HP Officejet Pro 8500 All-in-one Printer

I have been looking for a networked color laser printer suitable for home and small office use for some time. Then I received an ad for this printer. I was convinced to try it because of the new ink technology, the relatively low cost of replacement ink cartridges and the duplex printing capability. So far I've been completely satisfied. It's easily fast enough for my use. Print quality is high. It seems to have good color accuracy; I've printed a couple of photos on high quality photo paper and been quite pleased. It was a breeze to install (we are a Mac household). The scan and copy functions are easy to use. Duplex printing is slow but adequate for the times it is used. I've yet to have to replace a cartridge so I can't speak to the cost per page of printing.

Note that ink for this printer will set you back One Hundred and fourteen dollars!!!

Before purchasing the Officejet 8500, be aware that there appears to be compatibility issues with the current drivers (as of 5/5/2009) and Windows XP. Basically, the user gets the following error: "The printer has not yet responded, but the Microsoft Office program may be able to proceed without printer information". I have spent hours on the phone with their India-based tech support and with their chat technical support. Sadly, HP provides the worst technical support that I have ever experienced. The telephone reps barely speak English and the chat reps serve multiple customers at the same time, leading to long delays between their responses. Moreover, I have been cut off during chat sessions five times, which leads me to believe it is intentional as this always seems to happen when I attempt to corner them on difficult questions. Before getting cut off today (5/5/2009) the chat...Read more

In our small office we print over 5000 sheets a month and share the printer over a USB switch with 4 of us. We use it also for scanning and sending out customer documents. Speed for faxing and scanning was important as we often scan and fax 20 to 40 pgs.

The price per page was excellent due to the oversized ink cartridges printing 2 or 3 times the number of pages as we had previously obtained with other HP ink jets. For every day printing we have further cut printing costs by 75% by using refilled cartiridges from ebay. Overall the best color printer we have purchased in the last 4 years.

Only drawback that we have found is that for pdf scanning, a direct usb connection to a PC is required. Bottom line: Its got speed and the initial price is higher, but with much lower ink costs, payback is in a couple of months.