Lexmark's success in the printer market has been in no small part down to an effective combination of high speeds and low prices. After recently announcing a new range of all-in-ones we were keen to get our hands on one of these feature-packed office solutions. The X6570 on test here is the headline model.

A wide range of features and functionality combines with a small footprint to make this an ideal solution for a home office. You'll find a colour inkjet printer, scanner, fax and copier built in, and on top of this the 6570 can also connect wirelessly to your PC and offers two-sided printing.

Alongside some very effective software support you'll find the Lexmark toolbar that allows you to instantly print Web pages, including ‘text only' output which handily removes any pictures from the page for you. This is a nice addition but is currently only compatible with Internet Explorer.

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The setup routine for the printer is straightforward provided you follow the instructions, which should reassure users who doubt their ability to add a wireless printer. A wireless indicator on the front panel changes from red to orange to green to show the status of the connection, but if you're not happy using this or don't have a wireless network you can hook the printer up directly using a standard USB cable.

The X6570 is a pretty compact unit. We liked the grey and cream styling and, although it perhaps doesn't feel as solid as some rivals, this isn't a big concern. The main control panel and LCD display on the front make it easy to access features such as the copier, fax and scanner without going through your PC, and additionally you'll find a multi-card slot and Pictbridge connection for accessing your digital photos.

In terms of performance the Lexmark certainly scores points for speed, claiming up to 28 pages per minute for monochrome prints, although you'll have to really dial down the quality settings to get close to this. Typically you can expect around 15ppm at the standard quality setting, although this should still be fast enough for most. Photo printing is also fast, with a full colour, borderless A4 print appearing in just over 4 minutes, and less than half this time for a 6 x 4-inch photo.

Unfortunately the quality isn't quite up to the same standard. Text printing is fairly good, although we did notice some ink bleed on parts of the page despite using premium inkjet paper. More significantly we were quite let down by its photo printing capabilities. This clearly isn't a dedicated photo printer, and Lexmark isn't marketing it as such, so you won't find a photo paper tray or a colour screen on which to preview your pictures.

It is the quality of the printouts that's the biggest concern though; pictures weren't particularly sharp, with noticeable colour bleed and an apparent greenish hue over most of the images. Lexmark does offer some automatic colour, contrast and sharpness enhancement, although we didn't find this made much of a difference. On top of this we noticed that ‘borderless' printing wasn't completely borderless, so expect a thin white border around at least two sides of the image.

It's also worth noting that this printer saps ink like it's sprung a leak. After just three full colour A4 prints the colour cartridge was half empty, and although it wasn't as bad for black and white text printing, at £20 a pop you're not doing to want to replace them very often.

The X6570's photo capabilities were a let-down then, but this doesn't write the printer off by any means. If you're looking to primarily print photographs you'd be better off shopping for a machine more dedicated to this area. Anyone else should be impressed by the range of features, wireless connectivity and two-sided printing function, which works well. There's good software support which makes it great for beginners, and it's quick out of the blocks.

Despite the X6570 falling down in terms of photo printing we were still impressed by the fact that you can get all of these features on an attractive looking device at a reasonable price. It'd be ideal for a home office, being fast, responsive and very easy to use.