So I got an e-mail out of the blue asking me if I wanted to try out a printer for a month. Hoax or spam was my first thought but it turned out to be real! This is an honest review and I didn’t feel pressurized to give a favorable review. In fact I was told to publish my blog review without sending it to them first.
Like the vast majority of amateur photograpahers I snap and snap away but virtually no photos end up getting printed, never mind gracing my walls. Anytime I need to print I’ve used an online store. Which is fine but you can’t print photos ‘on the fly’. So this was my chance to try out a free printer and see if it’s actually something that I’d use or would it end up consigned to the attic.
So onto the printer- it’s a HP Officejet wide format printer (prints up to A3 size). And like most printers today it’s also a scanner, copier and fax machine. (I didn’t even look at the fax or scanner.) Which means for a home business it’d do everything you need. And the surprise is that it can work over WIFI. Which is very simple to set up. After using a printer like this I couldn’t go back to a ‘standard’ printer which I have to be connected to by a wire, especially as most people are on a laptop these days.
SETUP: I was a bit nervous about this but it’s as easy as pie. Physically set up in under 10 minutes. Next the challenge of setting up the WIFI. The printer has a touch screen pad that makes selecting options simple. My first attempt at connecting to the WIFI failed and I thought “here we go” but I tried it again it worked.
This is a printer with many features and bells and whistles.
The printer allows you to download HP web apps, including news, games and puzzles which you can print (without a need for a laptop). This could be a good feature but I didn’t even think about it as it wasn’t relevant for me.
Another feature, and a great one, is ePrint. This allows me to print remotely (from smart phones, other laptops!). Think about that for a second. Yes, it is cool and very useful isn’t it? You’re out, take a photo with your phone and can have it printed before you’re even home. It’s simple to set up (I’m repeating that work ‘simple’ a lot); you go to the ePrint website, register the printer with your e-mail address and that’s it.
But it’s not all two thumbs up. While printing 4″ by 6″ or 5″ by 7″ photos was fine the printer couldn’t print 8″ by 12″ photos for me. It gave me an error message, I logged a message on the HP Help forum but didn’t get it resolved. If I had bought the printer I’d obviously had persevered and guess I’d have gotten it resolved.
So would I buy one? I don’t know would I need one that large in size. But as it’s wireless the size really isn’t an option as you can store it anywhere in the house really. It was simple to set up and use (expect for the A4 printing issue I encountered).
Some bits to note
The HP printer stores up to 150 pages.
As it can print sized A3 it is a big beast. But this shouldn’t be an issue as you can place it out of the way.
Copying (up to): 33 ppm (mono) / 32 ppm (color) – printing (up to): 33 ppm (mono) / 32 ppm (color) – 150 sheets – 33.6 Kbps – Hi-Speed USB, 10/100 Base-TX, 802.11b, 802.11g, 802.11n
Sells for approx €225 in Ireland
