We recently purchased a new printer. It’s not just a printer, though. It is the HP Photosmart C6180 All-In-One Printer. It copies, scans, faxes. Slices, dices, chops. Oh, yes, it prints, too, of course.

Installing the software took a bit of time. The first mistake we made was connecting the device before turning on the laptop. The laptop was so confused it hurt. Unplugged, restarted, then plugged and all was good. Installed the software, and was able to print pretty much right away. The printing time is fast, relative to our old ink jet printer. I printed a one-page calendar created in Excel and it took just a few seconds (according to Amazon, printing time is 32 ppm. Not too shabby). Print quality is good, though I haven’t tried printing out an image yet.

My next experiment was scanning. I attempted to a few times and the printer (which, really isn’t a printer, buy sca-cop-fax-inter is too difficult to say. AIO for short). wouldn’t talk to the laptop. So, restart the laptop and suddenly everything is hunky dorry. Scanning quality is decent, for its purposes. Take a look:

Cake! What else would I show you? Our wedding cake. Don’t ask me what kind of cake it was because I can’t remember. Neither can the husband. Different tiers were different flavors, but that’s all I remember. But I digress.

So, scan quality is not terrific, but does its purpose.

HP software offers image editing but I probably won’t bother since I already own a couple of other ones. One of the cool things about the AIO is that you don’t require the PC to operate it. You can scan and save to a memory device (i.e. USB flash drive). You can insert a memory card from your digital camera, and the AIO accepts all sorts of cards, including CF (compact flash), which is what our old Canon PowerShot uses. Yay!

Initial verdict: I like it. It’s pretty intense, lots of features. Now that the initial installation is over I see it is fairly intuitive, as you’re able to control it either at the printer or from the laptop.

Haven’t tried the fax yet. That’s next up. Will report later.