The Firehouse

The HP 5850 committed suicide, and decided it would start printing stripes across documents even after changing ink, cleaning contacts, and so on. One thing I used to like about HP printers was that their ink cartridges came with their own print heads – meaning that on each change, you’d get brand new heads. Other manufacturers suffer from heads that eventually clog or need specialized cleaning, so even though the ink was more expensive in comparison, to me it was worth the stretch.

With the new Vivaro inks, however, HP has moved onto printer-bound heads, and simple cartridges. From a business perspective it makes sense – the ink feels cheaper than before to the user (9 Euros per color, or 35 for a six-color pack plus 150 10×15 photo paper sheets), and the printer can be sold for more just by adding some trimmings, such as the huge touch screen of the 8180. This printer rocks – really. It connected to my WiFi network with no hassle, and was setup and configured with the HP driver on my Mac Pro, thus giving me access to printing, scanning and even the memory card reader, over WiFi.

One thing I didn’t appreciate, but which fortunately you can turn off in the preferences, is that after each printing action, the LCD  display starts showing a “tips slideshow”, which tells you how good HP’s photo paper is, how original supplies are way better for your printer, or that you can actually use the memory card slots to print your photos directly (duh! I thought they were just convenient holders for my cards so I would not missplace them!).