Review: Epson Stylus CX5400

Performance

If you’re looking for a workhouse of a printer, you might want to consider a somewhat more upscale device. However, if your needs are just to print several sheets a day, scan single-paged documents, and print occasional pictures, the CX5400 should do the trick just fine.

All the speeds are adequate. Epson claims 22ppm for plain text, up to 11ppm for standard color jobs, and as fast as 72 seconds for a 4 x 6-inch photo. My informal testing showed these numbers to be a bit optimistic, but not egregiously so. Using the machine as a copier, I got a yield of 12 sheets in one minute (Epson claims 15). Similarly, I was able to scan at a perfectly acceptable speed, whether as an image or recognized text. More importantly to my way of thinking, the color was accurate, the resulting print-outs were crisp, and I had no problems figuring out what to do enroute.

One of the best features of this product is actually a by-product: the printer driver. Whenever a print job begins, the dialog box that pops up is full of helpful tips, diagrams, displays, color-fixing tools, and logical screen flows that help you tweak what you need to get the job done. By the way, it’s a nice idea to leave the print status dialog box open when printing – among other things, it makes it easy to pause or cancel the current print job.

I’d like to tell you how easy it was to fix paper jams, but in a month of usage (including printing with card stock and photo papers) I didn’t have any. Tough. Probably the direct paper path from the back of the machine to the front (which involves a minimum of curling), is largely responsible.

Support

Epson’s Web site features drivers and utilities, along with documentation in PDF format. While there is no online master knowledge base per se, the search utility on the site allows you to limit your search to the support area, thus serving to answer many questions.

Failing that, there are many pages of FAQs, and the ability to e-mail Technical Support, which promises a response within 24 hours. I tried out the free phone support, available 6 a.m. – 6 p.m. weekdays (Pacific Time), and got a polite, knowledgeable helper after waiting about four minutes.

Specifications

Price: $149.00 (sug. mfr.)
Print Speed: Max. 22ppm (black), 11ppm (color).
Resolution: 5760 x 1440dpi (optimized)
Max. Input: 150 sheets
Max. Paper Size: 8.5 x 44"inches (print), 8.5 x 11.7 inches (scan)
Port: USB 1.1
OS: Windows 98SE and later; Mac OS8.6 and later
Dimensions: 17.8 x 17.1 x 10 inch
Weight: 19.8 lbs.
Warranty: Standard one year limited warranty including Epson Exchange program