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  • Introduction

  • Setup / Drivers and Software

  • Document Performance

  • Photo Performance

  • Tour and Components

  • Design and Interface

  • Inks and Toner

  • Print Settings and Options

  • Connectivity

  • Inks and Toner

  • Conclusion

  • Introduction
  • Setup / Drivers and Software
  • Document Performance
  • Photo Performance
  • Tour and Components
  • Design and Interface
  • Inks and Toner
  • Print Settings and Options
  • Connectivity
  • Inks and Toner
  • Conclusion

Introduction

Setup / Drivers and Software

Manual/Quick Start (7.5)

The HP D7640 comes with a setup guide and a basics guide. The setup guide is a 16-page pamphlet that's color-coordinated and graphically describes the setup process. The pamphlet does a good job of walking you through the setup with clear instructions and pictographs. There is little room for error in the setup of this printer, but the detailed instructions are good for those of us who may miss the obvious or are new to some of the features, like WiFi.

The basics guide is a total of 84 pages, but only 38 pages of it is written in English. The remaining pages are dedicated to French. The basics guide is basically a slight expansion of the setup instructions plus some added instructions on tools, features and troubleshooting.

Out of the Box (7.5)

Of the inks, the HP Photosmart D7460 comes with a Black ink cartridge (16ml), Cyan ink cartridge (4.5ml), Magenta ink cartridge (4.5ml), Light Cyan ink cartridge (4.5ml), Yellow ink cartridge (4.5ml), and Light Magenta ink cartridge (4.5ml). Also included are the software CD for Windows and Mac, setup guide, basics guide, power supply and the power cord.

Setup (8.5)

Setting up the HP D7460 was a pretty effortless. Outside of taking the printer out of the box, set up was simple and consisted of removing the orange tape, screen seals and putting the inks in place.

Installing the inks was surprisingly a fun task. The ink cartridges look like something out of a playdough can or a box of Legos. The bright colors and rubber-like feel of the cartridges make inserting the inks more of a child's game, something out of an Easter egg hunt, than a task. The cartridge slots also are reminiscent of rollercoaster seating, with its push-down, lock-in latch.

Drivers and Administration (7)

The main driver control for the HP D7460 is the HP Solution Center. At the top right corner of the HP Solution Center sits the name of the printer in view. HP's Solution Center picks up on any HP printer driver your computer. You can change which printer you want information about by clicking on the left vertical bar of the Solution Center.

Underneath the name of the printer, in this case it is "HP Photosmart D7400 Series," sits the "Status" link. You can click this to view general information about the printer: whether it's connected or not connected. It also holds two links on the left side: "View ink levels" and "Cartridge Information."

The "View ink levels" link will take you to the HP Photosmart D7400 Series Toolbox, which has four tabs for your choosing, one of which is estimated ink levels. You can also configure your Bluetooth device and execute printer cleaning through the toolbox.

Software (3)

The HP D7450 comes with two main software: HP Photosmart Express and HP Photosmart Essential 2.01. Photosmart Express pretty much lives up to its name, allowing you to view, save, share, order or print your photographs. Photosmart Express doesn't allow for anything that you couldn't do anyway on your computer. The good thing about Express is you don't have to go to an outside website to order prints, it allows you request an order straight from the same window you'd choose to execute any other request, like printing, saving or sharing.

Photosmart Essential 2.01 offers a very unique feature that makes organization and sharing photos easier: tagging. This tagging feature allows you tag your photos by assigned names to objects or people within the photographs. You can tag all the photos of an album or just a select few. If you have family or vacation photos, you can assign each photograph with names of people or places.

Document Performance

Warm-up (5.36)

The warm up time for the HP D7460 was a bit long; it took between 8-10 seconds and over a minute, with no discernable pattern as to how long it might take.

Power Usage (6.62)

The HP D7460 sucked up a bit more juice than most printers while printing and cleaning; of the printers we've tested, only the Sony Picturestation took more juice. Using 21 Kilowatt-hours in cleaning mode, the D7460 scored well above the HP A440 and the Epson PictureMate Snap.

When it came to being in the ready mode, the HP D7460 was on par with the other printers in its class, using only a steady 4 kilawatt-hours. However, it was very disappointing to see while all of the other printers, including the power guzzling Sony PictureStation all took in zero watts while off, the HP D7460 still required two watts of power.

Document Speed/Timing (5.44)

The HP D7460 was mediocre in its document printing speed. After recognizing the print request, it would at times, take an abnormal amount of time to print. The screen would display its "Printing" message but the printing wouldn't start until some moments of delay, at times over a minute. Although it didn't do this all the time, it did do it enough times to note. Printing text and graphics for the D7460 was on pretty much on par. It didn't print exceptionally fast or slow and printed good quality prints.

It did have one problem. The ink didn't stick to the page very well, even dried ink that had been sitting for days could very easily be smeared with the slightest touch of liquid, even a slightly moist hand, making the quality of the original not long-lasting at all; make sure to let the prints dry and keep them away from sweaty hands.

HP claims using their Smart Web Technology allows you to print websites without worrying about getting the edges cut off, but this feature only worked with Internet Explorer 6.0 and not at all in Firefox.

Photo Performance

Photo Performance (6.5)

Speed was not this D7360's highlight when it came to printing photographs. It was slow and unpredictable. The HP D7460 did not handle large files with any sort of class. It took an average of ten minutes to print five large-file 4x6 photographs. It frequently decided it needed to perform printer maintenance in the middle of many of the print tests, thus delaying the print time even more. If it had happened once or twice during the print test, we could just put it down to a minor glitch, but it frequently did this, more so during photo printing. The HP D7460 had a hard time printing large files in general, whether the print requests were 5x7, or 8.5x11 from PC or CF cards.

It did, however, do a much better job of printing small-file photographs. The table below shows the extreme difference in speed: the large-filed 4x6 took two minutes fifty-seven seconds per page to print, while the small-filed 4x6 photograph took only 36 seconds per page to print. That's a big difference when you're printing multiple pictures. We printed five large-filed photographs for the 4x6 and it took over ten minutes. Imagine if you needed to print ten or even 20 photographs; It could quite possibly take over a half-hour, which is much slower than many other printers: the Epson stylus Photo R400 took less than 20 seconds for a large print.

Color Accuracy (6.10)

Color error is a measure of how well the printer reproduces colors. We measure this by printing a digital version of a Gretag Macbeth Colorchecker, then scanning the print and analyzing the image to determine the average color error from all of the error from the sixteen color patches. Below is a sample of the chart.

The HP D7460 had a problem reproducing blue-greens, and colors such as six (bluish green) were extremely inaccurate. This was confirmed when later when sizeable errors came in blues and greens. Square 11 (yellow green) also had a sizeable error. This printer had definitely had a trend of performing better with lighter tones than darker tones. It was never able to accurately reproduce the darkness and depth of the dark tones on either tested papers: the manufacturer's HP Advanced Paper or the Ilford Galerie Paper we use to test all printers.

Color Gamut (3.67)

The Color Gamut test looks at how much of the standard Adobe RGB color space a printer can accurately reproduce. Printers that can render more of the Adobe RGB color space will ultimately output images with a greater range of colors and look more attractive to the eye. On the graph above, the solid color is the color space that the printer can cover, while the grid represents the entire Adobe RGB color space. The closer the two, the more colors the printer can represent and the higher the score. The HP Photosmart didn't do a great job of matching and covering the space. It was able to reproduce 43.45% of the color space. It's main disappointment came when trying to reproduce dark tones.

Dmax (5.9)

The DMax test is a measurement of the densest black that the printer can produce. We measure this using a densitometer; we use the EyeOne Pro spectrophotometer from Gretag Macbeth. The ideal value of a printer is 2.50, although reaching this score is nearly impossible, getting close is valued highly, as it means that the printer will produce deep, dark blacks.

Sadly, the HP D7460 performed poorly on the DMAx test, earning a score of 2.04. The Epson PM240 performed much better than the D7460 with its score of 2.43, as did the Epson Stylus Photo R2400, which scored a 2.26.

The only printer that we've tested that the HP D7460 beat out was its own predecessor, the HP A440, which earned an even worse 1.72.

Black and White (6)

As reflected in the color accuracy section and above in DMax section, the HP D7460 had a problem with dark colors, not only failing to reproduce the richness of the dark colors but also the depth and accuracy of them. The black and white test proved to be no different for the D7460. Although it was able to reproduce a black and white photograph accurately, its dark blacks came out as dark grays. The white tones proved to be better, but without the dark blacks, the images lacked tonal range.

Tour and Components

Front

The HP Photosmart D7460 gives off the impression that its intention was to be sleek. When closed, it is almost a perfect rectangle with rounded corners. The color combination adds to this attempted affect. The front of the printer is primarily silver while the rest of the printer is white. The Compactflash, multi-media and xD card slots are housed under a clear upward lifting glass door on the top right hand side of the printer. Below it is the Pictbridge USB port, which is open; it has no cover or casing to protect it from any dust or debris. The front of the printer also holds the trays, both input and output. Designed like shelving, the input tray rests on the bottom while a shelved tray above it houses the small photo tray and also acts like an output tray.

Documents and larger photos, beginning with 5x7s, are placed in the bottom tray and released above the top photo tray. While the bottom tray is open and can be pulled out to place papers in, the top tray has a lid that is pulled up.

The top half, or the silver lid, of the printer lifts up to reveal the inks. There’s a latch to lift up the frame, you put the ink and place and close the frame. Re-latching the frame keeps the ink cartridges in place. They look like colorful toys; even the feel of them is rubbery almost like playdough.

Right Side

The right side of the printer is mostly white and free of any ports and plugs.

Left Side

The left side of the printer, like the right, is also predominantly white with no ports and plugs.

Back

The back of the HP Photosmart D7460 consists of the product information and three ports: power, etherent and USB.

There's also a lid that can be completely removed to reveal the interior of the printer, which is useful in case of a paper jam.

Components

Display (9.5)

All of the HP D7460's on-unit menu navigation takes place through its 3.5-inch touchscreen. The sensitivity on the touchscreen is well-calibrated; it doesn't run off at the slightest touch but it also doesn't require immense pressure. The display is bright, colorful and depicts photographs well. The touchscreen displays graphics well and at different angles. The screen is thin and can be adjusted to your preference; you can lay it down flat if you like or pull it up to a straight vertical stand.

Paper Trays

The HP D7460 has two input trays: the bottom one for larger papers – 5x7 to 8x10 inch and legal size papers – and the top tray for 4x6 inch photo paper. The printer is really good about sensing the paper type in the trays;for example if you're trying to print a photograph on document paper, the printer will notice and will ask you to put in the correct photo paper. So it's important to keep the page type selection accurate. The bottom, larger paper tray has an input maximum capacity of 100 pages.

CD Burner (0)

There is no CD burner in this printer.

Battery (0)

The HP D7460 does not come with a battery, and no optional battery is available.

Power Supply

The HP D7360 features an external power supply with an AC adapter.

Multi-Tasking (0)

This printer is not a multi-function device; it is incapable of multi-tasking.

Hard Drive/Memory (2)

The HP D7460 has 64 mb of memory.

Accessories (11)

The HP D7460 offers a wide range of purchasable range of accessories from USB cords to ink, photo books, cleaning kits, photo paper, memory cards and printer cases. HP also has a value pack for this printer: an ink and paper set.

Design and Interface

Controls and Buttons (7.5)

The HP Photosmart D7460 has only four buttons: one red-eye removal button, a power button, a print photos button and a cancel print button, making the printer's on-unit navigation truly dependent on its touchscreen. The touchscreen proved to be not only easy to navigate, but bright and colorful. The touchscreen was good at not running away with the slightest touch, but being more on the less sensitive side. Although for the most part, an accurate, slightly firm touch selected the option, there were a few times where a more firm touch was needed.

Menus (7.5)

The menu navigation was pretty simple and even though there was a clear-cut directory and order to the menu, it tended to be a little confusing to navigate. Although the graphics were fun, they could also be somewhat distracting.

In the middle of the home screen, there is a default flower picture next to a box named 'View' where you can view photos from your CF card or other multi-media card. At the bottom there are four similar buttons aligned in a row: Print, Create, Share and Save. These options lead you to the above graphed directions.

Printing from the touchscreen requires a media card to be inserted into the printer. PC prints must be executed from a PC. Through the Create option, you can create several different types of photographs in accordance to size and design. The Share option requires software and wired or wireless connection but essentially allows you to share your photos with others. The Setup Menu is the most distinct part of this printer menu in that it houses options like Printable School papers. This option lets you print college and wide ruled lined paper and child notebook paper, as well as graph paper. It also lets you print music paper. The Setup Menu also offers help and tools for the printer, as well as networking setup, so you can use the wireless function. The printer picks up on nearby wireless accounts very easily; its just as connective as your PC.

Size and Portability (3.57)

Although HP gives this printer the option of purchasing a carrying case, it isn't the lightest or smallest most convenient printer to lug around. With dimensions of 18.2 inches in width x 19.7 inches in depth x 9.3 inches in height and weighing in at 17.6 lbs, it's a heavy, bulky accessory to carry around, although it is portable enough to move from one place to another occasionally. The printer also has two indents on both the right and left bottom sides of the printer so you can clasp your hands and carry the printer.

Inks and Toner

Configuration (7)

The HP D7360 uses six colors: magenta, blue, light blue, light pink, yellow and black. The black tank is the largest one.

Value (9)

The inks cost about $9.99 per ink cartridge while the black ink tanks costs $17.99. HP also offers a combo pack for the color inks for $44.99 and a twinpack of the black ink for $32.99. These options make the inks a good value although the individual tanks are on the small side.

Ink Management Tools (3)

The ink management tools were not located in the properties section, but in the solution center, which was not always convenient since many other manufacturers like Canon place the ink levels in the more easily acessible printer properties section. And we found that the ink management was not always accurate: the ink levels would jump from being full or nearly full to being nearly empty very quickly. However, the ink levels did give good warning when the ink became low, but still continued to print for some time.

Print Quality Settings (7.5)

As well as the usual quality settings for draft and best quality print mode, the advanced options allow you to adjust the color and brightness with a toggle bar. If you wanted to add more greens or reds or yellows to your prints you could do it manually instead of surrendering to the printer options of what adding yellows should look like.

Internal/Image Editing (6.5)

Image editing for this printer was basic at best. All of the image editng options were disappointing for a photo printer. Red-eye removal, trimming and color effects were among the main image editing options available, but there was no way to alter color or otherwise edit images within the printer itself.

Dedicated B/W Settings and Effects (1.5)

Outside of having the option to select grayscale, there was no other dedicated black and white options. Although you could play with the color adjustments in the advanced color options, they are not as convenient and targeted toward black and white.

Media Types (3)

This printer supports the common media types: plain paper, photo paper of various sizes from 4x6 to 8x10. However, this printer also supports panorama size photos as well, making it a very unique feature. It also is able to print grind paper, children's lined paper along with college and wide ruled paper. So at the last minute, if you run out of lined paper, you can easily reproduce it.

Connectivity

Formats and Capability (7)

The HP D7460 is Pictbridge enabled printer and is able to print from cameras and other compatible camera phones. These connect to the USB port conveniently located on the front of the printer.

Media Slots (6)

The HP D7460 supports USB, Pictbridge, memory cards, CF cards, multimedia cards, Memory stick DUO and xD cards. One port is dedicated for each card type.

Wireless Interface (6)

The D7460 includes 802.11g WiFi support. It can either create its own network, or join an existing one. The printer is able to print photographs and documents from any computer connected to the network, although the speed does slow down slightly compared to printing over the USB connection.

Network (5)

The HP D7460 is Ethernet capable; the Ethernet port on the back of the printer supports speeds of up to 100Mbps. This means it can be easily connected to and shared across a small office or home network.

Inks and Toner

East of Use (7.5)

The HP Photosmart D7360 was pretty self-explanatory and easy to navigate. It followed commands, albeit sometimes slowly, and the menus are clear and graphically appealing to the eye as well as easy to direct. Wireless use of the printer was also simple after it was configured and it made printing a hassle free experience. But printing large images is unacceptably slow.

Value (6)

For $124.99, the HP Photosmart D7460 is a good value if your main interest is in printing documents and small photographs. The inks are reasonably priced and the value-packs are definitely a plus. But the low price might be a false economy if you are looking to print large photos; you'd be better off spending a bit more on a faster printer.

Comparisons

The HP Photosmart D7460 was definitely taken down by the Epson Stylus Pro R400 and the Canon Pixma Pro9000 in the photo speed test and again by the Epson Stylus Pro R400 in the DMax test along with the Epson PM240, but the HP D7460 was also beat out in the power usage section. As far as speed and color accuracy go, the HP D7460 barely improved on its own predecessor the HP Photosmart A440.

Conclusion

The main attraction to the HP Photosmart D7460 definitely comes in its quality of photographs; for a budget printer it does a reasonable job of producing photo prints. And it has a few tricks up its sleeve; it can produce lined or graph paper, as well as supporting print panoramic photos on paper in sizes up to 4 by 24 inches. With the printer's continued poor test results in large-file photo printing, color accuracy and DMax score, it only seemed to hang on par with its small-file photograph prints and power usage, giving credit, of course to the fact that it was able to produce good quality and clear photographs both with the large files and small files. This printer, overall, provided reasonable photo quality, but it was slow and did a poor job at printing other documents, but it is pretty cheap at $124.99. Just make sure that you can live with the lackluster non-photo performance before you lay out the cash.

Meet the tester

Binde Rai

Binde Rai

Editor

Binde Rai is a valued contributor to the Reviewed.com family of sites.

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