HP PSC 2210 Multifunction

Rating:
Summary: Good printer, but does not last long
Review: I do graphics design only in my spare time, so I didn't even put that much of a workload on my HP PSC 2210 -- maybe a dozen scans every two to three weeks, 10 black-and-white pages a week, and maybe 10-20 colour pages a week. I used the fax maybe twice or three times, and the photocopying function five or six times.

Given this light a workload, this thing should not have been malfunctioning as early as it was. But barely a year after I got it -- a year! -- the printer was on its last legs. After one paper jam, the scrolling became inaccurate and I couldn't get the 2210 to print one simple, black-and-white Word document without all the lines going out of alignment. Realigning the cartridges didn't help; it was the physical scrolling mechanism.

Even before this, I never liked the 2210 much. It printed fast and photos look pretty good, but the software was clunky and there was something wrong with the way the software interacted with the printer -- two out of 10 print jobs would freeze up midway. While most printing software allows you to continue the job and finish it, this one did not -- it scrolls the half-finished printing page out, then resends the entire job. When you're talking about a colour-intensive graphics-design job, that's a lot of ink wasted. I'd thought it was the USB connector and switched to two different USB hubs, then plugged the USB cable direct into the computer, but the problem did not alleviate. And it's probably not because of my applications, because Word documents froze up just as often as complex Photoshop documents. And while two out of 10 doesn't look bad on paper, it adds about 50 per cent to the time you need to print out, say, a 120-page screenplay -- effective negating the printer's speed and then some.

Buyers beware.

Rating:
Summary: It's Great When It Works, Lousy when you need support!
Review: This product comes with the WORST software. I've had to reinstall it at least 5 times by now! Don't waste your time!

Rating:
Summary: Strike 3 for HP
Review: I had this printer for about 10 months when it started having problems. It worked well before that. I called HP tech support and I got these people in Inda who had me try different things. They gave me a number to fax my information and case number to because the machine was still under warranty -- but then I got no response after that.