HP Envy 120 – Print Speed

HP only quotes modest print speeds and we got quite close to these under test. Our five-page black text print yielded 5.5 pages-per-minute (ppm) against a claim of 7.0ppm, while the 20-page document gave 6.3ppm. The machine also has a fast draft mode that’s actually surprisingly close to normal print, which managed 10.3ppm.

Duplex is standard on the machine and seems a little quicker than in the previous generation, giving 3.5 sides per minute with a much smaller pause between sides. A single page, colour copy took 48 seconds and 15 x 10cm photos took between 1min 12s and 1min 26s, depending on source. Interestingly, the fastest print was in best print mode, directly from a PC.

HP Envy 120 – Print Quality and Running Costs

Print quality is good, with dense blacks and very little ink spread. There’s quite a bit of smear in the fast draft mode, though little wash-out. Colours come through bright and solid, though there’s some banding in areas of solid fill. Copies are a little paler than originals, though unusually close in most aspects. The machine’s scanner does a good job of reproducing original content.

Photos come through well, with plenty of detail in darker and lighter areas and good colour reproduction, though with a slight loss of some red depth.

The two ink cartridges are available in standard and high yield versions and using the high yield, we get page costs of 3.7p for black and 10.2p the colour. In comparison with similarly priced all-in-ones, these costs are about average.

Verdict

HP’s Envy 120 has a real feel of quality about it, from the automatically opening control panel and tray to the silky smooth glass touch-screen and the innovative inverted scanner mechanism. It does a good job of printing, scanning and copying, and its wireless connection works well for printing from most mobile devices. Shame it can’t hold plain and photo paper at the same time, and that its asking price may discourage some customers.