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As a combined printer, photocopier and fax machine, the Epson BX305FW makes good sense and its four-ink DURABrite Ultra system makes for rugged prints that are water, smudge and fade-resistant on plain paper. It's nice to know you can print out important business documents and they're going to stay looking professional.
We liked
The auto document feeder works well with scanning, photocopying and faxing, and the BX305FW takes most office printing jobs in its stride.
The robustness of the output is definitely the main attraction and, while photo quality is poor on glossy paper, photographic images actually look very passable on plain paper. Wi-Fi connectivity is a bonus.
We disliked
The resin-based inks are perfect for double-sided printing, because the ink doesn't soak into the paper, but the BX305FW doesn't include an auto duplex facility, so you have to turn each page over manually.
The single paper input tray means you have to switch between plain paper, headed paper, envelopes and photo paper all too often, and there's no means of printing direct from a USB flash drive.
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Photo printing is extremely slow, especially in top quality mode, and running costs are very high if you use the standard-yield ink cartridges, and still pretty expensive even with high-yield cartridges fitted.
Verdict
The BX305FW works pretty well for basic printing, scanning, photocopying and faxing and its ULTRABrite Ultra inks make for impressively smudge-resistant prints. However, it's lacking in various areas and a few extra features would have made it much more useful in the office.
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