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Holistic Guidance - HP Photosmart Pro B9180 Printer
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List Price: $800.00
Our Price: Too low to display
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Hewlett Packard
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Electronics
Brand: Hewlett-Packard
EAN: 0882780360518
Feature: Professional-grade photo printer
Is Autographed: 0
Is Memorabilia: 0
Label: Hewlett Packard
Manufacturer: Hewlett Packard
Model: B9180
Modem Description: None
Publisher: Hewlett Packard
Release Date: 2006-09-07
Studio: Hewlett Packard
System Memory Size: 64
Warranty: 1 year warranty
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Features
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Professional-grade photo printer
Enjoy up to 4,800 optimized dpi color (up to 4,800x1,200 dpi) when printing from computer
Windows and Mac compatible
Ethernet network compatible
1-year limited manufacturer's warranty
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Editorial Reviews:
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The HP Photosmart Pro B9180 Photo Printer delivers exceptional image quality and the best photo performance on the market. HP Vivera pigment ink technology, combined with the printer's professional colors, enables accurate and consistent color reproduction. HP's third-generation gray ink is more neutral than ever before, allowing for exceptionally smooth transitions and detail. Eight individual high-capacity ink cartridges enable high-volume printing with efficient printing speeds producing 4x6 inch photos in as fast as 10 seconds and 13x19 inch photos as fast as 1.5 minutes ideal for professional photographers and advanced amateurs. Users can print exceptional photos on digital fine art media including canvas, photo rag, watercolor, stiff pre-matte and film up to 1.5-mm thick, as well as improved HP Advanced Photo Paper. System Requirements - Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional, XP Home, XP Professional, XP64, Mac OS X v 10.2 and higher, USB 2.0 and optional Ethernet Dimensions - Width 26.6 x Depth 16.9 x Height 9.2 inches Weight - 37.7 pounds
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Excellent Printer
Comment: This is an excellent printer. One review stated that you can only use "Advanced" paper in this printer...not so. If you want to use different papers you must "tell" the printer what type of paper you are using. It's easy to do from the printer properties menu. When you click "print", then click "printer properties" and several options open up to select all sort of things, type of paper, size, borderless or whatever. It's given me super results on many papers!!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Beautiful prints but expensive to maintain.
Comment: I love the excellent quality of the prints it produces, but I had no idea when I bought it how much money I would be spending on replacing the ink cartridges.
It turns out that to prevent the nozzles from clogging, HP suggests you leave the printer on 24/7. When you do this, every 24 hrs or so the printer automatically steps though a head cleaning routine that uses a certain amount of ink. This means that even if you don't print a single print, in several weeks you end up needing to replace some of the ink cartridges anyway, which at about $30 each (and there's 8 of them), you end up spending your kid's college fund just to keep the printer usable.
If you are like me, a casual hobbyist, then it's too expensive. However if you are a professional, or even a serious hobbyist for whom money is no object, then this printer will make you very happy. The results are really outstanding.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great features, great prints
Comment: Background: I've owned and/or used Epson 2200, 4000, 7600, and 9800 printers for prints up to 44x96. Other than laser printers, this is my first deviation from Epson. I'm very happy with this HP.
INSTALLATION
I don't remember the details, but the initial setup had a small problem. The instructions were very explicit, so I called support. In the end, they had me turn it off and on again and the problem went away. I could have saved an hour on the phone.
COLOR
I've been using this exclusively with a 13x19 Hahnemuhle fine art paper for which I had a custom profile made. I'm getting excellent results and a pretty good color gamut. I print photos, mostly color and some B&W.
INK CONSUMPTION
After the ink consumed to charge the printer, I've made about 35 prints (usually 9x13.5 image area) and 10 5x7 notecards and any minute now I'll replace the MK cartridge. The light gray is just showing the low warning now. Since the paper I use is $3 a sheet and ink carts are $30, I'm pressing my luck to get a feel for the accuracy of the warnings.
EASE OF USE
When I installed this, I was using Photoshop CS2 and printed through the "automate" menu. That went away when I upgraded to CS3, perhaps because I uninstalled CS2 first or perhaps just because the printer driver was already installed. It's not a big difference going through the regular print menu. It is, of course, important to have all of the correct settings; I wasted two sheets because Color Management had reset to Adobe RGB from Application Managed Color when I reopened the file.
One convenient feature is the Printing Shortcuts which allow you to save presets for your various paper/size/orientation standards. Overall, the driver is a bit more user friendly than Epson's.
Speaking of Epson printers, this one differs in that you do not control the platen. When you've inserted paper, you press the OK button and the printer grabs the paper and transports it. Anything you load through the slot (all heavy paper) gets pulled out the back and then prints moving forward. This means that you need space behind the printer.
Having been through painful episodes with clogged heads on Epsons I love several features of this printer. If necessary, I can replace the heads. But that's less likely to be necessary because the printer periodically checks itself. Just leave it turned on and you can go on vacation without fear that you'll have to jump through hoops power cleaning heads or even end up choking on the cost of a service call!
SHORTCOMINGS
The paper loading for specialty paper is tweaky. You drop the alternate loading slot door on the front and hand-align the paper. Curled corners of heavy paper catch on the way in fairly often. The good news is the only time I've had the paper skew is with some notecards (7x10 sheet size). I tried loading the Moab notecard stock in the tray and that did not work.
On two prints I notice a faint line rubbed in the ink. Same image, same spot (no, it's on in the image file). I blew out the printer and have not seen it again.
This printer is larger and heavier than many 13x19" printers. I have it on a substantial folding table and it really dances when it prints.
BOTTOM LINE
I don't know what was going on at the time, but I got this printer in March 2008 for $500 plus shipping. Prices are higher now. It would have cost me that much to buy a set of cartridges for the Epson 4000 which this printer replaced. I consider the HP B9180 a fine printer and outstanding value.
Customer Rating:
Summary: HP B9180
Comment: I had an issue with the first printer that I shipped, but I was completely satisfied with how Amazon handled it. Within about 3 days, I had a new printer.
The printer itself is gigantic - I measured the size before I purchased it, but that didn't prepare for the space requirements. I've printed a few photos out of the printer, and everything has been superb. The Photoshop plug-in helps as well; what I see on my monitor is replicated on the paper.
Great prints.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Appalling wheel marks on glossy paper... not a pro machine.
Comment: HP must be some very powerful company. I've read lots of positive reviews on this printer, so i went a purchased one.
But i quickly found out that it marks lines on glossy paper (both HP and Tetenal)
This is unacceptable for a pro range model.
I do not recommend HP B9180
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