Customer Reviews

HP Photosmart A516 Compact Photo Printer (Q7021A#ABA)

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Although there are nice features when you move up a level to the A616, there is a premium attached to that little adjustable screen that just isn't worth it to me. At the price this little printer is being offered, you can't go wrong. Lightweight and compact, with Bluetooth and PictBridge, this is a bargain hunters dream. High quality prints? absolutely. I honestly can't think of a downside unless you consider a print time of approximately one minute to be too long. Other than that, this little unit performs perfectly.

I've used the HP A516 Compact Photo Printer for about a month now. I got it on sale at Christmas for $50. What a great deal! A few things to note:

1. The best photo paper to use with this is the HP Advanced Photo Paper. I bought some HP Premium Plus photo paper thinking that since it was more expensive, the print quality ought to be better. However, this was not so! Apparently, the Vivera ink is specially formulated to print on the HP Advanced Paper, which produces even-quality laydown of the ink, with no defined edges between different colors in the photo. The HP Premium Plus photo paper showed a defined edge in the blank ink, giving it a "home-printed" look to the photo. The HP Advanced paper produced photo-lab quality prints that looked awesome!

2. If you edit or crop any photos in Photoshop before you print it out, you should save the file in the "Baseline (Standard)" format, otherwise the printer will not recognize the "optimized" file type.

3. Buy the ink cartridges and paper directly from the HP site to save money. They often have great deals on the ink -- Buy-One-Get-One Free or some other gimick. I managed to buy paper and ink at a price so that it costs me about $0.29 per print (ink+paper costs).

Pros:
- The 4x6 photos are truly borderless! You can't tell that the prints come off of an inkjet-type printer.

- The photos can be printed off with 1 photo per page, or the more fun features -- 2 or 4 photos per page! You can choose the same pictures for all 4 wallet-sized photos, or choose 4 different photos to print at that size.

- You can also print any frame of a mpeg (video) on the printer with ease. Just play the video file and stop it at the frame you want printed. It's easy! The only thing is that the resolution quality is lower, but it looks pretty good for a video shot. (This could be improved with other cameras, but this is what I noticed from my Canon SD630)

- Instant photos! This little printer prints rather quickly and with the HP Advanced quick-drying paper, the photos are ready for handling in a jiffy!

- The printer is truly compact. It is really cute, and can be placed anywhere without taking up much space.

I bought this printer for my mom to use with the digital camera that I also bought her for Christmas. I wanted to get an inexpensive printer that was small, lightweight, easy to use, didn't require the use of a computer, and produced good 4 x 6" pictures. The HP Photosmart A516 met all of the aforementioned criteria.

Setup was simple...just plug it in, turn it on, select your preferred language, install the ink cartridge, print an alignment page, and away you go. It has a built-in card reader that accepts the following formats - CompactFlash, Memory Sticks, Microdrive, MultiMediaCard, Secure Digital, SmartMedia, xD-Picture Card.

I printed several pictures directly from a CF card and each picture takes about a minute or so to print. I used the included HP photo paper and Costco's Kirkland brand and the results were identical. The pictures were sharp and the colors were accurate. When I compared the pictures to identical ones that I printed with a Canon iP5000, and an Epson PictureMate (not the newer deluxe or express versions), all using the same Kirkland paper, I noticed that those from the A516 exhibited just a tad bit less contrast. It's only noticeable when you compare the pictures side-by-side.

All-in-all, I'd say that the HP Photosmart A516 is a pretty good deal. It's simple to use and extremely portable (you can also purchase the optional internal battery to make it even more portable). I don't know how long the ink cartridge will last so I can't comment on the per-print cost.

I was shopping at a local circuit city and saw this wonder thing on sale....unfortunately they were sold out....so i looked online and found it also on sale for less than ciruit city on amazon....This klinched it...it was a great deal! After receiving it, I printed pictures from my laptop and from my new fujitsu camera....It did a wonderful job on both and was very simple to setup...No more going to a digital kiosk for prints that were sometime questionable...

I really like my little printer. For the price I paid I was very impressed with what I received. The photo screen doesn't raise but that didn't matter to me, if you just want a good 4x6 photo printer without all the bells and whistles, I recommend this one.

I purchased this printer on a sale -after reading some reviews of it- and now I am very happy with it. Output is great and the software that comes with it is even better.

Blessings to all...

Frank

Wonderful little machine - color quality great, easy to use - a real gem

I bought this item as a gift for my scrapbooking daughter, she loves it.
I have personally seen the print quality and was impressed for such a reasonable price. The print cartridges seem to last a long time too. I also purchase the carrying case which makes it easy for her to tote it to scrapbooking parties because it is light weight and compact.

I love my new little printer. It's just what I was looking for. The price was right, the quality is very good and it only took 5 days to be delivered with free shipping.

This small printer works great for 4 X 6 prints, I only use the H-P advanced photo paper, and have excellant results. Small size is a plus, and lcd display lets you eview photos before printing. My wife uses it for small photos (4 per page) for her illusrated journalling, and aslo to print out other journal material.