Expert’s Rating
Pros
Cons
Our Verdict
Dell’sV313wcolor inkjet multifunction printing machine is priced at a mere $ 100 , and it seems to receive regular discounting on Dell ’s Website . But while it calculate like a good deal ( especially in view of its mix wireless functionality ) it ’s ultimately a mediocre intersection overall , with expensive inks .
The V313w ’s few nice features are tack onto an otherwise unremarkable machine . The Wi - Fi solve delicately , and the front of the unit includes both a USB interface and a calling card reader for MMC , MS , SD , and xD culture medium . Though the control condition panel is easy to use , the buttons are inexplicably small , given the vast amount of blank uncommitted . The control board tilts upward for easier viewing , but you have to twist the underbody of the panel to retract it .
The underlying paper handling features on the V313w consist of a 100 - shroud rearward perpendicular provender and manual duplexing . An additional sheet print out with a semidetached house caper to pass the refeeding process ; you may incapacitate this aid if you do n’t require it . The A4 - sizing image scanner lacks an automatic papers feeder to hasten run down multipage jobs , but the chapeau telescopes a good inch to accommodate thick materials .
Performance is a motley dish . unornamented black school text printed at a fair rate of 6.6 pages per instant on the Mac and at 6.7 ppm on Windows . Also on Windows , snapshot - sizing photos printed at 3 ppm at default mount and 0.8 ppm at finer preferences . A full - Sir Frederick Handley Page , eminent - resolution photo printed on the Mac at a pace of 0.8 ppm , too — quicker than most other MFPs finagle with the same image . On the other hand , copying and scanning speeds were slower than modal .
Text quality was nicely dark , but crisper in our Mac sample than in our Windows sampling . Whereas coloring photos printed on apparent paper search excessively vivid and more or less wash out , but the same image look smooth and rude on Dell ’s own glossy paper .
We meet an interesting quirk in the V313w ’s printing cognitive process . simulacrum printed with Photoshop CS4 appear off vertical heart and soul on the page , with little to no margin at the top and excessive distance at the bottom . Images printed from other programs did n’t suffer from this defect . Dell propose that in Windows 7 , specify the Paper Source to ‘ Automatically Select ’ may have the margins to boost up , if the pressman has only one paper tray — as is the case with the V313w . Whatever the reason , it ’s a irritating fault .
Even if you could suffer the V313w ’s foibles , its ink costs may dissuade you from signing on : They ’re among the highest we ’ve find out . The standard - size black cartridge and the unified cyan , magenta , and yellow color pickup did n’t even last through our testing – that ’s how down in the mouth their pageboy yields are . The $ 16 black cartridge was good for 180 pages , and the $ 20 colour magazine delivered 170 pages , which play out to 8.9 cents per black page , and a 20.7 cents per four - colour Thomas Nelson Page . The 360 - varlet black ( $ 30 ) and 340 - page color ( $ 35 ) gamey - yield cartridges lower the MFP ’s consumables costs only marginally , to 8.3 cents per black-market page and 18.6 cents per four - people of colour varlet .
Macworld’s buying advice
Dell ’s V313w wait like an cheap way to get a Wi - Fi - equip multifunction printer . alas , its high ink cost more than offset your initial saving — and make its other quirks less tolerable .
