Review: SMB Printer Lives Large

The printer, available for $699, is a hefty device that offers resolutions of up to 4,800 x 1,200 dpi. A sleek black unit with a metallic front tray, it requires a lot of space. Measuring 26.6 inches wide and 16.9 inches deep (not counting the tray), this printer is not something to cram into a corner of a busy office or workarea. If the size doesn't convey the heft, perhaps the weight would: 37.7 pounds.

On, er, paper, the B9180 has a lot of features. The B9180 uses HP Vivera pigment ink technology for accurate and consistent color reproduction. Eight-color HP Vivera pigment inks allows printing on a broad array of media types up to 1.5 mm thickness, including stiff pre-matted paper or canvas. The printer can make both border- and borderless prints in a variety of sizes, ranging from 3 inches x 5 inches to 13 inches x 19 inches. HP also uses a closed loop calibration system—a feature commonly found in more expensive large-format printers—to keep colors in photos consistent across multiple prints.

The printer can self-diagnose problems and send alerts when the printhead needs to be cleaned. An HP Photosmart plug-in for Adobe Photoshop automatically synchronizes Photoshop and the B9180 printer driver for single user interface and color management. The software includes image browsers with basic editing controls and project options—HP Photosmart Studio for the Mac and HP Photosmart Premier for Windows.

According to HP, the printer can produce 13x19 photos in as fast as 1.5 minutes and 4x6 photos in as fast as 10 seconds. HP also said the printer can output draft quality monochrome prints up to 28 pages per minute, with the normal mode at about 4.5 ppm. Color printouts in draft mode are up to 26 ppm, and 4 ppm in normal mode.

Engineers tested for performance and image quality using a stopwatch and select files from the SpencerLab/CRN Printer Test Suite from Spencer & Associates. A collection of documents and photos designed to push printers to their limits, the suite looks at both performance and print quality. To look at image printing, the Photosmart Pro B9180 printed an 8x10 photo of a castle in several modes. Best mode, the default photo setting, took 3 minutes, 10 seconds. The Normal mode took 2 minutes, 15 seconds, and the lowest Fast Draft setting took 45 seconds.

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