HP DeskJet Ink Advantage 2520hc: Best suited for homes and SOHO users

All-in-one printing solutions are all about more and more connectivity features, but HP has chosen to keep a lid on it with the entry-level DeskJet Ink Advantage 2520hc and has instead decided to concentrate on offering more prints per cartridge. It’s clearly meant for home usage and for those who have a small office or home office (SOHO) setup. Let us find out if the speed and quality of this entry-level MFD are up to the mark.   Design and Build [caption id=“attachment_216313” align=“aligncenter” width=“648”]  HP DeskJet Ink Advantage 2520hc is an all-in-one MFD which allows printing, copying and scanning operations[/caption]   The HP 2520hc looks quite similar in design to its predecessors in the sub-Rs 10,000 price bracket. It comes in a dark brown coloured matte-finish body with a wavy design on its top portion. It is rectangular in shape with the edges tapering inwards. The sides are clean and you will only find the power port and USB port on the rear side. It weighs around 3.9 kg. [caption id=“attachment_216312” align=“aligncenter” width=“648”]  The flap on the scanner bed is quite sturdy but the hinges are fixed which can be problematic if you want to scan thick books[/caption]   Paper needs to be loaded from the rear and it has a transparent front flap to prevent papers from toppling over on to the front. It can hold up to 60 sheets at a time. The output tray comes with a tray extender which is not sturdy at all and can only hold 25 sheets at a time. There is no projection on the extender to hold printed paper in spot and it’s spit out of the printer. The top portion which is also the flap of the flatbed scanner is well built and does not flex. We would have liked it more if the hinge was adjustable because if you want to scan a thick book or magazine, then the flap rests at an angle against the material being scanned or copied. The direct operational buttons require a hard press as they are concealed under a sheet of thin plastic which covers the control panel.   Features The 2520hc is an all-in-one multi-functional device (MFD) with functions including printing, copying and scanning. The HP 2520hc has a minimal design as is expected of an entry-level AIO. There is a 1.1.-inch mono display which shows the ink levels and shows the number of copies being made or prints being taken. You have direct buttons to scan, copy and cancel an operation. [caption id=“attachment_216315” align=“aligncenter” width=“637”]  The control panel on the HP 2520hc is minimal comprising of a 1.1-inch mono display and dedicated buttons for scanning, copying and cancelling operations.[/caption]   Ink cartridges need to be loaded from the front of the 2520hc and it takes in two of them – the HP 46 black ink cartridge and the HP 46 tri-colour one. Installation of the cartridges and ultimately of the printer is quite easy. Considering this is an entry-level AIO, you only get USB connectivity. If you want wired/wireless connectivity options, you need to look elsewhere and pay a higher price. [caption id=“attachment_216310” align=“aligncenter” width=“543”]  The rear side of the HP 2520hc only has the power port and the USB connector port[/caption]   The resolution for colour prints goes upto 4800x1200 dpi and 600 dpi for monochrome prints. Scanner has a resolution upto 1200dpi whereas the copier is limited to 600x300 dpi for both colour and black copies. You can even resize the material to be copied on the HP 2520hc.   Test Setup Processor: AMD E350 @1.6GHz Motherboard: MSI E350IA E45 RAM: 8GB DDR3 HDD: Western Digital WD2500JS Blu-ray Drive: Hitachi BH30N Graphics card: HIS 7750 H775FT1G PSU: ASUS Atlas A45GA 450W Cabinet: Cooler Master Elite 120M OS: Windows 7 64-bit Ultimate   Performance The text document print took 54.22 secs at Best Quality. Dithering of ink was noticeable in font sizes 4 and 6, but for fonts larger than 6 dithering was minimal and noticed only when viewed under a magnifying glass. Overall text print quality was great. [caption id=“attachment_216323” align=“aligncenter” width=“384”]  Mixed document test print page[/caption]   The mixed document print took 79 secs at Best Quality. It was able to demarcate the colours distinctly on the colour swatch seen in the middle. In the gradient banding, it tended to merge the last three columns of the black colour. The yellow text on a red background was more readable and suffered from less dithering than the yellow text on black background. Under font size 4, text wasn’t legible.   Draft printing 5 text documents took 31.35 secs and for 5 mixed documents, draft printing took 89 secs. While we did not notice any issue with the text draft prints, in the case of mixed document printing, you could notice a drop in colour contrast and there were a lot of unwanted lines in solid colours. Also a lot of noise was noticed in areas with solid colours. So if you are planning to print a mixed document, use the draft mode only if you are trying to save ink. Colour copy took 50 seconds, which is par for the course. [caption id=“attachment_216324” align=“aligncenter” width=“384”]  Test image for Glossy photo print test[/caption]   We printed a test photo using Kodak Photo Paper at best quality setting. It takes a good 3 mins 21 secs to print out an A4 size photo, but the quality of the print was quite good. Skin tones looked good and minute details were well reproduced.   Price and Verdict The HP DeskJet Ink Advantage 2520hc has an MRP of Rs 8899. The rated capacities of the cartridges are 1500 pages for the black cartridge and 750 pages for the tri-colour ink cartridge - both of these cartridges cost Rs 546 each. This gives you a cost per page of 37 paise for mono prints and 73 paise for colour prints. If you are a home user or have a small home/office setup and are on a tight budget, this AIO makes a lot of sense. If you want connectivity options such as wired/wireless or even PictBridge, then you will need to look elsewhere. The HP 2520hc offers decent value and even if you discount 20 percent from the rated print capacity of each cartridge, you still get a decent cost per page. It is certainly not the fastest printer, but in home environment that is not such a deal-breaker.