Samsung SPP-2040 review

Samsung's SPP-2040 is the company's attempt to grab itself a share of the increasingly popular 6x4in photo printing market. And a pretty good attempt it is too.

The compact silver and black box is smaller than competitors from Epson and HP. And, although you'll need quite a bit of desk space in front of and behind the unit when its in use, when its dormant, you'll barely notice its there.

The SPP-2040, like Canon's Selphy and Kodak's Printer Dock, is a dye-sub based printer that can output 6x4in pics from your Mac, PictBridge camera, memory card, or Bluetooth phone.

Setting up the SPP-2040 is easy. It's supplied with enough paper and ink to print 10 images and the Quick Start guide walks you through inserting the ink ribbon and paper tray. Other than that, it's just a matter of plugging in the power and, if you want to print from your Mac, the USB cable. Both power and USB 2 ports are on the side of the device, alongside another USB port for connecting a PictBridge digital camera. This port can also be used to used to connect a Bluetooth dongle, available as an optional extra from Samsung for £27.

A Mac OS X driver is on the accompanying CD. With this installed you can print images from any Mac application. There are two options: postcard borderless, which produces a 6x4 in image edge to edge on the paper, and postcard, which will print an image surrounded by a thin white border.

The SPP-2040's 640 x 240-pixel LCD displays images from a memory card inserted in its integrated seven-in-one reader and the control buttons on the top of the device allow you to make basic adjustments to the image before printing. Printing from a PictBridge camera is equally straightforward, though any adjustments to the image must be made on-camera as the printer doesn't display images or allow you to edit them. Bluetooth printing involves a tortuous process of pairing the printer with a Bluetooth phone, before printing from the phone.

Despite the fact that dye-sub printing involves running the paper through the printer four times output was reasonably nippy, with prints from a digital camera landing on the output tray in around one minute. Prints from a Mac took a little longer at one minute 20 seconds. These results compare favourably with printers from Canon, HP, and Epson.

Output quality was very respectable. We did detect a slight hatching pattern in light areas and skin tones on some prints taken with a digital camera and output from Photoshop, but colour was accurate and prints were otherwise blemish free.

An SPP-2040 can be bought online for around £140, while our favourite photo printer, HP's Photosmart 375 costs around £175. More important than the initial price of the printer, though, is the cost per print and this is where the Samsung struggles. While cost per print for HP's Photosmart and Epson's PictureMate is around 22p per print within a 100-sheet pack, Samsung's 120-sheet pack works out at 27p per print, making it significantly more expensive.

The Samsung SPP-2040 is versatile, quick and turns out good results. Its card reader and LCD screen mean it ticks all the boxes for features. The price of the printer is competitive, but Samsung should reduce the price of its consumables to earn top marks.