HP Envy 7640

Heavy-duty printer makes light work

Printers often get discounted by retailers, but HP has cut the price of this one itself, making it good value for a multi-function device that’s a bit more businesslike (when not on offer, it sells for about £30 more). Not only does its scanner have a 25-sheet automatic document feeder (ADF) on top, but faxing is also supported, if you have a phone socket nearby. Ethernet, USB and Wi-fi are all included, and there’s a slot for camera SD cards.

The big colour touchscreenen makes the Envy 7640 easy to o use, even if the setup routinene is keener to install HP’S Printerer Remote program than the arguably more essential ‘Scan and Capture’. HP’S apppp also makes it easy to scan to phones andd tablets, as well as printing from other apps via Apple Airprint or Mopria (which works with Android devices).

There’s a separate 15-sheet photo paper tray, which is handy, but the main A4 input tray only takes 125 sheets and the output tray just 25. You can print both sides (duplex). Our black text document printed at a decent 12.5 pages per minute (ppm), while a full-page A4 photo took two minutes 16 seconds. Black text could have been a little crisper, and there are better photo printers, but business graphics looked great.

The scanner doesn’t make it easy to position thick items such as books, but it’s quick: a full-colour page at a sharp 600dpi (dots per inch) took us one minute 13 seconds, while black documents ran through the ADF at nearly 11ppm.

With one black cartridge and a combined colour unit, running costs work out at around 7.8p per colour page, which is about average, and 3.9p for black, which is quite high. As with other HP printers, you can buy a monthly ink subscription, from £1.99 for 50 pages. The printer then automatically reports to HP, over the web, when you need a new cartridge, and it arrives in the post at no extra cost. It could bring savings if you can predict how much you’ll print, but if you use nothing for a few months you’ll lose money. VERDICT: It’s not the best for detailed photos, nor is it a heavy-duty office printer, but the Envy 7640 has a broad set of features at a reasonable price

★★★★☆

ALTERNATIVE: Canon PIXMA MG5750 £49 Other models with ADF and fax tend to cost more, but if you don’t need those, this is half the price

Easy to use, great graphics, but scanning can be awkward