Thursday, September 12, 2013
Lexmark X560
The X560 is a color laser printer, copier, scanner and fax housed in a fairly tall body, especially if you opt for the duplexer. It is a good base model to begin with, but can be upgraded to the X560dn model which adds an automatic duplexer. There is also the option to increase the memory to a massive 1408Mb and paper handing to a total of 800 sheets.
The build quality is what you would expect from Lexmark. The chassis feels solid and strong, the buttons firms and direct, the LCD screen bright and informative and the overall footprint quite small considering the features.
The X560 produces great text, prints and copies. Even small point text was clear and sharp, normal sized and extra large produced clean edges and no blur or banding. Text prints are output at a rate of 30 pages per minute for mono and 20 pages per minute for color. Image quality was pretty good at the standard 600 dpi with nice details. The grayscale conversion of a color photograph was accurate and instantly understandable. Color prints or color images looked surprisingly exact, no artifacts or blank spots to be seen anywhere.
Scanning is also of a good quality, with good performance including the scanning of image heavy documents. The fax is the same, good but unremarkable as few of us actually use them anymore. It passed all our fax tests with flying colors though. It is a standard G3 and can send a page every 3 seconds. It has the usual phone books, storage, speed dials and integration options of its rivals allowing it to keep up with the competition.
The control panel is clear and well laid out, with each element having its own buttons. The small LCD screen is basic but adequate for most needs, and the controls are easily understandable enough to be able to speed through them in no time at all.
Standard mono toners will last 8000 pages and are competitively priced with their rivals. The color ones are much the same, offering a 6000 page coverage and only costing $10 more.
The X560 is a solid multifunction printer, scanner, copier and fax that can cope with most things, but has the option to improve or upgrade. The availability of consumables also adds to the attractiveness of the X560.
