What a great Device

This is my third multi-function HP printer, my HP k60 just wasn't cutting it anymore. My expectations were pretty high given my experience, and the price of this machine (as compared to others). I have to say I am presently surprised. This thing, of course handles the obligatory, faxing, scanning, copying, printing that one would expect from a multi-function printer.

The surprise is how well it handles all of them. The printing is lightning fast, I have never seen an inkjet this fast. The color prints are also very fast (also the fastest I have seen) and they are beautiful.

The scanning is 8 times as fast as the k60, and the scans are much clearer. Scanning can be accomplished by the glass, or through the sheet feeder. This is the only multi-function I could find that had the lift-up glass as well as a sheet-feeder for multi-paged fax/scans/copies.

Another cool feature is the double sided printing. It's the first time I've seen this on an inkjet. It prints out the front, waits 5 or so seconds for the ink to dry, then sends the page back in to print the back. It's pretty nifty, but the page waits (a necessary evil) make a big job a little more slow.

I purchased this thing for the printing, but what I got as a bonus was image-handling capabilities that surpass that of my minolta digital camera. Instead of attaching the camera to the wire and getting pretty slow transfer speeds while running the camera battery down, I can take out the SD card, pop it into the printer and do any number of things: Transfer to the computer, super-fast, with a number of options, send them over email automatically, or send them directly to the hp photo web site for hosting. I never expected all that.

The install was super easy. I set it up on my network (the printer is wired into the router, which hosts wired and wireless computers). I installed 2 computers without glitches in under 45 mins. That included setup of the computer itself. The network install was seamless and problem-free.

The LCD screen is a nice bonus, it displays a lot of information on what is going on with the machine (ink remaining, etc.) and its nice to see the images before you decide what to do with them.

So what are the negatives? Well I searched long and hard for this printer, and now that I have it, there are 2 no-big-deal negatives. 1) The size, its 21.6 x 17.2 x 11.4 in. Additionally, its about 40 pounds. So its kind of a beast. 2) Software bloat. The install is 650 MB on the machine if you want all the feature (the minimal install was ~300 MB). Addiitonally, there are 20MB of resident programs in memory after the install. Kind of silly if you ask me, but today's computers shouldn't have a problem with that. So it doesn't bother me (much).

I also looked at the 7410, the only difference I could find was wireless built-in. Since I don't plan on moving a 40 pound machine around, and the fact that it was hooked up to a wireless network, I decided against it. Good thing, my wireless devices work great over my network to that printer, so unless you don't have a wired port next to where your printer will be, save the $100. Additionally, you can buy a Bluetooth adapter for the 7310 for your BT devices if you desire.