The HP Officejet J6480 All-in-One ($199 direct) falls into the once-rare but increasingly common category of inexpensive all-in-ones (AIOs) that can serve double duty in the home and home office. Unlike its most direct competition, however, it isn't limited to the lightest of light-duty printing, making it a potentially good fit for a small office or as a personal AIO. It also puts the J6480 head and shoulders above the competition.

The J6480 prints, scans, and works as a standalone copier and fax machine. It can connect by USB cable, wired network, or Wi-Fi, and it can scan to and fax from a PC, including over a network connection.

Office-related features in addition to faxing include a 35-page automatic document feeder (ADF) for scanning, faxing, and copying multipage documents; a 250-sheet page input tray; and a built-in duplexer for printing on both sides of a page. The ADF is typical of those found on dual-purpose AIOs for the home and home office. A 250-sheet tray and duplexer are above and beyond the norm. The Brother MFC-685cw, for example, holds only 100 sheets.

For home use, the J6480 can print directly from memory cards, and it prints photos at unusually high quality. It cuts some corners on the home side, however, presumably to keep the price down. First, there's no color LCD for previewing photos on memory cards. Instead, you have to print an index sheet, then use the LCD-based menu to specify which photos to print.

Second, it can't print directly from cameras. If your camera uses a memory card format that the AIO doesn't support, you'll have to move the files to your computer before printing. The good news is that using adapters, the J6480 can handle the most popular memory card formats (CompactFlash I and II, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro, Memory Stick Duo, and Memory Stick Pro Duo, Secure Digital and MultiMedia Card, and xD-Picture Card) as well as the mini versions of these cards. As long as your camera takes one of these, you can print easily enough.

Setup is standard fare. The J6480 weighs 16.9 pounds and measures 10.0 by 18.7 by 18.6 inches (HWD) complete with paper trays. Just find a spot for it, plug it in, add ink and paper, and run the automated installation routine. I tested it using a network connection and Windows XP. According to HP, it also comes with a full set of drivers and software for Windows Vista, Vista x64, and Mac OS 10.3.9 and 10.4.x, with software and drivers for OS 10.5 available on HP's Web site. In addition, it comes with print and scan drivers (but not fax drivers) for Windows 2000 and XP Professional x64.

The J6480's print speed isn't overly impressive, but it's better than what you'd get from the most direct competition. I timed it on our business applications suite (using QualityLogic's hardware and software for timing, www.qualitylogic.com) at a total 17 minutes 44 seconds. The Brother MFC-685cw came in at a total 21:10.

To put these results in context, both times are significantly slower than the 12:18 total for the similarly priced Editors' Choice Canon Pixma MP610. But the MP610 doesn't include an ADF or fax support. You can find these features, along with essentially the same speed as the MP610's, in the Editors' Choice Canon Pixma MX850, but you'll pay substantially more for the combination.

Photo printing speed was also notably slow. The J6480 averaged 2:42 for each 4-by-6 and 6:19 for each 8-by-10. By comparison, the MP610 averaged 0:54 and 1:40 on the same prints. On the other hand, the MFC-685cw was even slower than the HP AIO, averaging 4:07 and 9:23, respectively. And there's an additional wrinkle to consider.

As with many inkjets, the J6480 gives you the choice of printing with four colors (cyan, yellow, magenta, and black) using a black and tricolor cartridge, or printing with six colors (adding light cyan and light magenta) by substituting a photo cartridge for the black cartridge.

Our official timing tests use six colors if that's an option, because the quality difference is usually significant. In this case, however, the difference was so small that many people wouldn't even notice it. More important, those who do notice a difference may think that printing with six colors is not worth the extra time it takes, or worth the effort of changing cartridges and letting the AIO print its alignment page. If you stay with four-color printing, the time drops to an average of 1:45 for each 4-by-6 and 4:19 for each 8-by-10.

The J6480's output quality is all over the map. It's subpar for text, par for graphics, and way above par for photos—even when printing with four colors. Fewer than half of our test fonts qualified as reasonably well formed at 8 points, and two heavily stylized fonts with thick strokes couldn't qualify at any size. The AIO did a little better on passing the threshold for easy readability, with more than half the fonts qualifying at 8 points.

That said, the text quality is typical of AIOs that are meant for both home and home office. Consider it good enough for schoolwork or for most standard business documents but not a good choice if you need to print small fonts or project a sense of professionalism in your output. Keep in mind, too, that you can always boost text quality a bit by using a more expensive, brighter paper, particularly one designed specifically for inkjets.

Graphics output is spot-on typical of inkjet AIOs. The only significant flaw I saw was a tendency to lose thin lines against a dark background—a common problem. Otherwise, the output is easily good enough for any internal business use, including PowerPoint handouts. It's even suitable for items like reports meant for an important client or customer.

The J6480's photo quality is better than you'd expect from a typical drugstore or local photo shop, which makes it better than what most inkjets can manage. Every photo I printed qualified as true photo quality, suitable for framing. Unfortunately, the photos aren't at all waterproof, so you'll have to handle them carefully. But they'll be safe framed behind glass. They should also last, with HP claiming a 200-year lifetime for photos kept in dark storage, as in an album, and 108 years framed behind glass.

Despite some text-quality issues, the HP Officejet J6480 offers a remarkably good balance of features. It's certainly one of the best choices to date if you need a single AIO for both home and home office. And although it's slower than the Canon Pixma MP610, its ADF and fax capability give it the overall advantage, making it the new low-end Editors' Choice as a dual-purpose printer for home and home office.

Check out the HP Officejet J6480 All-In-One's test scores.

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