OfficeJet 6000 Wireless InkJet Printer: good hardware, poor software

Author's Rating:

Pros: Capable, fast printer with wireless and double sided printing (609n only)

Cons: Noisy, bulky and difficult to install

The Bottom Line: 
Good piece of hardware, but I can only recommend it to savvy computer users.

Author's Review
There are actually 2 types of Hewlett Packard OfficeJet 6000 InkJet Printers. This review is for the Hewlett Packard OfficeJet 6000 Wireless InkJet Printer, model number 609n. The other one is the Hewlett Packard OfficeJet 6000 InkJet Printer, model number 609a (reviewed by the previous reviewer). By the way, neither type of the Hewlett Packard OfficeJet 6000 InkJet Printer is All-In-One. This must be an error by Epinions. Hewlett Packard OfficeJet 6500 printers are All-In-One and this is probably where the mix up came from.  Both Hewlett Packard OfficeJet 6000 printers are small/home business-class network inkjet printers marketed as cheap alternatives to laser.  The 609a printer can be connected by USB or Ethernet cable.  The 609n printer can be connected by USB, Ethernet cable or wirelessly using 802.11g/b networking. One additional difference is that the HP 6000 wireless printer has automatic two-sided printing, absent in the wired HP 6000 model. Other than that, there are no differences.

The HP 6000 printers advertise fast printing speed of 32 pages per minute and I believe it, as the printer is very fast in draft mode that is passable for daily home use.  The better speed quality is slower, 7 pages per minute but is supposed to compete with laser quality. The black/white print quality is indeed very good. I cannot comment about color as I don’t print pictures at home.

The printers are energy efficient with up to 40% less energy than with laser printers. I again believe it as the printed goes to sleep mode when unused and wakes up when needed.

The printer uses separate black, red, blue and yellow ink cartridges. The printer comes with “standard” ink cartridges and “XL” ink cartridges are available at extra cost. Either the “standard” is euphemism for “starter” or the printer eats lots of ink during installation, but the low ink lights (all of them at once) illuminated awfully fast after printing only approximately 30 pages.  I understand that the cartridges are easy to DIY refill, but I did not do it yet (printer still prints with low ink lights). 

This printer comes with complimentary USB cable as it is needed for setup even if one opts for wireless connection.  The manual is on the CD-ROM.

The setup consists of light assembly, printer setup, and software installation. After the printer is turned on the first time, it goes through very lengthy and noisy setup.  It literally sounds like the printer is just about to break apart.  After at least of 10-15 minutes (felt like forever) of setup, one can install the software.  The software is a monster. Installation took nearly an hour on a modern Vista laptop with Duo Core 2.2 GHz. User is asked to connect and disconnect USB cable to printer a few times and turn off antivirus and firewall software. One has to choose to “ad hock” mode or network mode.  “Ad hock” involves temporary connection to printer, but the PC has to disconnect from regular wireless network at the same time. Network mode is connected all the time. I initially installed “ad hock” as it sounded much simpler in the manual. In retrospect, network mode is the better choice and it is not as intimidating or difficult as the manual implies.

The printer worked fine with wireless connection (ad hock) for a while but connection problem started a few months later and printer could not be connected to anymore. It could be because I tried to install the printer on another laptop (XP pro) and another PC (XP home) and the software installations were unsuccessful. I blame the buggy and bloated software.

I recently reinstalled the printer again, this time in a network mode, so it is always connected when wireless network available. The installation again took forever and generated lots of errors. A few times, the HP software did not recognize HP printer connected via USB! The first round of installation ended with failure and I had to install once more.  The second time generated a “fatal error”, but to my surprise, the printer now works. By the way, the software on HP website is the same version as the CD-ROM (ver 12), so no help there. Due to the previous installation problems, I’m afraid to install it on another PC at home.

In summary it’s a capable, fast, but noisy printer with a few very attractive features (wireless and double sided printing).  Being office printer, it is quite big in it’s form factor, bigger than typical home printer.  The biggest negative is the software, very slow to install and with lots of problems during installation.  Considering that I got this printer very cheap (black Monday), it’s worth the effort. I would not pay the current regular price though ($119 on HP website).