Cheap, easy to use and quick. But the quality on offer lets it down.

A workgroup printing workhorse that delivers classy mono and colour print quality

An excellent all-in-one, particularly when it comes to photo quality, but it’s possible to get more features elsewhere.

Good photo quality and a large touchscreen make this the A4 inkjet to buy.

While HP’s strength in photo printing is once again proved, mono prints take too long and the scanner is poor.

The quality of this diminutive cutie is almost as good as the high-end models, but the price means a compromise on both speed and features.

Packed with features like network capability and transparency scanning, it also has the best scanner by far, with great print quality too.

Digital photography is gaining in popularity, and the features offered by the HP PhotoSmart 2710 are designed to cater to this: PictBridge, a large colour screen and on-printer photo editing. The HP is the most expensive machine here, but isn't geared to one particular market or another.

The PhotoSmart 8150 boasts Compact Flash Type I and II, SmartMedia, Secure Digital, MultiMedia Card, Memory Stick, xD, USB flash drive support as well as PictBridge and an optional Bluetooth adaptor. Such a wide range of supported formats should leave you hassle free when it comes to plugging in and printing off those precious moments you've stored on your camera or other device.

Another contender for an award this month, this model narrowly missed out, with a marginally below average value rating

The absolute epitome of 'feature-packed', the number of inclusions on this unit floored us. Its whopping 162 point feature score is over one-and-a-half times the average point score and comes on the back of its big feature line up.

The Photosmart 7960 is HP's flagship photo inkjet and comes with the new Photoret Pro engine. It's a development of Photoret IV, and a fourth cartridge containing three grey inks has been added too. The 7960 can print 4,097 shades of grey - ideal for black-and-white photographs.

The market for specialised compact photo printers remains relatively small, but as prices come down for printers and digital cameras, they are becoming more popular. As digital camera prices come down and more cameras have direct printer connectivity, a small photo printer becomes a viable accessory.

It is all well and good selecting expensive printers based on the quality of the photo prints they produce, but the general home user often wants something that can do basic print jobs well, and make the kids' homework look good.

The HP K80 takes our Quality Award this month, nudging ahead of the competition in all our speed, quality and features tests. Alongside the HP PSC750, the K80s highly specified 2,400 x 1,200 inkjet printer produced noticeably top-quality colour prints.