The D88 and the slightly cheaper D78 are Epson's latest, four-colour, general purpose inkjet printers aimed at the home user, both for domestic and home-based business needs.

The D88 Plus is a squat, though relatively compact, silver and black printer with a traditional upright paper feeder at the back, and it weighs in at a relatively light 4.2kg. Apart from some basic control buttons on the top (paper and ink replacement warnings and the on/off control) that's pretty much all you get. Even though this is a budget machine, it was disappointing to see only a USB 1.1 connection in this 2.0 era.

However, when it comes to print quality you have the same optimised dpi rate (5,760 x 1,440) as the more sophisticated Epson printers and all-in-ones like the Stylus DX6000. Even the print speeds are not far behind its big brothers, with optimum black text at 23ppm, colour text at 14ppm and 10 x 15cm (6 x 4-inch) photos averaging 92 seconds. There's no option for an extra paper feeder but the 100-page limit should be more than sufficient for most household requirements.

The D88 Plus uses Epson's regular DURABrite Ultra ink which means that laser-like print quality can be produced on plain paper and photos are not only of a high standard but also they emerge smudge free and dry almost instantly. As is increasingly the norm, the use of multi-cartridges (four in this case) is designed to keep costs down as you only pay out for replacements (£7 each here) when a particular colour runs out.

Unfortunately, running out rapidly has been the ongoing problem with the DURABrite Ultra inks and this remains the biggest stumbling block to using it for large numbers of photo reprints.

On the plus side, you do receive Epson's current software package which has been consistently excellent. As well as the detailed User's Guide (which gives a complete breakdown of the hardware, operating instructions and software) you have the action-packed Creativity Suite which includes Easy Photo Print and File Manager that together cover most functions like scanning, editing, saving, sorting, printing and attaching to e-mails.

In addition, Epson Web-to-Page resizes Web pages to fit your paper, PIF (i.e. Print Image Framer) Designer does exactly what it says on the tin and ArcSoft Photo Impression allows you to further enhance and retouch your images and then turn them into calendars and greeting cards, etc. If you're working off a Mac, you'll be pleased to hear that the software is also Mac compatible.

An absolutely basic printer for home users on a limited budget which delivers superior quality photo reproductions at a reasonable speed using admirable software. But bear in mind that for another £30 you'd get USB 2.0 (though whether this would make the printer any faster is questionable), multi memory card slots and an LCD viewer, by buying the DX6000 instead.