HP Photosmart 7520 review

Although part of HP's image-orientated Photosmart range, the HP 7520 is a very capable home office all-in-one printer. It has fax facilities alongside the expected printing, scanning and photocopying.

There's a 25-sheet document feeder for the scanner, a meaty 125-sheet paper tray and a 20-sheet tray for photo paper (up to 5 x 7 inches). It can both print and scan in Duplex too.

On the downside, there's no second A4 (US letter) sized paper tray and the scanner lid has fixed hinges so they can't stretch to accommodate thicker materials.

But even so, the multifunction printer is comfortably good enough to service a home or small office. Is the distinction between HP's Officejet and Photosmart printer ranges becoming blurred?

The HP Photosmart 7520 connects to your network through Wi-Fi or directly through USB; there's no Ethernet option. HP ePrint enables you to email documents to your printer from internet-connected smartphones, tablets and computers, and it's AirPrint-capable for printing from Apple devices.

Wireless direct printing enables you to make a Wi-Fi connection without a network, and it's also Google Cloud Print-ready. Its inkjet system uses five tanks: cyan, magenta, yellow and black, with a second black tank with pigment ink for high-quality text printing.

The HP Photosmart 7520 is easy to set up and use. Its 10.9cm (4.29-inch) colour touchscreen puts all its functions at your fingertips, and you can view video guides for maintenance tasks such as clearing a paper jam or replacing spent ink cartridges.

Wi-Fi set-up is simple too - you'll be connected to your network in no time. The touchscreen is very responsive, but not so twitchy that you will press buttons by accident simply by brushing against them.

Unfortunately, it can be fickle when scrolling through the row of downloaded print applications atop the screen, but its basic function buttons work well.

Overall build quality is very good. It's solid and robust, with meaty paper trays and a solid ADF for the scanner. It has a couple of weak points, though. The hinges for the scanner lid don't stretch or telescope for when scanning something thick and meaty, which is a surprising oversight considering how much effort has been made in bringing small-office features to the printer.

Also, the catch tray that holds your printouts is little more than a sliver of plastic that has to be manually extended before printing.

The HP Photosmart 7520 is priced £179/US$149.99/AU$269, putting it in the same sort of price bracket as the HP Officejet 150 Mobile, Canon Pixma MG6350 and Brother MFC-J4510DW.