How do I put this? Printers are the most complicated piece of technology that somehow fails on us from time to time. Every few weeks I find myself standing before a printer with eyes closed, taking a deep breath and then unleashing something on the updated lines of: “You scullion! You rampallian! You fustilarian!” Printers, in general, bring out the worst in us. But then there are a few exceptions, like Canon PIXMA G3770.

You can't go wrong while filling the ink tanks because of the shape of the nozzles

Sure, it’s a mouthful but it’s among the least annoying printers I have used in some stretch of time, thanks to its straightforward setup, good Wi-Fi and well-designed hardware. The best part of the deal: I could make it work to print files from the iPhone easily. Since it’s an all-in-one machine, it can print, scan, and does all this at a rapid pace.

As an overview, this is a wireless refillable ink tank printer or three-in-one featuring a 3.4cm LCD screen making device operation easy. As with three-in-one printers, you can print, scan and copy. First, let’s talk about the ink. It’s a tank printer, meaning you can refill easily. Of course, all the ink bottles are meant for Canon printers and the nozzle is designed to fit only into the designated ink tank, eliminating potential mixing accidents. The couple of weeks I had with the printer weren’t enough to make the tank go dry… nowhere near dry, I must add.

The control panel of the printer

The issue I have with HP inkjet printers is the time taken for the machine to deliver the first copy after starting up. That’s not the case with this Canon model. It’s pretty fast and seamless. I hooked the printer with a Windows laptop as well as printed over Wi-Fi from the iPhone. Both work well. A quibble: The connecting cable with the printer supports USB-A but it’s time to move to USB-C.

Smooth operator

Canon claims the ink bottles print up to 6,000 pages mono and 7,700 pages in colour, which is fine for both home and small-office printing needs. At home, kids are still given project work that needs a printer and in the office, we need to print quite a few pages in colour to check the final draft. This is the machine to have. Maximum print speed is 11 pages per minute in black-and-white or six colour pages.

I was told by Canon to connect with the service centre for installation but why do that while reviewing? Was it easy to install the printer? All told, it took me 10 minutes. Five minutes to unpack and fill the four ink tanks and five was required for Wi-Fi setup. Usually, the latter is the trickiest part. Normally, it takes a long time to get a printer hooked to the Wi-Fi. With the Canon printer, it took me exactly three minutes after downloading the app. Yes, it connected on the first attempt. Oh joy! And it worked smoothly each time I took a printout of a picture from the iPhone. You are free to choose size, resolution and all that jazz.The 3.4cm LCD screen is effective but frankly tiny. I like to believe that my eyesight is that of a 20-year-old but I needed to squint now and then to get things right.

Should you buy it?

The paper slot is protected by a cover, which ensures dust doesn’t enter and play havoc with the sensor. The printer itself is compact and fits well in most spaces. Now, the questions I cannot answer involve replacement toner cartridges, which are available on the website but I am not sure how easily you will find it everywhere offline.

You can easily do maintenance work on the printer

I didn’t get a chance to review this long enough to talk about clogging but going by my past experience with Canon, it shouldn’t be an issue. But each time a printer is before me, I tend to take prints that are unnecessary, something I realised during the pandemic. There are many tasks that can be done without taking prints and we should wake up to that reality. Overall, Canon PIXMA G3770 is a printer that’s better designed ergonomically than the competition. And it’s easy to set up.

At a glance

Device: Canon PIXMA G3770

Price: Rs 20,270

High notes

Easy to setup

Wi-Fi works seamlessly

Good print quality

Muffled notes

LCD screen is small

USB 2.0