PC gaming front, Nvidia has led the charge with its 3D Vision technology for the last few years and has done a good job of getting the technology out there, while garnering up support from game developers. To display in 3D, a monitor needs only the capability to display images at a 120Hz refresh rate, ... Expand full review

Fortunately the Acer GD235HZ is a monitor that does more than just play 3D games.

Design and features
The 23-inch Acer GD235HZ follows the company's typical design aesthetic for a gaming monitor, with its black chassis, sharp corners, and an X-shaped, "four-toed" foot stand with orange highlights on its edges. Knocking the monitor from the sides results in some wobbling, but, given the width of the foot stand, with its gorilla-style, front and back "toes," we weren't too concerned about it toppling. At 12.1 pounds, the monitor is lighter than your typical non-LED gaming monitor; its substantiality betrays its plastic origins.

The monitor tilts back 10 degrees, but unfortunately includes no other ergonomic options. Its profile is a fairly thick 1 inch initially, with another 0.9 inch included for its connection options, bringing the full depth to 1.9 inches. The bezel measures about an inch on the left and right sides and also includes VESA wall-mounting capability, provided via four symmetrically arranged screw holes on the back.

Connection options include DVI, HDMI, and VGA. The connections are arranged as on most monitors, facing downward instead of out, thus requiring more effort when connecting cables.

On the front, in the lower-right-hand corner, sits the power button, designated by its bright blue LED light. On the underside of the bezel are five buttons arranged horizontally. Each button is aligned under a white dot on the bottom of the bezel. Pressing any of the buttons brings up the onscreen display (OSD).

The OSD includes controls for brightness, contrast, RGB color controls, and color temperature. Five presets are featured, including User, Text, Standard, Graphics, and Movie. Navigating the OSD was fairly simple. Pressing any of the buttons brings up the OSD, which consists of five symbols, each aligned to the five buttons, allowing access to the full OSD or the presets. Navigating through the full OSD took some getting used to, but as long as we remained aware of which symbols corresponded to which buttons, we had little difficulty.

RGB, Warm, Cool, and User temperature

Performance
We tested the Acer GD235HZ through its DVI input, connected to a Windows Vista PC, using the included DVI cable. The display posted a composite score of 88 on CNET Labs' DisplayMate-based performance tests.

The GD235HZ's worst offence was the amount of backlight luminance, or clouding, that seeps through its screen. The monitor saw its most dramatic backlight bleeding at the top and bottom of the screen. This level of clouding disrupted our ability to accurately test using the Extreme Grayscale Bars text pattern. The test pattern evaluates the monitor's ability to display very dark gray, using dark gray blocks on a black background. If any of the blocks can't be seen, it indicates that the monitor may have trouble displaying dark detail. In the case of the GD235HZ, the clouding is so prominent in the area where the blocks appear, that it rendered the results inconclusive.

The clouding issue resurfaced in the Screen Uniformity tests (which tests how evenly the backlight light is distributed over the screen) and Dark Screen tests (which specifically looks for backlight bleeding) as well.

As for color, the monitor had good results when displaying linear, dark to light progression of color. In our Color Tracking test, however, we saw some obvious green tint issues.

Text: In text, we saw no color problems with black text on a white background. Fonts were clearly visible down to a 6.8-point size. We did see a lot of blooming around text with both blue and pink fonts on a black background.

Movies: We tested the Acer GD235HZ using the Blu-ray version of "Avatar." Dark details were easy to spot and the monitor displayed fairly dark blacks. Colors were slightly hindered by a green push, but not to an egregious level.

Games: Because of our intimate familiarity with StarCraft II (SCII), it remains our favorite tool for judging color quality and vibrancy in games.

When using the Graphics preset, characters in SCII looked smooth and the game exuded vibrancy near equal to the high standard set by the Samsung PX2370. In this preset there was a noticeable amount of green tint, however.

Hide Review Next page

To test refresh rate, we used DisplayMate's motion graphics tests and watched a bunch of graphics fly around the screen, looking for evidence of streaking. The GD235HZ exhibited the same low level of streaking as the PX2370.

Nvidia 3D Vision performance: We tested 3D performance using Call of Duty: Black Ops. The GD235HZ uses Nvidia's 3D Vision technology, and Black Ops looked great running on the display in 3D, with the monitor's already high vibrancy contributing to the visual panache.

We also got a chance to see how the GD235HZ handled 3D photos and watched a short 3D movie. 3D photos are, from technical standpoint, interesting, but we don't think that the effect adds much to still images. The photo seems to move and slightly shift perspective as you move your head, but it doesn't really enhance pictures in any meaningful way. Also, it makes foreground objects look like 2D cutouts, lacking any depth.

The 3D movie of a Nurburgring race fared better, looking like native 3D content and not something post converted to 3D. The film had multiple levels of depth, and the foreground assets didn't look like cardboard cutouts.

The 3D vision glasses use active shutter lenses, and as such, when viewing any 3D content, expect it to look darker than when viewing normally.

Photos: The Acer GD235HZ delivered sharp-looking photos, but when viewing dark-skinned faces, the skin had a slight, but noticeable green tint. This was especially true when compared side by side with the Samsung PX2370, which pushed red more than the average monitor.

Viewing angle: The optimal viewing angle for a monitor is usually directly in front, about a quarter of the screen's distance down from the top. At this angle, you're viewing colors as they were intended to be. Most monitors are not made to be viewed at any other angle. Depending on its panel type, picture quality at nonoptimal angles varies. Most monitors use TN panels, which get overly bright or overly dark in parts of the screen when they are not viewed from optimal angles. The GD235HZ uses a TN panel, and indeed gets very dark when viewed from below. We were fine viewing text from the left or right sides as long as our perspective didn't pass a 30-degree threshold. Beyond that, text became very difficult to read.

Power consumption
The Acer GD235HZ achieved fair power consumption, with a Default/On power draw of 37.5 watts, compared with the Samsung PX2370's 25.01 watts in the same test. In our Sleep/Standby test, the GD235HZ costs 2.8 watts and the PX2370 pulled a lower 0.27 watt. Based on our formula, the GD235HZ would cost $12.25 per year to run, compared with the PX2370's lower $7.65 per year.

Brightness (in cd/m2)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
Contrast ratio
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
DisplayMate tests
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

Find out more about how we test LCD monitors

Service and support
Acer backs the GD235HZ with a three-year limited parts and labor warranty that covers the backlight; this matches the great coverage from other monitors vendors like Samsung and Dell. E-mail support is provided via a form on Acer's Web site, and drivers for the display are available there as well.

Conclusion
As a gaming monitor or just a monitor to watch movies on, the Acer GD235HZ is a very good performer with a fast refresh rate, fairly deep blacks, and a level of vibrancy that matches some of the best monitors out there. While it skimps on ergonomic options and looks pretty typical design-wise, it does include the connection option trifecta and a capable OSD with plenty of usefulness.

Its cost, at $345, is slightly pricey for a 23-inch monitor, but if you're looking for a gaming monitor with 3D capability, it's actually a pretty great deal. For a non-3D, general use monitor with great performance, the Samsung PX2370 gets a higher recommendation.

02:14 | Labels: GD235HZ | 0 Comments

Lexmark Interpret S405

Review:

The $130 Lexmark Interpret S405 meets the needs of a multitasking business environment with quick output from any of the print, fax, and scanning features. We also appreciate the simplicity of the wireless setup, but the autodocument feeder gets easily jammed and replacing the individual ink tanks can inflate the overall cost of ownership. And although we didn't experience the connectivity issues that overwhelm the user reviews for this printer, we can't ignore competing devices from Canon and Epson that offer a snag-free user experience for less. We've seen the Lexmark Interpret S405 for under $100 on ... Expand full review

Design and features
The autodocument feeder (ADF) gives the S405 a larger footprint than the printer's lower-end linemate, the Impact S305. The S405 measures 8 inches tall, 18.8 inches wide, and 13.31 inches deep, but only weighs 17.1 pounds, making it easily maneuverable around the office. Like the S405, this model gets a gray-and-black color treatment with a glossy black ADF, so it should have no problem fitting in with the rest of your office decor.

The control panel sits on the front face of the S405; it can either stay flush with the unit or come out at an angle for unobstructed visibility. Lexmark opted for a small two-line grayscale LCD display, with a cluster of shortcut buttons lining the top edge. There's also a standard directional pad for scrolling through menus and a pad for dialing numbers on the fax side.

As is typical for most multifunction printers in this price range, Lexmark includes a multimedia card reader as well as a PictBridge-compatible USB port on the lower right side for accessing snapshot photos without need for a computer. The reader supports SD, Memory Stick, xD, and MMC cards, effectively letting you leave the USB cable for your digital camera at home.

There's another USB port on the back for a direct connection to a host computer, but you can also use the built-in 802.11g/b wireless print server. Setting up the wireless connection is a simple matter of inserting the included setup CD and running through the connection wizard. We encountered no difficulties setting up an ad hoc wireless network using an initial USB connection, but we should note that many of the CNET user reviews are reporting frequently dropped router connections that require a computer reboot to fix.

The Impact S305 can handle up to 100 sheets of plain paper in the rear-loading, adjustable tray, and all prints shoot out of the front onto an extendable plastic arm. This method is standard for modern printers, but office jockeys used to robust features like autodocument feeding, double-sided printing, extralarge paper trays, and alternate page layouts might find Lexmark's Platinum Pro905 more tailored to their needs.

Some of the CNET user reviews for the S405 report frustrating problems with loading paper into the ADF, and we ran into similar issues with the fickle paper path that's used to load up to 35 sheets of paper into the machine: the tray is so sensitive that even a slightly misaligned stack of paper in the ADF will cause the spool to jam and cancel a job, which can also be damaging to the ink head and cartridges. Throughout our testing, we encountered numerous paper jams and see little reason to recommend using the ADF on the S405, unlike the Canon Pixma MX410, on which the ADF operated smoothly and gave us no trouble.

Part of the initial setup requires you to install the printhead and each of the four ink cartridges. While many other manufacturers like Canon only include a two-ink cartridge bay in their budget offerings, Lexmark gives you three individual cartridges (yellow, cyan, and magenta) plus a separate black cartridge for richer, more realistic snapshots.

The printer is also one of many to feature Lexmark's newest Vizix individual ink cartridges. Using the XL-capacity cartridges, which offer a better overall value, we calculate the price of one page of black ink at 5 cents per page and one page of color at 3 cents per page. Both costs are average for a printer at this price, but note that the S405 won't print if even one of the cartridges is depleted, so plan to spend more money in the long term on refills.

Hide Review Next page

The S405 ships with minimal paperwork to conserve paper, but you can access most of the instructions, warranty information, and promotional offers on the CD included in the box. Along with the drivers that support Windows 7, XP, and Vista and Mac OS X, the CD also automatically installs several Lexmark productivity programs on your computer. The Lexmark Toolbar gives you a shortcut bar on top of your Web browser for easy-access printing. Lexmark's Productivity Studio and Imaging Studio programs provide an easy way to autoedit or crop your photos and include them in a series of creative projects, and the Lexmark Service Center acts as a troubleshooting aide should you encounter a snag in the printing process.

On the other hand, the Canon Pixma MX410 offers all of the above with its Canon Solution Menu EX, but adds its new HD Movie Print feature that rewards adopters of the Canon hardware ecosystem with the ability to pull still snapshots out of videos shot with compatible HD video cameras. Canon's software also allows you to edit video images to prepare a clip for capture, and grabbing still shots from the video is as simple as selecting a video snippet and either capturing a group of 10 frames or hitting the "capture" button to select single images.

Performance
Like its linemates, the Interpret S405 excelled in all four of the output speed tests, although it still takes second place to the reigning champ of print speeds, the Epson WorkForce 610, which blows away the competition with 13.24 pages of text per minute, compared with the S405's 7.65 ppm. Lexmark also comes in second to Epson in the color graphics speed tests and the 10-page presentation speed test. We performed all tests using the printer's default setting, although it also offers a faster "economic" setting.

Printing performance (in ppm)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

The S405 outputs acceptable-quality prints, and black-text prints come close to laser quality with fully formed lines and crisp tones throughout the document. Thinner lines also appear rich with a slight hint of wicking that produces a blurred image, but such imperfections are acceptable with inkjet printers, especially at this price. We also have few complaints about the quality of color prints and snapshot photos. After closely examining several sample prints, we found all of the 4x 6-inch photos reproduced with a strong color gamut and little loss to overall quality, and we wouldn't hesitate to use this printer to submit professional documents like presentations and office handouts.

Service and support
Lexmark covers the Interpret S405 with a generous three-year warranty that includes lifetime priority phone support. The warranty will transfer ownership in case you want to sell the printer within that time. In addition, the Lexmark Web site's AnswerBase provides a comprehensive list of FAQs, how-tos, device specifications, warranty extension information, and driver updates. You can contact tech support via live chat or e-mail (they claim to respond within one business day) from 5 a.m. to 8 p.m. PT weekdays and from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. PT on Saturdays. Finally, Lexmark also offers customer service training in both its printers and general computing at designated authorized locations. Online courses are also available.

Conclusion
The user reviews for the Lexmark Interpret S405 indicate widespread connection and installation snags, and while we didn't have the same experience, we don't doubt that these problems are occurring. Overall, we hesitate to recommend this printer for its mechanical failures and high cost of ownership, especially with alternatives like the Epson 610 (slightly pricier with many more features) and the Canon Pixma MX410 (slightly cheaper with the same features) available.

Find out more about how we test printers.

22:04 | Labels: Interpret, Lexmark | 0 Comments

HP Photosmart Premium C410a

Review:

The HP Photosmart Premium C410a occupies the middle ground between a versatile, low-cost inkjet for the home and a high-volume multifunction for office use. It has a list price of $299, but you can find it online for $199--including direct from HP with a $100 instant rebate. It produces faster, higher-quality prints than competitive low-end all-in-one printers, and HP also includes its convenient ePrint and AirPrint technologies that let you send print jobs via e-mail and directly from Apple iOS devices. We recommend it for home offices with light-duty printing expectations or if you frequently print photos, but if you ... Expand full review

Design and features
The HP Photosmart Premium C410a is of average size for a midgrade MFP, measuring 11.1 inches high, 18.4 inches wide, and 17.8 inches deep. It features one 125-sheet paper tray with a 20-sheet photo paper tray above it. In comparison, the Epson WorkForce 840's 500-sheet paper tray offers four times the capacity for busy offices that cycle through more prints.

The Photosmart Premium C410a's main paper tray can hold up to legal-size paper, and the small photo tray can hold up to 5x7 paper. A busy, high-volume office will constantly need to refill the 125-sheet paper tray, but it's highly convenient for home users to have a dedicated photo tray that saves the hassle of manually loading photo paper when alternating between document and snapshot photo prints.

On top of the printer, you'll find a 50-sheet auto-document feeder (ADF) that lets you slide in a stack of sheets for hands-free scanning, copying, or printing. The Photosmart Premium C410a also features automatic duplexing that can print on both sides of a single sheet of paper, and a button on the printer's control panel lets you easily toggle between single- and double-sided printing.

The Photosmart Premium C410a bucks the touch-screen trend, serving up a control panel littered with physical buttons. The control panel runs nearly the entire width of the printer with ample room for an organized button layout. A small, 2.4-inch status LCD sits on the left side of the control panel. The panel sits fixed at an angle, but the color LCD can tilt forward for better viewing when you're seated. To the left of the LCD on the front face of the printer are three media card slots (MemoryStick, SD, and CompactFlash) and a PictBridge USB port for direct printing from a compatible digital camera.

You'll also notice a button labeled "Print Photos" in addition to the usual buttons to initiate scans, copies, and faxes. When you attach a USB device or insert a media card, the printer will scan the drive or card for photos that you can view on the LCD and scroll through using the arrow buttons. You can also select the photos you'd like to print, perform a few basic edits if you so desire (though the small screen makes it very difficult to see how your edits affect the image), and hit the Print Photo button to output your project. Finally, the convenient automatic paper sensor will automatically draw media directly from the photo paper tray.

Installing the printer is no more complicated than installing the software and drivers from the bundled CD, and then connecting the printer to your PC or Mac using a USB cable. You'll need to supply your own for a direct connection as HP leaves it out of the box. The C410a also features Ethernet and Wi-Fi networking, and we connected it wirelessly on the printer by stepping through the setup screens, clicking on our preferred Wi-Fi network from a list, and entering our password.

You need no additional apps to print from an iPhone once you have the printer synched up to a wireless network. It also works with the iPad and iPod Touch, although we didn't test with these devices. HP calls this functionality AirPrint, and it's incredibly slick. Without the need to visit Apple's App Store, we were able to print directly from our iPhone. We printed out a photo from our iPhone photo library by simply choosing the printer, and hitting Print. You can't adjust any print properties, however, which resulted in some clipping on a square Hipstamatic photo using both letter-size paper and 4x6 photo paper.

In addition to AirPrint, the printer also features HP's ePrint technology, whereby you can e-mail the printer an attachment to print out. To set it up, hit the ePrint button on the Photosmart Premium C410a's control panel and it will print out a welcome sheet with a code that you then must enter on HP's ePrint Web site. The code then becomes the e-mail address like so: code@hpeprint.com. ePrint is a convenient feature, but it comes with a few restrictions. For one, the printer must be on and also connected to your network (you select whether anyone can e-mail print jobs to your printer or only those to whom you grant access). For another, it can't print Web pages, although you can simply copy the Web text into the body of an e-mail to get a similar page.

The printer also features HP's print apps, which let you print pages from outlets such as Financial Times, Yahoo, Reuters, USA Today. Others from DreamWorks, Nickelodeon, and Disney let you print coloring pages, paper airplane templates, and other crafts. You can also install additional free apps, but you must do so from HP's ePrint Center Web site after creating an account. It would be infinitely easier to simply download them directly to the printer. Also, the apps are much more useful on a printer with a larger LCD display.

The flatbed scanner/copier measures 8.5 by 11.7 inches, meaning it can scan or copy letter-size documents but not legal sheets. It features a 4,800 dpi resolution, and scanned and copied documents looked crisp and sharp. You can send scans to a PC, a memory card, or a USB drive. There is also an option for scanning photos to whatever paper you have in the photo tray. The front-right corner is used to align material to be copied or scanned, which is easier than other printers that make you align your pages or photos in the back-left corner. Unlike the Lexmark Pinnacle Pro901, however, the Photosmart Premium C410a's hinges do not detach, which is inconvenient when scanning or copying pages from thick textbooks.

Hide Review Next page

The Photosmart Premium C410a employs a five ink-tank system (yellow, cyan, magenta, and two black cartridges). High-yield black cartridges (564XL) cost $17.99 for a rated 750 pages, and high-yield color ink cartridges (564XL) cost $22.99 for a rated 550 pages. Working with these figures, monochrome pages cost 2.4 cents a page, and color pages cost 4.1 cents a page. These numbers are roughly average for an inkjet, though the Lexmark Pinnacle Pro901 uses high-yield black ink cartridges that cost only $4.99 and deliver monochrome prints at less than a penny per page. The Pinnacle Pro901 also boasts a low 3.2-cents-per-color-page figure.

Performance
In lab testing, the HP Photosmart C410a proved itself an above-average performer across all four of our speed tests among multifunction printers (MFP) in its price range. On our speed tests, it produced just over eight pages of monochrome text, four pages of color graphics, and just over six PowerPoint slides per minute. Those speeds trailed the performance of the Epson WorkForce 840, our Editors' Choice for this category, but outpaced similarly priced MFPs such as the Lexmark Pinnacle Pro901. It also clearly outclassed an entry-level, two-tank MFP, the HP Photosmart D110a, which shows the performance you gain as you scale up HP Photosmart line.

The Photosmart C410a also produced 1.35 4x6 photos per minute; we think anything over 1 4x6 photo per minute is respectable, and even the highly rated WorkForce 840 failed to hit that mark.

The Photosmart C410a's speed does not come at the expense of quality. It produced crisp, dark black text, which was clearly superior to the Lexmark Pinnacle Pro901's text quality. Color graphics and photos exhibited accurate colors, though we found that copies of photos, come out slightly blurry. That said, we recommend simply reprinting a photo from its digital source if you need another copy.

Speed tests
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

Service and support
HP backs the Photosmart C410a with its exclusive enhanced support services: a dedicated toll-free number, troubleshooting over online chat with an HP expert, and a one-year warranty that guarantees repairs with "Next-Day Business Turn Around" and offering brand-new replacement units for the first 30 days after purchase.

In addition, HP offers an added Accidental Damage Protection and a Pick-Up-and-Return program that sends an authorized courier to pick up your failed equipment and deliver it directly to an HP-designated repair facility.

You can find more warranty information by visiting the HP Support Web site that also features online classes, FAQs, driver downloads, and troubleshooting tips, as well as a new shopping buddy that puts you in a chat room with an HP sales rep so you can ask questions before you buy.

Conclusion
For a home office that needs copy, scan, and fax functions, the HP Photosmart Premium C410a offers crisp speeds and output. Its low-capacity paper tray limits its appeal for high-volume offices, but HP's ePrint and AirPrint features make it a worthwhile option for home users.

Find out more about how we test printers.

18:00 | Labels: C410a, Photosmart, Premium | 0 Comments

Apple TV (Fall 2010)

Review:

Editors' note (3/24/2011): The most recent firmware update has added MLB.TV and NBA League Pass streaming video services, as well as other AirPlay enhancements.

In case you haven't noticed, there's a revolution going on in how people watch movies and TV. Traditional services like cable and satellite are losing ground, as more people are streaming content directly from the Internet, using services like Netflix, iTunes, and Amazon Video On Demand. The revamped Apple TV is the company's aggressive move to capture the streaming-video business: for just $99, you get access to Netflix, YouTube, TV, and movies from the iTunes Store, plus all the music and videos on networked computers running iTunes. And with a pitch-perfect design and user interface, it'll be hard for Apple fans to pass it up.

The Apple TV's shortcomings are all about content, which is arguably the most important aspect of a product like this. Currently the only supported TV networks are ABC, Fox, Disney, and BBC, and even with those networks, many popular shows, such as "Modern Family" and "House," aren't available. That's a lot of missing content for people looking to ditch their cable subscription, especially when the competing Roku XDS offers Amazon VOD, which streams TV shows from every network, and will soon have Hulu Plus to boot.

That said, Apple TV's shortcomings are strictly content-based--something that could be fixed in an instant with a software update or new deals with additional TV networks. At $99, it's still a great deal, especially for those who already own compatible Apple products and want an easy way to get content to their living rooms. We hope that Apple adds even more TV content and third-party services to the device, and we're looking forward to seeing how much the forthcoming AirPlay feature helps change the content equation in just a few short weeks--at which time we'll be re-evaluating the product in detail.

Design
We knew the Apple TV was small, but we didn't realize just how tiny it was until we pulled it out of the box. It's a quarter of the size of the first-gen Apple TV and more impressively, it's even smaller than Roku's line of video streamers. Apple products are generally known as the ultimate for status-seeking gadgeteers, but the Apple TV's style is decidedly low-key. It's a small charcoal gray box, with a glossy finish around the perimeter and a matte finish on top, where the Apple logo resides. The bottom has a slight bevel and rubberized surface so it doesn't slip. There is a small white light on the front panel on the right-hand side, which unfortunately can't be turned off in the settings menu. Overall, the understated look is a winner for a home theater, where it's much better to fit in than to stand out.

The new Apple TV is much smaller than the old one, largely because it lacks a hard drive.

The Apple TV's connectivity is basic, but completely sufficient. It has built-in 802.11N Wi-Fi, so you won't need an Ethernet cord in your living room. The main connection on the back panel is the HDMI output, which can handle both high-def video and surround-sound audio. There's no component video output for older TVs, but every modern HDTV supports HDMI. If you have an older AV receiver without HDMI, the Apple TV also has an optical digital audio output, which is capable of surround sound as well. There's also an Ethernet port if you prefer the stability of a wired network connection. Rounding things out is a Micro-USB port, but that's not for general use.

The included remote is as minimalist as the box itself. It's the same superslim clicker included with iMacs, consisting just of an aluminum casing, with a directional pad, a menu button, and a play/pause button. The Apple TV's interface is simple enough that it's all you need, as long as you're familiar with standard Apple navigation; use the menu button to jump back.

Though the included remote is perfectly fine for simple Apple TV operation, the device really takes off when using an iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad as a controller, using the free Remote app. Using gesture-based controls, you can swipe and tap your way through menus, plus you have the ability to use the keyboard on your portable device to do text entry, which is much quicker than using the onscreen keyboard and standard remote. Even better is queuing up music from your iTunes library by browsing cover art. It's one of the best way we've seen to browse your digital music library.

Setup and user interface
The initial setup is as simple as it gets. Plug it in, connect an HDMI cable, and fire up your HDTV to start the guided onscreen setup. Then just pick a language, choose your router, enter your password, and you can start to use the Apple TV. To access some of the more-advanced functionality, like Home Sharing and Netflix, you'll need to enter some additional info, but it's a cinch.

The Apple TV's main user interface is the best we've seen on a video-streaming device.

The user interface is largely unchanged from the original Apple TV, which isn't a bad thing. The main screen lists the basic content categories: Movies, TV Shows, Internet, Computers, and Settings. If you select movies, a list of cover art for current top movies shows along the top, before you even jump into the main movies section.

For movies and TV shows, you can browse by top content, genres, or directly search. You also have the option to filter by networks with TV shows. Any non-Apple services, like Netflix and Flickr, are grouped together in the Internet category. Navigation feels very quick and the screens are laid out intuitively. If you're looking for eye candy, there's no competition for the Apple TV.

Netflix, iTunes Store, and a few extras
The original Apple TV was centered on syncing with your iTunes account, but the new Apple TV is all about streaming off the Web. The two main media sources you can access via the Apple TV are Netflix and iTunes.

Not only can you access your Netflix Instant Queue, but you can search and browse by genre.

Netflix: With a $9-per-month subscription, you can stream an unlimited amount of Netflix's streaming video content to your Apple TV. The user interface is one of the best we've seen, offering access to your Instant Queue, plus the ability to search and browse categories like "New Arrivals" and "Movie Genres." Your Instant Queue is laid about in a grid with box art, which is large enough to read even when we were sitting about 10 feet back. It's one of the better Netflix interfaces we've seen, outpacing the standard Netflix interface included with Blu-ray players.

The Netflix Instant Queue interface is better than that of most competitors, using a grid format to show more movies at once.

Though Netflix is a great addition to the Apple TV, it's worth pointing out that many tech enthusiasts will likely already have access to Netflix streaming in their home theaters, as its become ubiquitous on devices like Blu-ray players, game consoles, and connected HDTVs.

Hide Review Next page

iTunes Store: The iTunes Store currently has the largest selection of movies to rent, with about 8,000 titles in total and 3,500 in HD. Apple has been pushing the idea that many movies are available at the same time the DVDs are released. For some titles, that's true; "Get Him to the Greek," "Babies," and "Frozen" were available in the iTunes Store when the DVDs came out this week, but "Iron Man 2" wasn't. Still, overall we feel like there was lots of recent content and a large back library.

There's an extensive collection of movies in the iTunes Store, including some movies available the day the DVD comes out.

Though the selection for movies is extensive, TV show selection is very limited. First, only four major content providers are currently supported: ABC, Fox, Disney, and BBC Earth. That means no CBS, NBC, or any cable channels. Even worse, the selection of shows on ABC and Fox isn't comprehensive. At the time of the review, top ABC and Fox shows, such as "Dancing with the Stars," "House," "Modern Family," and "Fringe," aren't available to rent directly from the Apple TV. On the upside, all TV rentals are in HD and only cost 99 cents.

The content omissions might be acceptable if the Apple TV was the only game in town, but it's not. Amazon Video On Demand has content from all the major networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox), including many shows omitted on the Apple TV, such as "House," "Modern Family," and "Fringe." Amazon also has content from some cable channels, so you have access to shows such as "Mad Men" and "Louie," from AMC and FX, respectively. If your goal is to completely ditch your cable subscription, you'll find it a lot easier to do with products that support Amazon VOD, such as Roku's network video streamers, Panasonic's Blu-ray players, and Sony's SMP-N100.

The selection of TV show to stream is limited to just ABC, Fox, BBC, and Disney.

Making matters even more confusing is that much of the content that's missing from the Apple TV is available from the iTunes Store when accessed from a PC, although only to buy, not rent. That leads to the very un-Apple scenario of needing a PC to, say, buy the latest episode of "The Office," wait for it to download (which can take more than a half hour, even on a fast connection), then stream it off your PC. That's far from the user experience promised by the Apple TV, where you choose shows from your couch and they start streaming immediately.

Not every ABC and Fox show is available, including popular series such as "Modern Family."

We're sure Apple will continue to negotiate with content providers to add more TV content that's directly accessible from Apple TV, but currently the streaming selection is very underwhelming.

In addition to videos purchased from the iTunes Store, you can stream any other PC- and Mac-based video, so long as you first convert it to an iTunes-friendly video format. There are plenty of freeware programs that do so, but it's a time-consuming transcoding process. In other words, don't expect Apple TV to offer instantaneous compatibility if you have a giant library of DivX, MKV, WMV files, and the like. If that's a core concern for you, you'll have better luck with something like the WD TV Live Plus or theSeagate FreeAgent GoFlex TV--if not a PS3 or Xbox 360.

Extras: Aside from the big three services, the Apple TV has a few additional sources of content, including YouTube, Flickr, MovileMe, podcasts, and Internet radio. Flickr is particularly impressive, especially when using an iPhone to swipe through your gallery of photos.

On the other hand, iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad users who have become accustomed to streaming music services like Pandora and Rhapsody will be disappointed to find that those services aren't available on the Apple TV. Though the App Store has really opened up the iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad to all kinds of developers, the Apple TV remains a closed program, with Apple deciding what services get added. Which brings us to AirPlay.

AirPlay
Tech enthusiasts have been referring to AirPlay as Apple TV's secret weapon and for good reason. The basic concept behind AirPlay is that you'd be able to take any content--music or video--playing on your iPhone and "push" the content to your Apple TV with a couple of taps. The most basic implementation of AirPlay will include any media that plays in the iOS device's native media player, but the Apple representative we talked to mentioned that developers will have the ability to add it to their apps as well. So the idea is, if you're listening to Pandora on your iPad, you'd theoretically be able to easily push that to your Apple TV, getting around the issue of the Apple TV lacking an App Store. (At least for those who own iOS devices.)

That's the idea, but unfortunately we won't get to test out AirPlay until November, when Apple releases the iOS 4.2 software update. It will also depend on how many third-party apps support it. Bottom line: if AirPlay works as advertised, it has the potential to be a game-changing killer app for the Apple TV, but we'll have to wait and see.

Image quality
Much has been made over the fact that the Apple TV only supports 720p resolution rather than 1080p, but as we've explained before, the resolution spec really doesn't matter for streaming video. Rather than relying on abstract numbers, we compared the Apple TV directly with the older Roku XR using the same program material.

First up was the Season 6 premiere of "Bones." The streams from iTunes (on the Apple TV) and Amazon (from the Roku) looked excellent and nearly identical. We could make out some slight compression artifacts in the background, but we imagine most viewers would be impressed by the image quality.

Next, we compared both devices' Netflix-streaming image quality using Episode 13 of Season 5 of "Lost." The Apple TV had a slight edge here, looking just slightly sharper than the Roku, although the difference will only be noticed by enthusiasts. The bottom line is that both boxes offer excellent image quality, considering it's streaming video.

Network performance
For content streaming off the Internet, we didn't run into any issues with the Apple TV. Movies, TV shows, and Netflix content began playing after only a few seconds, using the speedy connection in our corporate testing location. As always, the speed of your home broadband connection will affect streaming speeds.

The first time we tried to stream a downloaded, HD episode of "The Office" off our laptop, we got about 35 seconds in before the Apple TV had to rebuffer. The same happened when we loaded the most recent episode of "Mad Men." Yes, both the Apple TV and the laptop were connected wirelessly, so perhaps that's a lot to ask of our home network, but we were only forced to use that scenario because the iTunes Store requires the workaround.

To be fair, buffering is still an unfortunate reality with any streaming-video solution, whether it's streaming directly from the Internet or over a home network. We did appreciate that the Apple TV will continue to cache your video if you pause, which cuts down on buffering slowdowns.

13:35 | Labels: Apple | 0 Comments

Monsoon Vulkano Flow

Review:

Slingbox has owned the video placeshifting market for the past five years, to the extent that such an act has been coined as "slinging" content. To the company's credit, there has been a steady amount of copycats to come and go, but the Vulkano Flow is easily one of the best.

While the experience is a bit clunkier than what Slingbox users might be used to, the Vulkano Flow does offer some additional features the Slingbox Solo doesn't like wireless access. It also beats the Solo in the pricing department, as the Flow can be had for just $ ... Expand full review

Setup
Setting up the Flow is certainly a little less polished than the Slingbox experience, but it's just as--if not more--functional. After attaching the device to a home network, the Vulkano software locates the Flow on the network and checks for the latest firmware (which updated quite a bit during our review process).

The installation wizard continues through various setup screens that configure video settings, set top box controls, and location information for the EPG, the system's built-in Electronic Programming Guide.

These settings also allow the user to dictate streaming resolutions and bitrates, a nice touch for the do-it-yourself power user. Here are also controls for the player's recording settings, for when users wish to record TV content to their computer.

Design and features
The Flow itself is 16 inches wide by 5 inches deep by 1 inch high and will take up a decent amount of room in a home theater setup. It's lightweight and plastic, and can feel flimsy when being held. We wish it had a more compact design, similar to that of the Solo, so that it wouldn't take up as much surface area.

The Flow itself is a bit wide, measuring 16 inches.

That aside, the Flow boasts passthrough composite and component video connections, though there aren't any HDMI ports. Around back also lie an Ethernet port, reset button, and IR blaster socket. The Flow can also work via a Wi-Fi signal, but we'd recommend a wired connection for the best performance.

There also seem to be a few dormant ports on the Flow, including an "RSVD" button, a USB port (that essentially has no purpose), an infrared IR window, and another slot covered by some electrical tape. The unit we received looked finished enough, but we can imagine that some of these outstanding items will be addressed for a proper retail release.

The Flow includes most of what's needed right out of the box, including composite and component wires, a 6-foot Ethernet cord, IR blaster, and power cord. Another composite or component wire will be required for passthrough.

Hide Review Next page

Here are the accessories included in the box.

Performance
The Vulkano Flow doesn't attempt to do more than advertised--and for customers who want a device focused on video and audio placeshifting, the Flow will work well. Overall performance on the Flow PC and Mac-based players was great. The system was able to deliver a high-quality video stream when attached via an Ethernet connection. The stream quality certainly dipped when we tried it over Wi-Fi, but by no means rendered it unwatchable. That said, for those tapping into the Flow from outside their home network, we'd adamantly recommend a wired connection.

On paper, the Flow's electronic program guide (EPG) sounds like a fantastic way to bypass the tediousness of controlling a set-top box with a delay. The EPG is stored on the client-side, so there's no lag in choosing content. That said, we didn't always find the EPG to be completely accurate with times and descriptions, though some of the blame here can be directed at the channel guide content provider.

We really like the fact that users can pause and rewind live TV natively via the Flow client when being used on a PC or Mac. The player keeps a running buffer constantly recording so that rewinding can be done instantly and not remotely.

The PC and Mac clients (and we're told the iPad as well) allows for TV recording. In the client settings, users can allocate a directory for local saving, which the client will encode in MP4 format. It's tough to imagine a scenario where a user would need to record TV live to their computer, but the functionality is certainly a welcome feature, especially because it leaves us with a self-contained file of any TV program. Just note that the PC or Mac must be turned on to do so, as the Flow player records in real time.

Flow owners can also placeshift content to their mobile devices, but we weren't able to test these items in our initial review. When we've had some hands-on time with the software, we'll update this review with iPad and Android app impressions. The Flow player client is available for Android, iPhone, iPad, and BlackBerry devices for $12.99.

Conclusion
The Vulkano Flow is a great streaming-centric device that does a wonderful job at placeshifting content to a PC, Mac, or mobile platform. We love its TiVo-like recording abilities and the EPG's ability to bypass laggy remote control, even though the whole implementation isn't perfect.

It's a bit unsettling that at the time of this review the company's site hasn't even been updated to reflect the 2011 line of products nor is there a specific support section devoted to the Flow or the step-up hard-drive-enabled Vulkano Blast.

Overall, we were impressed by the Vulkano Flow with its bevy of streaming-focus features and DIY-friendliness. For those who need their hands held through the waters of placeshifting, the Slingbox Solo is a proven alternative, and it also lets users watch their own content via the company's Web site. On the other hand it's more expensive than the Flow, and the corresponding mobile apps clock in at around $30.

09:51 | Labels: Monsoon, Vulkano | 0 Comments

Projectors Reviews, price and comparision

HP Wi-Fi Mobile Mouse

BenQ XL2410T Monitor

Epson WorkForce 635 Wireless All-in-One Inkjet Printer

Altec Lansing IML247 Orbit USB stereo

Logitech Couch Mouse M515 mouse

Dell V715w All-in-One Wireless Printer

Epson WorkForce 840 All-in-One Printer

Acer GD235HZ

Lexmark Interpret S405

HP Photosmart Premium C410a

Apple TV (Fall 2010)

Monsoon Vulkano Flow

my friends list

Blog Archive

Feedjit

ads

Etiketler

Recent Posts