Lexmark Genesis S816 All-in-One Printer

The Lexmark Genesis comes in an upright format that's different than anything you've seen before. Along with a smaller footprint, the printer comes with excellent printing (photos in particular, but prints as well), and a very easy to use scanner. It's not perfect: of course there's no automatic document feeder or duplex scanning; and you may find pages come out limp when you print color documents (particularly on both sides). Still, I found it a very easy printer to use--if the touchscreen were bigger it would be even better, since next generations will likely let you surf the Web--and the results were top notch.

The first thing you'll notice about the Lexmark Genesis S816 all-in-one is that it stands printers on their head--literally. The printer is twice as tall as it is deep, meaning that prime desktop realty is saved. The 4.3-inch touchscreen is on the printer's front panel, and features large, bright icons that are very responsive. Given the large front of the printer, I wished the screen was bigger; when entering text (such as when setting up WiFi), I found the 'keyboard' a bit cramped and had a few fat-finger mistakes. That aside, the buttons are simple (copy, scan, fax), and options for each were laid out plainly.

Like other new Lexmark printers, the Genesis offers Smart Solutions--programmable quick tasks that are frequently needed, such as scanning directly to e-mail. You can take advantage of Lexmark's SmartSolution site to find options.

The Genesis printed faster than the Lexmark Pinnacle (which took nearly half a minute to put out a first page): for Word documents, first pages took about 20 seconds, with subsequent pages taking about 12 seconds each. For a PDF (printed across the wireless network), a first page took 30 seconds and about 19 seconds for subsequent pages. So, this isn't the printer for you if you need speed. However, it is a great choice if you need great-looking prints and photos. Color graphics were excellent, though when printed duplex the ink tended to make the page limp (there's probably a setting to reduce the ink density when printing duplex--frankly, I wish that it kicked in automatically when choosing duplex printing).

Photos looked great, with some of the finest colors I've seen in any all-in-one. One small gripe: A small part of the leading edge of 4x6 photos got slightly bent (probably where the roller pulls the photo paper into the printer). It didn't mar the photo, but I've not seen this happen on other printers. A 4x6 photo took only 39 seconds to print, which is very good time for an all-in-one to print a photo.

Scanning was one of my favorite features on the Genesis. The front of the printer swings open to reveal the scanner, and at first glance it looks as though it'll be tough to get a page to sit properly. However, this wasn't an issue at all, with letter-sized paper fitting easily and perfectly into the scanner. Close the top and you get an instant preview of the page inside, as well as myriad correction and saving options. If you want to print multiple small pages (for example, photos) at once, you need to place the items into the clip along the top edge of the printer. That's convenient, but it does cut off the edge of the scanned object.

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