About Printer X75 PrinTrio
Printing, scanning, and copying--all in one--this low-profile device makes an ideal addition to any home PC system with low-volume printing needs. The Lexmark X75 can print from a PC or a Mac, scan images to your computer, and copy in black and white or color. It is one of a new generation of all-in-ones, a good deal smaller and neater than similar earlier devices.
Taking paper from a feed tray which folds up from the top surface of the machine to a near vertical position at the back, the X75 feeds to a pullout tray at the front, or directly onto the desktop. It uses the same print mechanism as the Z25 and Z34 printers, with the same diminutive color and black ink cartridges. For replacement, the top section of the all-in-one hinges up, and a red plastic stay springs out to support it, like the hood of an old sports car.
The lid of the machine lifts up to reveal an A4-size flatbed scanner, which can scan at up to 600 x 1,200 dpi resolution. A small control section at the front right of the top panel offers power, page feed, scan, black copy, and color copy buttons, plus two status lights. The real power of the machine rests in its software control, however. As well as the driver for the X75, the accompanying CD-ROMs provide OCR software, a photo editor, and fax software.
Print quality from the X75 is pretty good, with dense black text and bright, reasonably precise colors. Color print, as indicated by a 5-by-3-inch test photo, showed up well, with little noticeable banding. We noticed minor dithering, but the dither dots were so small that they were hard to see. Print times were also good for a machine at this price, though it's never going to break any speed records.
Copying was not as successful. The printed copy lost sharpness and color depth--blacks came through grey and colours looked muddy. We compensated for this, to an extent, through software manipulation, but black-and-white copies are, in general, much more successful than colour ones.
