Lexmark X2500 – Surprisingly Good

Pros

The Lexmark X2500 is an immensely inexpensive Color All-in-One printer delivering surprisingly fast task speeds, low per-page print and offers a respectable assortment of photo editing features in bundled Imaging Studio utility.

Cons

The Lexmark X2500 doesn’t have onboard LCD, so you will have to initiate the advanced functions such as scan and copy from your PC; the printer doesn’t have media card readers and even the photo quality could use some improvement.

Introduction

The Lexmark X2500 Color All-in-One printer is one another proof that Lexmark is trying to corner the average printer market. Earlier we’ve seen Lexmark Z1300, priced at $25, it was the cheapest single-function printer that we’ve seen till now, and now we have the X2500, which up to now is the cheapest Color all-in-one printer we’ve seen till date.

The X2500 is priced at $60, and is still $30 less than Canon’s Pixma MP160 and $20 less than HP’s DeskJet F380. Considering all the aforementioned things, we actually weren’t expecting a lot from the $60 multifunction printer, but it shocked us with its surprisingly fast task speeds and in general well-mannered task quality. So on a whole this all-in-one printer is well matched for the casual home users who requires printers just in case there is an emergency or for rare print or copy needs.

Design

Like most of the reasonably priced printers the Lexmark X2500 all-in-one also flaunts a basic simple design. Measuring 11.5 inches deep by 16.9 inches wide by 6.9 inches tall (devoid of paper trays unmitigated), the white-and-light-gray printer weighs 10.4 pounds, which is comparatively lighter. Flip open the scanner lid of the printer and you’ll see an A4-size flatbed scanner.

The paper input support for the printer sticks out from the rear end of the printer and is protected by a lucent gray shield, which prevents unwanted objects from falling in and jamming the paper input. The output tray of the printer extends from the front the printer. The longer corral sheets are hold by a fold-out flap. The control panel of X2500 is pretty elementary and comprises of only six buttons, four out of  the six are the buttons to start various tasks and the remaining two buttons are the cancel and feed buttons. There also are two ink icons, that lights up when the ink levels in the printer are low. Like we made it clear in the very starting of the review, the printer doesn’t have a display to speak about, so most of the adjustments have to be made using the bundled software utility. The Lexmark X2500 comes with two-ink tank system: one tricolor (CMY) and one black. The printer delivers really affordable per print costs and even the ink tanks for the system are easy to get. The good thing here is that for a $60 all-in-one printer, the Lexmark X2500 offers really decent amount of features. Though, using all of them surely is not as easy as using them on the expensive all-in-ones, but that’s hardly a problem and is rather expected.

System Configuration

Price: NA
Manufacturer: Lexmark
Part Number: 21A0501
Printer Type: Digital
Dimensions (L x W x H): 14 x 19 x 9 mm

System weight: 5,900 g
Technology: Inkjet
Scanner Type: Flatbed Scanner Path-Through Scanner
Supported Media Type: Banners, Index Cards, Envelopes, Photo Paper, Labels, Transparencies, Plain Paper, Cardstock and Hagaki Card
Operating System Supported: Microsoft Windows 2000, Microsoft Windows XP Pro x64, Microsoft Windows XP, Apple MacOS X 10.3, Microsoft Windows Vista, Apple MacOS X 10.4, Apple MacOS X 10.3.9 and Apple MacOS X 10.3.6
Power source: Mains

Performance

The Lexmark X2500 delivered much better performance than what we expected from the printer, considering the $60 price tag. For text printing, the printer beat its even more expensive competition from Epson and HP by a score of 4.34 pages per minute (ppm), though it was behind the Canon Pixma MP160 which printed at the speed of 5.81ppm. The performance was satisfactory even for 4×6 photos, and the printer tool only 0.77ppm, and was again only behind the Canon’s Pixma MP160 which delivered 1.36ppm. The scores for rest of the test were also pretty satisfactory and we were happy to see that even in terms of quality the X2500 did a decent job. Though, there were problems with the prints upon closer examination, but on a whole we liked the print quality, especially considering the fact that it came at quick pace and from a printer that’s priced on $60. So on a whole, its quality might not be stellar, but still is acceptable for casual uses.

Support

The Lexmark X2500 gets a one year standard warranty from. You can get the toll free support from Monday to Friday from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m., and on Saturdays from noon to 6 p.m. ET. You can also get online tech support via chat at the same timings, or can even send an e-mail to Lexmark’s tech support at any point of time. You can always get a knowledge base of how-tos and FAQs, as well as drivers and product manuals.

Word from the Experts

The Color All-in-One printer Lexmark X2500 has a surprising blend of affordable price, comprehensive feature, and really fast task speeds. The printer might not be for everyone, but definitely is a decent option for the users looking for a bargain.