All-in-one Printers are ideal for those with limited desk space, and offer great value for money compared to buying an individual printer, copier and scanner. The HP Deskjet F4280 is an entry level unit, fitting the bill perfectly for my needs. Although I have had a few problems I think on balance such a machine is better than three seperate machines.

There are three uses for the HP F4280, a printer, a copier, and a scanner. The first feature to mention is the printer. This printer can print 26 pages per minute in black/white and 20 ppm in colour. As the whole unit is priced at around £40 I think this is a very reasonable printing rate. I have had printers in the past that take forever to print sheets, but the HP F4280 copes easily with large numbers of pages. Replacement cartridges can be bought for under £20 for the colour and slightly less for mono. Initial installation is also simple. All I had to do was install software on my Laptop in order for it to recognise the F4280, then each time I plug it in the laptop will instantly recognise the USB connection of the F4280. The pages are printed in high quality, vibrant colours and the overall finish is impressive. Although printing is fast it is also fairly quiet also. The paper tray holds up to 80 sheets of paper, but I never fill it as I don't print that many sheets at one time.

The copier of the HP F4280 also gets a fair bit of use, with the same colour and black/white copying figures as the printing ones from above. The copier is very simple to operate by placing the item you wish to be copied under the flap at the top of the unit. Then you just press the 'Copy' button on the right side of the top of the F4280 and you can print upto 10 copies at a time. The scanner is the final feature of the F4280 and again it has a simple operation to it. The scanner works the same as the copier, apart from instead of printing a copy out, it simply transfers it to your laptop or PC.

Overall the operation is very straightforward and if you get stuck on something there is a helpful and informative instruction manual included in the package. For around £40 I am struggling to find bad points. The scanner has posed a few issues, with it asking me to replace the ink cartridge before use, although this must be an error as I could still print afterwards. I would recommend the HP F4280 to anyone looking for a good all round performer for use in the home, if you have a heavy workload for such a product then I suggest you look elsewhere.