The HP Photosmart Plus e-All-in-One is a multifunction photo printer with an appealing price tag.
HP's Photosmart line-up has redefined the way printers can be used, offering a direct connection to the internet. The HP Photosmart Plus e-All-in-One isn't as sophisticated as some in the series, but those with Wi-Fi access will be able to access a huge number of features.
The HP Photosmart Plus e-All-in-One is assigned its own email address under the ePrint service, letting you email documents to it for printing. You can also share images using the HP Snapfish service, and hook up the printer to a range of devices, from Windows Mobile and Android smartphones, to Apple's iOS devices, such as the iPhone or iPad.
All this is accessed through the HP Photosmart Plus e-All-in-One's 3.5in touchscreen. Although it isn't as large as that built into the Lexmark Interact S605, this is still the second-largest TFT we looked at in our recent photo printers group test. It isn't quite as user-friendly an experience as on the Lexmark, however, and a firm prod was required to access some of the HP's options.
The HP Photosmart Plus e-All-in-One's 125-sheet paper tray is chunky and substantial, and you can also load up to 20 photos. There's no disc-label printing, which is no surprise, but we were less pleased to see the omission of a USB port for memory sticks. There is a memory card reader, however.
The HP Photosmart Plus e-All-in-One's scanner lid has considerable strength, although the hinges aren't the lengthiest, and it would be hard to use this device for large magazines and books. Scan speeds aren't great, with the Plus one of the slower models we looked at. The quality of the scans is adequate, though, and while the HP fell behind the Lexmark and Epson Stylus Photo PX720WD in our tests, it displayed a varied range of colours.
The HP Photosmart Plus e-All-in-One injects its images with a decent amount of colour. And while it lacks the finesse of the Canon PIXMA iP4850 and Epson Stylus Photo PX720WD, most shades are capably delivered, and colours well blended. There were few artefacts across our test prints, and the Plus is certainly considerably better than the HP Deskjet 3000, especially on glossy paper, despite packing so much more for less than double the price. It is a little slow though, with the times stuck in the middle of the order. Glossy times are particularly poor.
The HP Photosmart Plus e-All-in-One offers the cheapest running costs of the multifunction printers we looked at recently, at 2p per page for mono and 4.8p per page for colour.
Next page: Our expert verdict >>
See also:
Comments
Claire said: Ink runs out quite quickly and scanning is not duplex scrolling doesnt respond well I am an HP printer lover but this one is not its greatest I wouldnt recommend it for someone who prints a lot of paper jobs and requires heavy scanning Speed and capabilities are limited