Our initial impressions when we took the X5470 out from the box were that this inkbox looked like a transformer. There were as many safety stickers to remove as there were moving parts on this multifunction inkjet. Even though Lexmark claims it has a new design strategy with its latest printers, we felt that this was still a conservative move. The X5470 retains the familiarity that comes with the rest of the company's lineup, except it now arrives with a reflective iPod-ish white color supplemented by gray-silver hues.

Design
If you place this printer in a dusty environment, be prepared to clean it often--white doesn't go well with dust and dirt. The control panel may seem intimidating at first with the array of buttons, but once you take a closer look the learning curve isn't all that steep. There are dedicated keys for each of the main functions of the printer and a button each for printing in color and monochrome.

Lexmark doesn't include a built-in LCD monitor, which has become quite standard in many inkboxes these days. Instead there's a two-line text display on the control panel. If you're going to print photos frequently from your memory card, give this printer a miss. Alternatively, you can pre-select the pictures you wish to print and use the PictBridge port to get the snaps onto hard copy.

Features
Previously, we lamented on the non-Mac-compatibility issue, but according to Lexmark, the X5470 is the first from the company to be Mac-friendly. Good news there, really. System requirements state that you should be running Mac OS X versions 10.3.0 and above.

This inexpensive Lexmark prints, scans, copies and faxes--great for the home business running on a tight budget. There's also a built-in card reader for CompactFlash, Secure Digital, MultiMediaCard, xD-Picture Card, Memory Stick and a PictBridge port to the right of the control panel.

As mentioned earlier, there's no built-in LCD display to preview pictures, but what Lexmark touts is a proofsheet (with red-eye reduction selection) to select the frames you wish to print. All you have to do is slot your flash media into the onboard reader, print out the proofsheet, check off the photos you want and place the sheet back onto the scanner bed. For photo-editing, you'll have to rely on the editing functions on your camera (if there is any) or any post-processing software on your PC. Lexmark bundles the printer with a Photo Editor and Imaging Studio application which allows you to do basic editing.

There's also a 10-page automatic document feeder (ADF) on the X5470 that supports multiple page faxing and copying. If you have only a few sheets of paper to fax (via the 33.6Kbps modem) to a colleague or friend, then the ADF is a godsend, likewise for copying of documents. This Lexmark uses a flatbed scanner that has an optical resolution of 600 x 1,200ppi, scan to PDF and optical character recognition features.

On the downside, the X5470 doesn't use the one-cartridge system so you'll have to shell out more cash for separate black and color ink tanks. The power adapter looks like a brick, but the saving grace is it slots into the rear of the inkbox so you actually won't see it that often. We also wished that this Lexmark was network-ready which would make it indispensable in a multiuser environment.

Lexmark offers a next-business-day one-to-one replacement of up to one year for the X5470 mulitfunction printer.

Performance
The X5470 performed basic printing tasks just fine. Our 10-page printout took 1 minute 18 seconds for the last sheet to drop onto the tray. We could read Times New Roman up to size five, beyond which the lettering started to bleed and we had to squint a little to read sentences. Printing a color document with text and graphics took about 34 seconds.

Photo printing took a while; expect to wait twice as long if you're printing in Photo quality. A 4 x 6-inch print took 1 minute 18 seconds while an A4 color photo needed about 2 minutes 35 seconds. Scanning on this Lexmark was a breeze and we managed to scan to JPEGs and PDFs in slightly under 12 seconds. Copying using the ADF took a tad longer at 46 seconds for a text document and 56 seconds for a color document. If you had used the flatbed scanner for copying tasks, you'd have saved about 8 seconds, but you cannot do multiple copies.

Image Quality
The Imaging Studio software allows you to select only three paper sizes: 4 x 6-inch, 5 x 7-inch and 8 x 10-inch. So if you're printing in other sizes, skip the program. Print quality on our text and color documents was nothing to shout at, but it got its job done though we noticed slight banding in color gradients.

For photos, we preferred printing in Photo quality as that gave us more saturated colors and shaper printouts compared with Normal quality. That said, if you're in a rush, you can print in Normal quality and the picture would still look alright.

Scan quality was generally fine, though if you're using the ADF in copy mode, be prepared to chuck the prints unless you need them only as draft sheets.