The Canon Maxify GX1020 ($329.99) is a slightly cheaper, smaller, and lighter-duty version of the Canon Maxify GX3020 that we reviewed earlier this year. Both are all-in-one (AIO) printers by definition, since each combines a printer and scanner, but both offer far more robust printing than scanning. For the GX1020, which is limited to a single paper tray, the difference in capability between the two functions isn't quite as pronounced. But while the printer's speed, paper handling, and low running cost are suitable for moderate- or heavy-duty printing by small- or home-office standards, the flatbed-only scanner is strictly for light duty. If you're mostly looking for low-cost printing, but would also like some minimal scan and copy ability, the GX1020 could be the printer you want sitting on your desk.
The three-function GX1020 prints, scans, and copies, but you might want to think of it as a printer that can do some minor scanning in a pinch. The biggest limitation for scanning and copying is that paper handling for scanning is limited to manually placing pages on a letter-size flatbed. That's suitable for one- or two-page documents, but not for regularly scanning documents much longer than that, particularly if they're printed on both sides of the page. Humidity Dome For Plants
Paper handling for printing includes only a single paper tray, which can accept up to legal-size paper and offers automatic duplexing (two-sided printing). The one tray, without even a single-sheet bypass to supplement it, means that any time you want to switch the paper type or size, you'll need to swap out the paper in the tray. However, if almost all of what you print is on the same paper, that won't be a problem. And with a 250-sheet capacity, you can print up to 1,000 sheets per month without having to refill the tray more often than about once per five-day work week.
Physical setup is standard for a tank printer. At 15.4 pounds and 7.4 by 14.8 by 15 inches (HWD) with the output tray closed, or 20 inches deep with it open, the printer is easy to move into place. It's also small enough to fit comfortably on your desk for easily swapping or loading paper in the tray, as well as for entering commands on the 2.7-inch color touch-screen control panel and its surrounding buttons. Setup consists of inserting the print heads, loading paper, and pouring the ink into the tanks, with each bottle of ink—cyan, yellow, magenta, and black—keyed so you won't mistakenly pour it into the wrong tank. When you finish, the printer goes through a fully automated alignment.
Software installation is just as easy. For my tests I connected an Ethernet cable, followed the included instructions to go to the Canon website, and stepped through a self-explanatory installation routine that required little more than picking English for the language, USA for the location, and confirming that the software found the right printer before it installed the driver and scan utility. The other connection options are USB and Wi-Fi. For mobile printing and scanning, you can download a Canon app to your Android or iOS phone or tablet.
The main appeal of a tank printer is that its low running cost will offset the higher initial cost compared with cartridge-based equivalents. Canon says the GX1020 comes with enough ink to print 3,000 standard mono pages plus 3,000 standard color pages. After that, a full set of replacement bottles will print mono pages at 0.25 cent per page and color pages at 1.25 cents per page based on claimed yield and current ink costs. (Canon curiously estimates twice that amount for mono pages and only 1 cent for color pages, and a spokesperson was unable to explain how the company calculated those numbers.) As always, though, you shouldn't focus too much on the low ink cost. The better approach is to look instead at the total cost of ownership—running cost plus initial cost—as we discuss in our guide to How to Save Money on Your Next Printer.
For our performance test comparisons, I included the GX1020, the GX3020, the tank-based Canon Maxify GX5020, and the Epson WorkForce WF-2960. The Epson is a cartridge-based model that costs less than the others in this group and has a somewhat lower paper capacity than the GX1020, but it adds an automatic document feeder (ADF) to easily scan multi-page documents.
The GX5020, the only single-function printer of the group, delivered the fastest performance for our Word file, for both first page out (FPO) and for printing pages two through 12. Among the three AIOs, the difference from fastest to slowest for the entire file is just 13 seconds. However, the differences will be more obvious if you print longer files. The GX3020's faster speed for pages after the first would make it the fastest AIO for long files. The GX1020 was tied for slowest FPO time and was slowest for the remaining pages, which makes it the slowest printer in the group for any length text document.
Relative speeds were similar for the full business-applications suite. The GX5020 came in first for most individual tests. However, it took so much longer for our PowerPoint file that it came in second overall as measured by the total time to print the full suite. The WF-2960 came in second for most files, but tied for first on the PowerPoint file, giving it the fastest time overall, at 3 minutes 17 seconds (8ppm). Here again, the GX1020 was slowest overall, but only 30 seconds slower than the WF-2960 was. With six files in the suite, that averages only 5 seconds slower per file.
For 4-by-6-inch photos, the GX1020 averaged 39 seconds each.
Text quality in our tests was a clear step below top-tier for a business inkjet, with smaller fonts lacking crisp edges. A look through a loupe at the smaller sizes showed uneven widths for lines and somewhat ragged edges. However, all the fonts in our tests that are likely to be used in standard business documents remained readable even at 4 points. Two fonts with heavy strokes held up unusually well, largely because the spaces between characters in both tended to fill in less than with most printers. The one that's harder to render well was still easily readable at 8 points. The other was easily readable at 4 points.
Using default settings, graphics on plain paper delivered saturated, vibrant color and nicely shaded gradients. The printer did an excellent job holding a 1-pixel-wide line on a black background. However, although solid fills using bright colors were suitably smooth, I saw obvious banding in fills with gray, black, and dark colors. Most photos on Canon's Photo Paper Plus Glossy II were solidly drugstore-quality, but I saw some banding in light grays in the one mono photo in our tests.
In our water-smudging tests, both black and color ink smudged only slightly on plain paper. On the recommended photo paper, I didn't see any smudging for black or color ink, and didn't see any water stains after drying. Text on plain paper didn't smudge at all when using a highlighter.
Any of the four printers mentioned here can be the right choice as a personal printer in any size office, or as a small- or home-office printer. If you want the low running cost of a tank printer and don't need scanning and copying at all, consider the GX5020 for its two paper trays and fast speed. At the other extreme, if you have lighter-duty printing needs than most of these printers are meant for but need more capable scanning— including an ADF for multi-page documents at up to legal size—consider the cartridge-based WF-2960. It has the highest running cost in the group, but if you don't print enough for the low cost of bottled ink to offset the higher initial cost of a tank printer, it can actually have a lower total cost of ownership.
If a letter-size flatbed is all you need for your scanning and copying, either the GX1020 or GX3020 could be the right choice. Between them, the GX3020 was a little faster on our tests, and its two trays plus single-sheet feed give it a big advantage if you often need to switch back and forth between different types or sizes of paper. But if you print almost everything on the same paper, the GX1020's single paper tray can serve nicely. It also costs less; it adds an Ethernet port; and its small size makes it less imposing to share a desk with. That combination is enough to make it exactly the right printer in a nontrivial share of small offices.
Most of my current work for PCMag is about printers and projectors, but I've covered a wide variety of other subjects—in more than 4,000 pieces, over more than 40 years—including both computer-related areas and others ranging from ape language experiments, to politics, to cosmology, to space colonies. I've written for PCMag.com from its start, and for PC Magazine before that, as a Contributor, then a Contributing Editor, then as the Lead Analyst for Printers, Scanners, and Projectors, and now, after a short hiatus, back to Contributing Editor.
I'm pretty sure I'm the only person who worked on every Project Printer blockbuster PCMag ever produced, often writing 15 or …
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