HP Officejet Pro 8600 Price Review

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55 of 55 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars My iPad Printing Buddy!, December 21, 2011
By Vincent E. Martin “Darkbard” (Aurora, IL United States) See all my reviews
(REAL NAME) This review is from: HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus e All in On Wireless Color Printer with Scanner, Copier & Fax (Office Product) One of the big complaints about the iPad when it was 1st presented was that one couldn’t print from it. Apple heard us and with the release of IOS (iPhone Operating System) 4.2 the company included Apple Air Print a technology that lets, or is supposed to let the iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch to print wirelessly from the device to an ever increasing number of Hewlett Packard printers like the “HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus Inkjet Printer.”

Hewlett Packard upped the ante with this All n One (AIO) unit by as well as wireless and giving the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus Inkjet Printer an e mail address (@hpeprint.Com address) from which one can print from any computer, iPad or other mobile device via a technology called “HP e Print.” One may also print wirelessly to an Apple mobile device like an iPad, iPod Touch, iPhone etc. Via Apple Air Print.

Un Packing

Make no mistake the “HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus” is a hefty printer checking in a 21 pounds. And while the unit doesn’t require a two man lift, it’ll require many finesse to get it out of the box and onto a flat surface. One unboxed it took me a little less than 15 minutes to totally assemble the printer as well as the duplexer unit. Thankfully the power supply is fitted, so no heavy power brick to find a place for.

Network Setup

Before connecting the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus network via Ethernet (RJ 45), or Wireless the choice must be made to use one or the other communications medium, but not both. USB may be utilized with either configuration. Since I wanted my iPad to “speak” to the printer and print I installed the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus using wireless and USB and I can print either way also as use the scanner to print to computer. Wireless set up was effortless using DHCP; all I required to know was the network WPA2 passcode.

Wireless Printing & e Print

One of the selling points of the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus e AIO is of course the capability of the iPad to print to the device either wirelessly (Air Print) or via e Print. I’m happy to report that both work!

As I stated above Apple IOS variant 4.2 shipped with Air Print, which lets the iPad to wirelessly “talk” to Air Print enabled printers like the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus. Once the printer was set up on the wireless network I could see the printer on the iPad from Air Print enabled applications like Safari, choose the printer and print. G that was it, no setup needed on the iPad.

HP’s e Print also works like a charm, most of the time. With e Print the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus is assigned a customizable e mail address to which one can forward e mail’s to be printed from iPad, iMac, iPod, or PC as long as the printer is connected to the Internet. This feature works reasonably well; it’s supposed to be able to print attachments, but this is a hit or miss proposition; i.E. On occasion it works, sometime not, on occasion it print half a page. But, in general, I’m happy with e print.

Software Installation

My HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus is connected mainly to an Apple iMac 2.7GHz machine with 4GB RAM, 1TB hard drive running OS X Lion variant 10.7.2. Out of the box the software disc won’t work with Lion 10.7.2, so I had to download a software update from Apple and another from HP, but both worked seamlessly and I was able to get up and running with full functionality (including scan to computer) in under 15 minutes. And I have to say for the record I like the iMac interface for the printer better than the Windows seven interface.

Printing

Pretty straight forward; the software installation procedure installed a full set of print drivers which in turn give you complete control over the printing procedure, as well as two sided printing. The HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus may also print from put in USB flash drives and or MMC/SD Media cards.

Scanning

The HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus offers up both a 50 sheet ADF and flatbed scanner for use. Initialing the scanning procedure may be accomplished from the included software, inserting a page(s) into the ADF, or the units control panel. Once an item is placed into the ADF or on the flatbed scanner glass surface, you may be able to push the Scan button on the front panel, at which time you decide where to scan to: Computer, USB Flash Drive, or Memory Card. Once a destination is chosen, you may be able to then chose to scan to file (.PDF is an option), e mail, or photo.

Copy Process

This procedure, like printing is pretty straight forward; both color and black & white copies may be made, up to 99 at a time. Because there’s a duplexer installed two sided copies may be made in some different configurations, as well as 1 side original/ 1 side copy; 1 side original/ 2 side copy; 2 side original/ 1 side copy; 2 side original/ 2 side copy. Copies may also be enlarged up to 144, or reduced down to 25 of original.

Working with Photos

As stated above, the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus will accept input from some commercially available movable memory storage devices, slots for which are located on the left hand side of the printer underneath the cartridge insertion flip down panel. Simply put the memory card and the photos it holds are displayed on the small 4.6″ touch screen color display on the right hand side of the unit.

Conclusion

Overall I like the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus e AIO, because it works seamlessly with my iMac and I can print to it from my iPad. The design is a little austere; there aren’t buttons to push because everything is controlled from the color (touch screen) display panel, which may prove problematic if it ever decides not to work. But, there’s generally the control set on the computer, so.

The fitted wired Ethernet capability, coupled with USB and wireless make the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus e AIO Inkjet Printer a versatile, adaptable unit that’s ideal for a small home office setting and well as workgroup setting. If you or your small workgroup need a scanner/ copier/ printer/ fax, and have to print from your iPad or other mobile device in many form or fashion the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus should be given serious consideration.

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91 of 96 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars Printer that works everytime, November 29, 2011
By S. Heard “Rockingchair” (Missouri) See all my reviews
(REAL NAME) () This review is from: HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus e All in On Wireless Color Printer with Scanner, Copier & Fax (Office Product) bought this printer to replace another HP printer that had served it is usfullness. This printer clearly is a work horse and prints out quality prints and photes without hesitation. Have tested it on nearly everything without a glitch. Was easy to set up and meshed into our wireless system without annoyance. Set up menu was intended for people like me that aren’t experts in the field. You will not go wrong with this buy. Greatly recommend. So far this has proven to be a quality product. Using for iphone, ipad and wireless computer printing.

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30 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of five stars works well with Mac OS X Lion, after an initial hiccup, December 15, 2011
By Brandon St Amant (Baton Rouge, LA United States) See all my reviews
(REAL NAME) () This review is from: HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus e All in On Wireless Color Printer with Scanner, Copier & Fax (Office Product) I bought this printer to replace a Brother MFC 7820N multifunction laser printer, which was a great printer that interfaced well with my Mac for many years. I was firstly cynical of buying the HP because I have had problems with other HP printers. I also read reviews on other sites saying the printer wasn’t completely matched with Mac OX X Lion. But I decided the feature set was too irresistible not to give it a attempt.

I received the printer from quicker than I projected and has been excited to set it up. Unfortunately, the setup was a nightmare from the moment that I turned the printer on. The printer has a really nice touchscreen but no physical buttons other than the power button. When you plug in the printer, the 1st thing that the setup program prompts you for is a language. I pushed what I was thought was English but seemingly my finger really activated another language close and from that point forward I couldn’t read any of the setup screen prompts. I fumbled through some buttons that I thought may work, but the procedure ended in an error message in a foreign language that I could not exit out of. I called tech support, who tried to help me do a factory reset, but they really could not figure out how to make the printer return to factory settings! seemingly last models had a mix of key presses that could factory reset the machine, but the touchscreen makes this procedure more complicated. There’s supposed to be an area of the panel that you push four or five times to bring up a service menu, but my touchscreen was totally unresponsive.

So, HP sent me a substitute. I was more cautious to choose the language that I was familiar with this time. Setup went smoothly this time. As instructed in the package put for Mac users, I used the Software Update on the Mac to get the new driver. I was up and running quickly, printing both from my Mac and also my iPhone and iPad via AirPrint. Nice. This printer is fast and delivers high quality text and graphics.

I was not totally out of the woods still though I tried to scan a document to pdf using the printer, and got an error message that my computer wasn’t properly setup for this. When I tried to follow the onscreen information, I kept to get error messages. So back to HP tech support I went, this time with an online chat. I has been guided through an uninstall and reinstall of the HP utility, which worked flawlessly. I’m now able to scan to pdf from the printer, and it also has a really cool feature that allows you to send an email directly from the printer with the scanned document attached. I have read reviews on other sites that these scanner functions aren’t supported in Lion, but I can guarantee you that they’re. If you’re having trouble I could recommend contacting HP for a walkthrough.

All in all, excellent printer and could have given five stars if it were not for the issues I had with setup and needing to get a substitute sent. At less than $200 this is many of printer for the money. It has a bigger footprint than the laser that it’s replacing, but it is not grossly oversized and looks nice on a desk.

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