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It's worth it. But it survived without any problem, very much to my surprise. I'd also recommend using a Macintosh. I almost bought a RIP, but the quality of prints using the free drivers is so good that it isn't necessary (for me, anyway). Must be a tough little printer).Some/many people seem to have trouble feeding cut sheets of paper through this printer, so I decided to go with the 130nr model which includes the automated roll feeder on the back, which I VERY HIGHLY RECOMMEND. I've had the printer for about 2 years now, and bought it used from a popular on-line auction site. The faster ones cost several times more, so if you're not in a high-volume shop this printer is fine speed-wise.As a graphic artist, and amateur photographer (for 3 decades), I can't recommend this printer highly enough. I've been amazed at the large prints of my artwork and photos that I've been able to make and use so little ink.
If you buy the roll feed seperately, it runs about $600 from HP. I use the DesignJet 130nr with my older desktop G4 Powermac as well as my newer MacBook Pro. I was actually stunned by the quality, the way the software upscaled my photos without visible artifact. That alone is worth a good bit of money.The printer itself has been very reliable (and sturdy, as noted earlier). The inks aren't cheap, but they last so long that I'm not tempted to use third-party inks; I'll stick with HP inks.Another huge plus is the software drivers included with the printer.
It's amazing. Very happy with the printer and HP paper.This isn't the fastest printer, but at this price who cares. :) BTW, whoever said that HP stopped making paper for this printer is wrong; I've ordered many rolls of paper from them, and they are very good quality, and reasonably priced. Extra spindles to hold rolls are about $50-60.I have used Epson printers in the past, but wanted to try something different because the Epsons clogged without constant use, and I wasted lots of ink with all of the cleaning cycles I had to do. The print quality is as good as it gets (use good quality paper, of course). (It was terribly packaged, attached to a wooden skid with no protection.
Even making a 24" print of an image taken with my older 4MP camera came out incredible, which you wouldn't expect from only 4 megapixals. Anyway, this HP seems to really ration ink. Roll paper is much, much cheaper than using cut sheets. But the print quality was very good.
Some nutcase decided to design this printer with JAGGED EDGED METAL ROLLERS. i am always hesitant to tell people not to buy. The paper doesnt load AT ALL from anywhere. I will not be using hp again - thats for sure.DO NOT BUY (and by the way, i got my printer from amazon).
And by the way, thats even when you select the desired kind of paper before printing.Seriously, i have no doubts some people have no problems, but I am highlighting this because enough people have had similar issues as i have to give this information some credibility. HP needs to have a look at this printer and make some adjustments - this is just terrible, i have had to close my online shop which i have lost out on because of this printer. It basically pummels light paper and chews heavyweight paper. ALSOOOOO - when using front loading, more often than not a horrble wheel mark from the rubber rollers are present from its harsh loading system.
Now some people who have bought this item find this situation laughable, and I aks them, why has more than one person, infact, why has a bunch of people had same issues. Especially on large pics, when using lots of black or dark backgrounds, the track marks just shine through and as for glossy photos - just forget it. I have bought some junk over the years ans shrugged it off, but this is just the worst. I mean wtf.
basically for the price they suck.Second - even when you do get a so called awesome print, it leaves track marks and here is why. Sure, after about ten attempts and five chewed pieces of paper later it will print but even at that it sometimes only half prints. Indeed, it is a recognised universal problem with the designjet130.
I can tell from some of the reviews that some people are attempting to load manually from the back.If you don't have the automatic roll feeder you're MUCH better off loading all paper from the FRONT.With this printer and my old HP 100 wide format I probably have around 5% that kickback.Maybe half of those are non square edges and the rest user error while feeding.Someone stated they tried 8 times with no luck is outright laughable.Also consider buying a CIS (continuous ink supply) to majorly decrease the ink cost.So far the auto color match profiling works great and it's value can't be over emphasized.Especially is one uses multiple papers or canvas.For the money there isn't a better 24" wide format printer out there.No doubt there is a slight learning curve and reading the manual completely is a must.It's obvious from some of the reviews that a few haven't read it.I owned a HP 100 wide format before this one.The extra 2 colors and the auto color match profiling make the HP 130 a no brainer over the HP 100, 110 and/or HP 120.Not too mention the increase available resolution of 2400x1200.Bottom line if you do a considerable amount of large prints and don't mind spending a little time to learn this printer, you'll be more than pleasantly surprised.kd
And get this I try to call their customer service for support and they charge.69 min. It takes you to a website and you have to have HP do it for you. It still didn't print sharp. Well like may Graphic Artist I wanted to produce layout s in largeformat. Where do these jerks selling crappy printers get off charging for customer service.My god save your money and just print your stuff at Kinko's or a small needing printing company.HP is a crap brand. I must have done this 8 times before I just wanted to beat the living hell out of it. I have always heard how good HP was and how easy it was to use so I figured that me next printer should be the king of printers.I can't tell you how upsetting this piece of crap is.It is so picky that you need to load the paper just the right way for it to grip it and if you don't it will keep kicking it back out to you over and over again. Oh but it gets better, this thing is so stupid that it does NOT calibrate the colors on its own.
Setup was a breeze, no problems with the changeover from XP to Vista, and all in all a great machine. I've had this printer (with attached roll feeder) since Nov 07 and it has caused no problems for me. Since then I have printed around 175 or so large format colour images.
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