Customer Reviews
Nice printer with only a few problems 
2006-10-07
This is a solid printer with problems typical to HP photo printers.
The dedicated paper path prints with only very limited image drift. This is something you can't get on a printer that prints other paper sizes. Talk to HP about image drift and they will deny it but it is very real. If you are trying to print composed images this is something that will be important to you.
Yield per cartridge using hp hi capacity ink is about 120 6x4 images per cartridge. You will need to clean the print head at about every 30 images then print a dummy image (to saturate the head) to avoid noticeable banding and a more subtle banding that occurs in wide strips about 4 across the page. I use medical alcohol wipes to clean the heads.
If you are printing a black or photo grey back you can use the hp photo grey cartridge for that, this printer will accept that ink cartridge as well. Also old cartridges that no longer print color accurate print black just fine for a while.
You can only fit about 7 to 10 pages in the paper tray at a time without introducing multiple sheet feeds, jams, or slippage.
The PC drivers tend to convert your images to 300 dpi. This printer runs best when you put the image on a cf or other memory card then print from the memory card. Then you can print full 1200 dpi images and never hang up. When you try to print 1200dpi images from the pc, you will be either down sampled or the image will be ignored. Using the memory card, you can preview the images and decided which and how many of each to print.
This is one of many HP printers that when given a 6x4 inch image will resize and crop the image on its own. The only way to print something near your 6x4 inch image accurately is to add a small amount of bleed space around the edge to allow for the possibility of the paper going through a slight bit askew (even commercial printers do this) then add a border to make the size 7.5x5 inches. Put the image on a memory card, then when you print it, program the printer to crop it to 1.25. This will print the inner 6x4 inch image. I kid you not. This is a simple process and literally the only way to print your image as a 6x4 inch image. The automatic resizing software cannot be defeated. I have talked to HP engineers about this.
Best color accuracy and image quality are achieved using a good paper like MOAB Kokapelli and printing tiff images through a memory card. Jpeg images are fine and if your image starts that way, leave it alone. If you shoot raw images than transfer those into Photoshop or something like that, just save them out as tiff files on your memory card. This printer does not accept CMYK.
Image quality is very high. When printing through a PC, I personally find all the HP software designed to "improve" my image to be annoying as I have to constantly shut it off as their setting don't like to stay set. This is another reason to just print from a memory card.
This device also functions as a card reader/writer and allows your memory cards to show up as disk devices independent of the printer. This allows you to pull the memory from your camera and plug it into the printer to transfer images instead of plugging the camera into the PC.
Overall this is a good device. I do think the paper sensor may be going out but this is from attempting to pull paper out once printing has started - be warned. So far I have printed about 2000 images from this printer. Average wasted paper per run of 40 is 2 sheets.
It would be nice to be able to clean inside the unit. Most of the interior is sealed. This printer ships with low capacity ink cartridges.
Great Printer***** 2006-08-19
Prints great pictures, very easy to use, I would highly recommend this printer.
Worth every penny 
2006-05-27
I bought it at a great price during Christmas break. Since then I have taken numerous pictures with it and it is just great. Works like a charm and no one can ever tell the difference if is home printed or shop printed photo :)
The second great thing about it is that it accepts all types of memory cards. So I usually take my Sony memorystick pro card out and insert it directly into the printer. All my photos show up instantly which I review on the small LCD screen before printing. It saves so much hassle of hooking up a computer or reviewing pictures on computer before printing.
Oh, it is very light and easy to take around.
great little printer 2006-03-13
It is a great little printer, I have enjoyed using it. It is convient and prints out real good pictures and it is small enough to take along with all your other camera equipment.
SO easy to use 2006-02-28
This is great! No computer needed, but can be connected with one little cord. Slide your media card in the slot, your pics come on the screen. Select the one you want, how you want it layed out on the paper and push print....that's all there is to it. So great, even my "electronically challenged" hubby can use this. Buy the ink and paper kit to go with it, and you can print 100 photos! The color is great and looks spectacular. No more pics sitting around in the computer or on the digital camera cards....no they're finally getting printed out.
Good Printer 2007-12-24
This is a very good printer for the type it is. I have now seen a Thermal Film Transfer Printer which gives more of a 'developed' look but has lower Picture Quality. Prints from this printer seem to have uneven drying of the ink, which is sometimes distracting if looking at the photo from different angles. This 'problem' is easily corrected by framing the photo or putting it in a book with a gloss sheet over it.
Works fine some times 
2007-04-28
If I fix the image on my computer, copy the image to a CF card, and use the card print the image, the printer complains "Cannot display this photo". It doesn't print it either. I really don't want to connect this printer to my computer. Another HP printer connected to the printer prints the picture fine.
All pictures are in simple JPEG format.
HP Service was absolutely worthless. The only suggestion I got was to "change the power source". While I was extremely skeptical, I did try a different source and as I expected, nothing changed. The lady at the support told me to try another power source!
Update 5/4/2007:
I found that the images edited using the software are missing some EXIF information (X and Y resolution) and that is causing this printer to fail on those images.
There is a free software on the Internet called jhead.exe using which I could copy EXIF data from another image to the problematic image. Then the printer printed it fine.
BTW, I compared a print from this printer to a print from another HP all-in-one deskjet printer. The quality of this printer is barely better than the regular printer. I don't see any advantage to this printer (other than portability).
this printer is junk: jams 
2007-01-20
this printer is junk.
after a couple months of low usage,
it now jams all the time.
the power supply also died, and i had to replace it at high expense.
and now i have this jam problem.
what a piece of junk!
and as usual, the windows xp sw drivers are awful. 180 mbytes! give me a break. and no linux drivers available. and no simple/small drivers available.
no more hp photo printers for me.
Worst Service EVER!! 2007-01-16
I got this printer last year as a present. The printer worked well at the time, although it ate up A LOT of ink. Then I went to use it for the first time in a few months and all it would flash was a error message. I called, but they wanted me to pay just to TALK to someone about the problem. So, instead I got online and talked to a person there about the problem and all she could tell me is that it was a software problem and that I could trade it for a newer model but it would cost me a $100. Okay is anyone else seeing a problem here? I don't recommend any HP products....this company obviously does not stand by their products and instead I recomend Lexmark...they do!
Not durable...scam artists at customer support 2006-10-08
We bought our photosmart printer about eight months ago and it recently started having paper jam problems. We have probably printed about 40 pictures on it total. The problem go so bad it would not print anymore. We called technical support and they said that it was a "software" problem and that the printer's warranty for software issues is only 90 days. They wanted $59 to fix the problem.
While the printer does make great pictures I don't see how paper jamming in the printer would be a software issue.
