» HP Photosmart D5160 Printer. Up To 1200 Dpi Black. Up To 4800 X 1200 Optimized D

HP Photosmart D5160 Printer. Up To 1200 Dpi Black. Up To 4800 X 1200 Optimized D Reviews

Customer Rating:
Summary: Very Good For The Price
Comment: I purchased this printer to print on CD's and DVD's. The software supplied with the printer did not seem to be very good, but I do not use it. I use Roxio Media Creator. On the label creator just tell the software to print to the CD tray on the printer. You will need to make adjustments so that it prints the right area, but this is to be expected on any new printer. So far the quality has been very good and the only problems have been operator error ( that would be me of course). Ink seemed to be used at a reasonable rate as well.

---

Customer Rating:
Summary: Good, Not Great
Comment: Bought the printer for CD/DVD printing capabilities as many others did. I didn't want an Epson after seeing so many people have problems with that brand. At the time (a few years ago) it was one of the few options, apart from using Lightscribe and similar technologies.

Software/drivers are junk. Lining up the disc is impossible without using their provided software. Other software always prints offset the disc with no way to adjust it. And their provided software has so many limitations on characters, images, etc... it's good for only the "novice" user who wants to do a simple image background and a few lines of text on one portion of the disc. I finally gave up, made my own image with text on it, and had the software use the image directly. It's also buggy - had to reinstall it several times after it mysteriously started crashing on startup. The media card reader on the printer caused my computer to complete POST very slowly. It had to do with it's emulation of a USB device, and my computer trying to initialize it as a device on POST. A BIOS setting change fixed that.

The hardware itself appears to be ok. It prints very well. I gave the photo cartridges/paper a try. Very nice. Everyday printing is good. Funny occurrence: If you turn the print options to "b&w draft mode", it prints so fast that the paper comes shooting 3' out of the printer when it's done. It also has an intermittent issue where it will spit the CD tray back out at you and ask you to put it back in. Occasionally it will intake two pages instead of one. Paper feed tray is kinda small. Output tray is virtually non-existent.

A friend of mine borrowed the printer to create some copies of a musical recording he made to sell. They turned out very well. In fact, it performed like a tank. Never broke down that entire time, even after churning out hundreds of discs. Even today, it's still working after 2 years, and numerous ink cartridges. If nothing else, I gotta give it props for that. Very durable, and good print quality. But overall, just a lot of little nit pick issues that combine together to sour the experience. I like the concept and the hardware - just wish they would improve the software and quirks. If you're getting it for CD/DVD printing, you'll be disappointed. All other things - if it's on sale, I'd give it a thumbs up.

---

Customer Rating:
Summary: Piece of junk
Comment: I made the mistake of buying this in a hurry, because my Epson died at a critical time, and I needed a printer urgently. so I drove across the street and grabbed the first Mac compatible printer that was reasonably priced.

This has been a POS, absolutely the worst printer I ever owned. Unreliable, jams frequently. Guzzles ink even on low-ink settings. Reqires frequent tinkering to keep it running. Today stopped printing the bottom half of every line, and HP's diagnostic software and website tells me it is working fine.

Only had it for 2 months, and I'm done. I will write off the $100 I spent on it and it's cartridges as experience.

---

Customer Rating:
Summary: WOW!
Comment: I bought this because I wanted to be able to print on CDs and DVDs. All i can say is WOW! The cd/dvd print is super fast and takes under a minute even with complicated pictures. I must mention though that i did not buy mine on Amazon. i got it on Ebay for $48 including shipping. :D

At first, i was really unhappy because the print job was ugly and blurry. Guess what? IT WAS OPERATOR ERROR! I was using images that were TOO SMALL so when they got blown up to fit on the CD face they got all blurry.

NOTE: If you're using google images, DON'T use the picture as you get it in the search as those are shrunk to thumbnail. Take the trouble of 4-5 additional seconds to click on the picture and then click on the original image size and BAM! beautiful CDS.

I made a copy of Burn Notice Season 1 and got an image from google to print on it and the result was hard to tell it was not a retail DVD copy except for my horrible design skills :) . Use the right image size and this think is an unbeatable deal. Also, it does not use ink excessively like other printers. I've printed about 40-50 dvd/cds and i'm still half full. Oh, and it makes nice paper printing too. I haven't tried the photo printing yet though. Mostly shipping lables and business documents.

The software is really easy to use and does a really good job if you're not trying to do professional editing. The only complaint I have is that you can't get rid of the text box on the cd/dvd but it's okay.

I wanted to put in a video/picks of some of the dvds i did before and after i figured out about image size for those complaining about bad prints but i can't figure out how.

P.S: I PUT THIS REVIEW IN TWO PLACES BECAUSE THERE ARE MULTIPLE LISTINGS FOR THIS ON AMAZON

---

Customer Rating:
Summary: Great dvd/cd printer
Comment: I bought this printer a month ago after I read the reviews and it's true the software included sucks, but I am using it with Surething CD labeler lightScibe 5 and it's great, you only have to make your own template to work with this printer, this software has a wizard to help you do the template and it's easy you can even edit it after it is created.
I have done around 25 disc labels so far without a problem. The colors are great, is fast an easy to use.

---

More Reviews for HP Photosmart D5160 Printer. Up To 1200 Dpi Black. Up To 4800 X 1200 Optimized D