Canon Pixma iP5300 review

While many a printer has the frustrating tendency to lumber like an anaesthetized tortoise, this four-ink laser Canon’s trump card is speed. It can run off a borderless A4 photo print in around a minute, faster than the portable models can manage a puny 6×4 snapshot.

Hey, good looking

They’re great-looking photos, too. If you can stand to drop the settings you can get something slightly less impressive in around twenty seconds, and speeds go up even more when you switch to the less demanding realm of text printing. 

This really is a hugely capable device, and if you plan on knocking out a lot of good-sized photos – or even just a few between normal document printing – there’s little point in looking further afield.

Cheap to run The Pixma iP5300 is affordable to run, too. The five-ink system means you can swap out colours as they run out, and they’re cheaper to replace than the higher-end six-ink systems previously required for this sort of photo quality.

Just to make it even more practical there’s an extra fitting to easily print on writeable CDs or DVDs, opening the door to your classiest-ever mix tape or home movie, and a duplex attachment for easy double-sided printing: something that most of its rivals only offer as a paid-for extra. The fools. 

Oddly, this comes at the expense of a built-in card reader – the only way you can avoid using your computer in the printing process is to connect the camera direct to the USB port. This isn’t a big sacrifice to make for such speed and convenience, and it’s nowhere near enough to prevent this from being a great buy.

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