Dell has long been in the business of competing on both price and features for some while now, and its relatively late entry in the printer market is no exception. At a price point of around $100, the 946 offers identical print and copy rates (25 ppm for monochrome, 19 ppm for color) and a relatively average fax rate (10 ppm). The company also offers high-capacity black- and color-ink cartridges (at about $25 for black and $30 for color) as well as regular-capacity cartridges (at about $15 for black and $20 for color).

This unit works well for printing text documents, copying and sending faxes. Photo printing is trickier, because there's no 4"x6" paper tray, and paper orientation works either way. Also, incoming faxes and printed pages eject from the machine onto whatever surface is beneath the paper output, so you'd best arrange this unit on a work surface where the paper can pile up without falling on the floor or getting lost. Paper jams can also be hard to clear, because access to the paper path is limited.

Print resolution is 4800x1200 for color, and 1200x1200 for monochrome. The scan resolution is rated at a conservative 1200x2400 for 48-bit color (which is up to 16 bits more color depth than for some other scanners in this Buyer's Guide). Paper formats supported are numerous, and paper handling capabilities are good (especially for envelopes). This printer also appears able to handle a heavier duty cycle than numerous other models on the market, many of which publish 2,500 to 3,500 pages per month (we can't find a similar specification for this printer, but suspect it to be somewhere in the 5,000 page range).