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Nathan B.

Nathan B.

Joined on 08/05/06

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Product Reviews
product reviews
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Most Critical Review

It's great... for 20lb paper.

HP Officejet Pro 8600 Up to 18 ppm Black Print Speed 4800 x 1200 dpi Color Print Quality Ethernet (RJ-45) / RJ-11 / USB / Wi-Fi Thermal Inkjet e-All-in-One Color Printer
HP Officejet Pro 8600 Up to 18 ppm Black Print Speed 4800 x 1200 dpi Color Print Quality Ethernet (RJ-45) / RJ-11 / USB / Wi-Fi Thermal Inkjet e-All-in-One Color Printer

Pros: It's quick (as long as it picks up the sheet) and easy on the ink. Photo quality is passable but it has poor halftones and you'll see a lot of pixelation in shading. Don't expect it to make pretty pictures compared to other contemporary models. Basic text on standard 20lb is pretty good.

Cons: It's a monster, size-wise. That isn't an issue for me but may be for some. The duplexer is easy to insert with an inproper alignment which will cause everything that goes through it to crumple and jam. It won't pick up cardstock. I'm using a 65# astroparche and it just won't do it. I've done all the "fixes", cleaned and roughed the pickup wheel, used all the appropriate settings, tried curling the leading edge and it just doesn't work.. It doesn't like photostock either... I've only tried once and it may be possible but since the photo quality is kind of bad I gave up to use my other printer. Label stock: This is the most important to me as I use it for my shipping labels. It has a hard time even right off the bat (with roughed and cleaned feed wheel) and still generally requires several feed attempts to get it to pull and print regardless of setting. I find that the feed path junks up pretty quickly and I can clean it up with rubbing alcohol which reduces the number of feed attempts som, for a short while, but it rarely feeds on the first attempt regardless. ** Please note that all the other stock attempts were prior to using for labels so should not have been affected by any residual label goo.That being said I've never seen any of my printers get gunked like this so I don't know if it's the immediate U path it takes or what... this printer is pretty much best left to standard 20lb stock and that's it. Touch screen is redonkulous. It doesn't correlate to the screen and you have to learn where to press and just accept that it is what it is. TH eprinter driver is... either designed for the mentally deficient or just poorly made. The options are not thought out and I find it much more difficult to use than others. It feels like they've attempted to dumb it down to the point of non-useability. It's more of a trial and error thing than just choosing what you want. I will likely be switching to another printer for the purpose I need it for. A shame, I want to like it considering the decent ink useage.

Overall Review: Scanner works. Not the sharpest I've seen. Beware of the wireless wakeup. It doesn't always like to turn back on from a sleep state. I've only had an issue with it like 3-4 times but I usually hit power first just in case. The ability to download apps etc. may be good for some people but I find it to be... well.. ridiculous. It does ease firmware updates... but I haven't seen any benefit (especially when they were supposed to improve stock handling.) Printing from a phone - Sometimes it works, somtimes it cuts half the document off. Perhaps it's me but I haven't found settings to rectify. YMMV. Its a poor choice for photos, labels or cardstock. If that's not an issue then, hey... You could do worse.