WHAT'S HOT: We were impressed with the S520's print quality all around. It produces clean black text, prints narrow black lines without too much overlapping or blurring, makes great-looking monochrome photos, and renders realistic-looking color photos with very good detail and subtle textures and shading--even on ordinary paper. It also prints fairly quickly, turning out text at 6.6 pages per minute, and has among the lowest ink costs for both black-and-white and color print jobs.

WHAT'S NOT: Canon's installer didn't work as described in the set-up guide; after several false starts, we had to let the Add Printer Wizard figure it out for us. Like those on many other recent Canon ink jets, the S520's paper trays don't attach firmly to the printer; the output tray is particularly inclined to fall off. That's not a big problem, but it can be a nuisance. Also, the driver is burdened with an aggravating number of dialog and subdialog boxes: Just to print a watermark, you must modify settings on four tabs.

WHAT ELSE: Canon's driver provides a wealth of features, including a way to print an external file as a background--for example, using a photograph as a form of stationery. The Print Advisor walks you through the steps to get the best quality on several common kinds of print jobs, such as photographs, tables, and charts. As on other Canon printers, each ink color resides in a separate cartridge, so if you you can replace tanks individually instead of having to replace the whole cartridge each time one color runs out.

UPSHOT: The combination of low consumables costs and attractive output makes this a good choice for the family room.

SUMMARY

Canon S520 Color Bubble Jet Printer Rated 12 ppm monochrome/6 ppm color, 2400-by-1200-dpi maximum resolution, 100 sheets input, 50 output. $149 800/652-2666 consumer.usa.canon.com