Customer Reviews

HP Color LaserJet 1600 Printer (CB373A#ABA)

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

Just got this and it prints great on the 28lb paper that I use for 2 sided printing. It can be set for 2 sided printing but I find it easier to leave settings on default. Will not print on 110# index paper (jams) but will print on the HP 75# cover stock one at a time. If you try to print several copies of a cover, ink will begin to smear. I use my old ink jet if I need more than 1 cover or if I need to print on 110# stock.

I am writing this review, while the HP 1600 is running the second side of our annual holiday letter - in full color of a photo of hummingbirds while peach-picking at Masumoto's Family Farm in California.

The HP prints fast, crisp (offers a draft 600dpi or a full-on 2400dpi) and reliably. No jams and no blurring. This rivals the office laser printers at work, but unfortunately doesn't automatically do double-sided.

Yes, the ink refills are expensive, but it's a color laser printer! I haven't yet had to replace them a second time, so can't judge if the full cartridges are efficient or not.

However, I would like to recommend to HP and all other printer companies, please include FULL cartridges with all your printers. We are springing for the full package here, so let us print away on full (I also hate it when car companies don't give you a full tank to start either).

Happy holidays everyone!

I bought this printer in August of 2007 at the local Staples. I had compared the print quality to a Samsung of similar price range and concluded the HP had better print quality, so I bought the HP. BIG MISTAKE. First off, we ran out of black ink within about 30 days - the package said it was a 1,000 page ink cartridge that came with the printer, but I'd guess we got less than 700.

So then I pay almost $100 for a new black ink cartridge (the "high capacity" 2500 page cartridge). A few weeks after replacing that ink cartridge, I notice that I was getting red streaks on every page I printed. I followed the manual's troubleshooting suggestions, but nothing solved it. I figure maybe the magenta cartridge is running out or something (even though the meter on the printer said I had 1/4 of a cartridge left), so I spend almost $100 on another magenta cartridge. As soon as I replace the cartridge, not only did the red streaks not go away, but they got worse.

So I call HP, and I'm told that although the printer was still in warranty, I'd have to pay a $75 "restocking fee" plus shipping to send it back to them, and I'd have to pay their shipping costs to get a return one sent. All told it would have cost about $200 to replace the printer (under warranty!!!) when I only paid $300 for the thing in the first place!

Needless to say, I didn't do it. By May (only 9 months after I bought the thing), I could no longer print anything of importance because the thing is just dumping red toner onto the paper - everything I print comes out looking like I printed it on pink paper. And now I'm out $300 for the original printer plus $200 for cartridges I bought. And, a year later, I see I can buy the damned thing for $69 on Amazon. That shows you the quality of it, for it to drop from $300 to $70 in only a year.

Do not buy this printer. It is not worth the cost of styrofoam packing peanuts it comes in!

At the time that I shopped for the 1600, I discovered that it came with 4 half-full toner cartridges, and the 2600n, which has an Ethernet port, came with full tanks. This made it worthwhile to buy the 2600n instead.

The printer arrived as promised and following the simple set up instructions, I was able to print my first document in less than 20 minutes. The print quality is outstanding! For home office or home use, this printer is a great value for the price.

I really needed a printer and purchased this item in a rush at a local store. Now, I really don't know why I purchased this item!!

Con:
1) So huge and took up so much space, it won't fit on my desk space or side table; normal peripherial stand does not work for this printer!
2) Extremely heavy and it was such a hassle to bring this machine back to my room located at 3rd floor! (it did not fit in the truck or barely fit in the backseat of my car)
3) Ink catridge costs more than actual printer itself
(this can be said for most printers nowadays, but considering the cost of ink cartridges need to be installed, expect to spend averaging $85 per cartridge x 4 ("1 x black +3 x color") = $340 total!=> More expensive than printer itself!!!!!!!!!!!
4)Frequent automatic calibration!!
I am not sure if this can be applied to all, but my printer starts calibrating itself every 15 minutes or so for nothing! it is very noisy and annoying, and scares me a lot because it starts all of a sudden!
5)Single papertray
I thought there should be at least 2 trays avaialble for this size, but there is only one tray at the bottom. But tray number shows "Tray 2". I cannot find any other tray?!
6)When paper is low, it stops printing and shows "error"
this printer does not run until paper tray becomes empty. Instead, it shows "Error: Paperjam". There is no paper jammed in the machine, just papers are running low. this machine is STUPID!

Pro:
There is nothing special to note really but
1) Printing speed and data transfer speed is pretty fast
2) Initial sample cartiridge came with last longer than I anticipated
3) printing quality is quite good for all type of papers ( but using printing paper or non-economy paper is recommended for color printing)

Possible recommendation:
If I had more time to research, I would have gone to smaller, lighter weight, more compactly designed machine such as:
HP Laserjet 1018 Printer

In a weak moment I fell for the hype about this printer. After having had such god-awful printers with poor print quality that always ran out of ink I wanted a great printer. This HP performs beautifully, no jams,copies are pretty,the colors are amazing, etc. The downside of this HP 1600 is that it is very large and takes up half my desk and the worst part of it is the ink supply did not live up to the advertising. Also, the replacement Ink cartridges are too expensive! There is no gray scale level which would use less ink and thereby saves money and ink. If you want a test copy-it will use 100% ink. The life of the ink cartridge was suppose to be 500 printed pages before requiring a new cartridge but that hype turned out to be untrue so that is a huge disappointment. All in all the printer was too expensive and now that I am stuck with it and have to buy expensive ink! Do not buy this it's a money pit even if you do not do heavy printing.

[...]

Printing envelopes is a challenge. Just figuring out the proper settings to print envelopes was a headache. Moisture sealing envelopes cannot be used because they seal themselves as they pass through the printer. Only pull and seal envelopes can be used. Often the addresses come out splotchy with part of the address barley visible.

After about 6 months of using the printer, everything I print has a vertical yellow streak and the left side of each page.

Included cartridges are half filled and replacements are very expensive.


UPDATE:

I just took a baseball bat to mine and I feel so much better. This thing was going into calibration mode for hours on end. Completely unusable.

The printer has nice colors and prints beautifully if it's on regular paper. However, if you scrapbook and need to print on cardstock, do NOT buy! As a previous reviewer stated it starts to get messy after one copy. I returned mine. Also, it is quite a beast (tall and with a large footprint), so make sure you've got a large space for it to live. I would recommend this printer if you want bright, clear colors on basic paper only (especially if it's on sale for $180 at a local office supply store), which is where I bought and returned mine...

I received my purchase on time, the first thing I noticed was that the packaging was not conducive to receiving the product in good order. My worst fears came to be, the printer made a lot of noise, the pages it printed were smudged appearing and the paper had a sharp crease as it came out.
My technician inspected the printer and found evidence that the printer had been dropped damaging the fuser unit. I purchased a new fuser unit, replaced it repaired other shipping damages and put the printer into service.
So far the printer has been working properly, it is quite and no crease.
Having to purchase a new fuser, the labor and down time made this item very costly, but I needed it for my business.

At this point I would be reluctant to make another purchase like this from Amazon. I recently purchase another printer from EBAY and received it in perfect condition, probably will use EBAY from now on.