As one of the lower-end models in Canon's most recent release of five three-function (print/copy/scan) all-in-one printers, the Canon Pixma TS5120 Wireless All-in-One Inkjet Printer ($99.99) provides a basic set of features at a bargain price. It has good paper capacity for a budget inkjet, and decent speed. Its text quality is very good, but its photos are no match for the higher-end models in its line, such as the Canon Pixma TS9120.

Built for the Home

The TS5120 ($299.94 at Amazon) is a compact and light all-in-one printer, measuring 5.8 by 16.8 by 12.5 inches (HWD) and weighing 14.3 pounds. It has a simple, attractive design, with rounded corners. Our test unit is matte black; a white version of the printer is also available. The front panel, which can be tilted up for easy access, includes a 2.5-inch non-touch color LCD, flanked by control buttons and a four-way rocker switch with a central "OK" button.

Paper capacity is 200 sheets, between a 100-sheet main tray and a 100-sheet rear feeder (which can also fit up to 20 sheets of letter-size photo paper). This is very good for a budget inkjet all-in-one. It has an auto-duplexer for two-sided printing. On top is a letter-sized flatbed scanner, which lacks an automatic document feeder (ADF).

As the second-lowest-priced model in Canon's TS Series, the TS5120 has just two ink tanks—one black, the other combining the cyan, magenta, and yellow colors. The number of ink tanks vary through the series: The entry-level TS3120 ($239.30 at Amazon) also has two tanks, the midlevel TS6120 has five, and the high-end TS8120 and TS9120 each have six. As a result, the higher-end models are more photo-centric and produce better-quality prints, although the entire line does well at text printing (more on that in a minute).

The running costs for the TS5120, 6.7 cents per monochrome page and 14.7 cents per color page, are similar to other two-ink-cartridge printers we have tested. The HP Envy Photo 7855 ($229.99 at HP) , for instance, has costs of 6 cents per monochrome page and 16 cents per color page.

Mobile Printing Features

The TS5120 can connect directly to a computer via USB, or to a network via Wi-Fi, and also supports printing from or scanning to a mobile device from the Canon Print app. It also supports Pixma Cloud Link, which enables you to access your files directly from a variety of photo-sharing, social networking and storage sites. Unlike the Canon Pixma TS9120 ($149.99 at Walmart) , it lacks Ethernet connectivity. We tested it over a USB connection with drivers installed on a PC running Windows 10 Professional.

Respectable Speed

Budget inkjet all-in-ones are not known for their document-printing speed; although the TS5120 is no exception, it stacks up well against the other Canon printers in its series. In printing the text-only (Word) portion of our business applications suite, the TS8120 averaged 12.5 pages per minute (ppm), and at 4.3ppm in printing our full business suite, which includes PDF, PowerPoint, and Excel files in addition to the aforementioned Word document.

These scores are not significantly slower than the Canon TS9120, which costs twice as much; we timed that Editors' Choice model at 13.2 and 4.7ppm on the Word document and full suite, respectively. The TS5120 proved much faster than the entry-level Canon TS3120, which we clocked at 4.8ppm on the Word document and just 2.1ppm for the entire suite. It was also reasonably fast at photo printing, averaging 29 seconds per 4-by-6 print.

Typical Inkjet Output

Overall output quality for the TS5120, based on our testing, was slightly above par for an inkjet on the strength of its very good text, while graphics quality was average and photo quality a touch below par. Text quality should be good enough for any business use, even at small sizes, at least with standard fonts.

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In outputting the graphics part of our suite, colors were generally well-saturated. The TS5120 did reasonably well with thin colored lines, and in differentiating between similar tones. Several backgrounds looked slightly faded, many showed mild banding (a regular pattern of striations), and there was some dithering in the form of dot patterns in several illustrations. Graphics are fine for household and typical school use.

Photo prints tended to be a little on the light side, with a slight loss of detail in some bright areas. The prints looked OK, though the colors didn't pop or show the contrast the way they do with six-ink Canon printers like the TS8120 and the TS9120. There was a slight tint on a monochrome print. Photo quality is fine for snapshots destined for a bulletin board or refrigerator door, but this model isn't a good choice for budding photographers.

A Good Basic Home All-in-One

As a budget home all-in-one printer, the Canon Pixma TS5120 is fine for light-duty use, provided that you don't need Ethernet or fax. It has good paper capacity and decent speed, and the rear feeder lets you easily print photos. While text quality is very good, especially for an inkjet at its price, its photo prints lack the vibrancy of the higher-end models in its series, though they're fine for casual use or distribution. If you can flex your budget to get superior photo quality, you'll get that and Ethernet connectivity with the Editors' Choice Canon Pixma TS9120.

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