Travellers can print on the run with rise of the mobile printer

FORGET about your desk-bound printer - use an easy to carry mobile one instead. 

ALONG with the smart phone and notebook PC, travelling businesspeople are adding another device to their mobile offices, a printer.

Despite regular predictions of the paperless office, they're finding printed pages still play a vital role in daily business life.

Anything from invoices and order forms to leave-behind presentations more often than not are delivered in paper form.

While creating these items in the office is easy, on the road it becomes more of a challenge.

Regular travellers find themselves relying on airport lounges and hotel business centres; this approach can be problematic and expensive, however.

But thanks to advances in electronics and design, there are a growing number of printers that easily can be taken on business trips. They allow everything from documents to photos to be produced virtually anywhere.

When selecting a portable printer, it's important to consider how it will be used. Some models offer only black-and-white output while others deliver full colour.

Another important variable is weight. While some offerings tip the scales at less than 500g, others will take up a good proportion of your carry-on luggage limit.

A third consideration is power. Some portable printers come with a battery, giving true mobility, while others need access to a wall socket.

Some of the offerings on the market include:

HP Officejet H470  $549

HP has a strong position in the office printing market, which is evident in the design of the portable H470 model.

Tipping the scales at just more than 2kg, it won't cause shoulder strain, yet it's large enough to undertake sizeable print jobs. According to HP, its battery will deliver up to 480 pages on a single charge.

The plastic case is robust and appears able to cope with the bumps and grind of regular travel. A flip-up paper holder and easily accessible ink cartridges make operation straightforward.

Once the drivers are loaded on to a notebook PC, the printer is up and running in minutes.

Black-and-white print quality is impressive although colours tend to be a little washed out.

There is an optional photo cartridge that can be used when printing photographs. This adds a little extra magenta and cyan to the colour mix, resulting in more natural skin tones.

HP quotes print output at 22 pages per minute for black-and-white and 18ppm for colour. Test prints took longer than this but were still more than acceptable for a portable unit.

As well as a cable connection, there is the opportunity to use Bluetooth via an optional HP adaptor.

Canon iP100  $449

Canon has opted for a flatter design for the iP100, which makes squeezing it into a bag just that little bit easier. It's just 6cm high, 33cm wide and 18cm deep.

The fold-out paper holder does not seem as robust as that on the HP unit in this round-up, but overall the printer feels solid. It weighs in at 2.2kg.

Connection to a notebook PC is via a USB cable or a Bluetooth wireless link. It comes with a rechargeable battery or can plug into the wall.

Set-up is straightforward, with Windows recognising the test device as soon as it is connected.

The iP100 delivers black-and-white and colour output. It produces satisfactory text documents, with a test page taking about 15 seconds to emerge. Colour output is clear, with photo quality comparable to prints produced by a much larger, office-based machine.

If printing photos on the road is a key criterion, this printer is certainly worthy of consideration.

Epson Stylus N11 $69

It's quite easy to spend more on new ink cartridges than it is on this portable printer.

Yet despite its small price tag, the N11 does a respectable job of producing everything from text and diagrams to colour photos.

Epson quotes output speeds of 28ppm for black-and-white and 15ppm for colour. While test prints are noticeably slower than this, it still will be sufficient for most on-the-road printing needs.

The N11 weighs 2.4kg and is more than 41cm wide, which pushes it towards the luggable end of the portable category. It also doesn't have a battery.

Output from the printer is impressive considering its price point. Documents are crisp and clean, and photos exhibit strong colours. Printing on photo paper slows things, with a standard 10 x 15cm print taking almost two minutes to appear.

If battery operation is not a requirement and you don't mind carrying around a slightly bigger unit, the N11 will be a good choice for many mobile workers.

Brother PJ-563 mobile printer $799

When it comes to portable printers, they don't get much smaller than the PJ-563. Weighing in at just 400g, the unit is 25cm long, 5.5cm deep and 3cm high, making it easy to slot into a computer bag or carry case.

To cram a printer into such small dimensions, Brother has opted to use direct thermal printing technology rather than the more traditional inkjet used by other models in this review.

This means you're limited to printing on thermal paper; however, you do have the choice of using A4-sized sheets or a continuous roll.

This printer won't appeal to those who need to produce large numbers of pages, although it will be handy for tasks such as printing out invoices or dockets or one-off documents to leave with customers. Output quality is acceptable, but it does struggle with complex diagrams or graphics.

Overall, the unit is relatively expensive, but if you need an ultra-portable printer this one will deliver the goods.