HP Photosmart eStation Review

You've have to hand it to HP: once the organisation makes a decision to rethink printing, it thinks big. Their HP Photosmart eStation weds a fast, competent colour inkjet multifunction with a distinctive bonus: the Zeen, a removable touch screen control panel working the Google Android 2.1 operating-system as well as providing various minor, tablet PCs-like functionality, which includes web browsing as well as E-book reading.

At a period of time when both tablets and also Google Android really are hot topics, however, the Zeen is apparently getting far more notice than HP may have wanted. Whether or not the Zeen will help sell additional HP Photosmart eStation mother ships is actually unclear - particularly at £379 inc VAT. The Lexmark Genesis, one other game-changing MFP, has comparable lure and qualifications.

As a control panel, the Zeen works well. Its big, 7-inch colour touch screen helps make reading the on-screen menus simple. Level of responsiveness is its main weak point: in our testing it seemed to be slow to understand taps, and it sometimes mistook a swipe for a tap. In the event you undock it, it is possible to still command the HP Photosmart eStation e-All-in-One, or even you can print from SD Cards filled in the top-mounted slot, plus print website pages. The arrangement looks like it's a logical expansion of HP's Web-app program.

As an MFP, the HP Photosmart eStation is satisfactory with regard to home use. It comes with a 125-sheet input tray which has an integrated 20-sheet photo tray, as well as a 50-page output region on top of the input tray's lid. Automated duplexing (printing on both sides of the page) is industry-standard, and is effective on both the PC as well as Mac. Just like nearly all consumer-level MFPs, it gives you no automated document feeder for you to scan multipage documents, just a letter/A4-size flatbed scanner. Using the Zeen control panel, you can scan on to a memory card, though not to a Personal computer; HP's Scan software will take care of that process through a linked pc.

The HP Photosmart eStation is an above-average performer. Plain-text pages printed at rates of around 8.4 pages per minute on the PC along with 8.3 ppm on the Apple. Prints of colour pics on plain paper exited quickly at 3.8 ppm. Our 22MB professional picture required just under 3 minutes to print with the Mac, and that is about par for the course. Normal scans and copies posted times within the upper-middle span.

Print quality is a plus. Text on plain paper was sharp and also dark. Photograph output upon HP's own glossy stock was in fact excellent, having a relatively cool colour temperature. The same photos on plain paper looked somewhat washed out. Our full-colour copy examination exhibited a darker reproduction with extensive banding.

We'd assume a multifunction as pricey as the HP Photosmart eStation to have more-economical inks. Alas, its costs are simply average. The standard-size HP Photosmart eStation printer ink cartridges comprise a 250-page black and 300-page cyan, magenta, and yellow. The high yield cartridges work out considerably cheaper.

The HP Photosmart eStation as well as its Zeen tablet undoubtedly out-gadget various other high-end home MFPs such as the Canon Pixma MG8120 and Epson Artisan 835. Nonetheless, other touch-based phones and devices are generally rapidly catching up to the Zeen's printing functionality. The chief grounds to fork out this item's significantly larger price tag is for the Zeen's providing of simple tablet features. If you'd like this specific MFP, get it - but you could get much more printer for your money elsewhere.

HP Photosmart eStation printer cartridges are to be found here.