01/23/2005 - HP Designjet Review

The HP 130 Designjet is an affordable six-color, 24” large format inkjet printer aimed at photographers and the graphic artist. It offers extremely stable dye-based inks, tested by Wilhelm Imaging Research in combination with various HP papers.

I have had the chance to use this printer for a couple of weeks and here are my first impressions. I plan to update this review as I perform more tests and become more familiar with the printer

Unpacking
The printer arrived, well packaged, in a very large box, 47” x 22” x 19” weighing in at about 70 lbs. I unpacked the unit myself, but the printer itself is heavy and bulky, and having a second person available will help. This is actually recommended, since the instructions depict two people unloading the printer from the box. I placed the unit onto a sturdy 54” x 54” worktable - its size is more than adequate. The printer itself requires a good bit of real estate – at least 30” x 42” to support the large paper tray when it is fully extended. The instructions recommend a minimum width of only 20” but this would result in the paper tray to reach 9” past the surface of the table when fully extended. Size wise the printer is not as wide or as deep (without the large paper tray attached) as the Epson 7600, but nonetheless it is a large and very impressive piece of HP machinery. Another option would be to purchase the separate media stand for the unit.

Setting Up
Setting up this printer was very easy, and took about 30 minutes to assemble a few pieces of hardware, insert the print heads, ink cartridges, including letting the printer run through its paces. One simply follows an oversized pictorial diagram (without words), and a simple three-step textual instruction page, which basically reads: 1-Install Drivers, 2-Connect to Computer, 3-Color Calibrate, and you are done!

(NOTE: After powering up the printer, it requires a sheet of paper to print a test image. I recommend inserting a couple of pieces of standard 8.5” x 11” office paper, so you do no waste your expensive inkjet paper or the sample paper included in the box. Save this paper for performing color calibrations, to be performed later.)

Configuring
Software driver installation was quite easy - simply follow the installation wizard on the screen. A little booklet, included with the printer, further explains each screen. I also installed the optional RIP software, also very easy to install. However, understanding how to set-up the RIP was a little cryptic at first, and HP could have provided some easier instructions. However, after finding and then reading some of the documentation on the disk, this was also not a problem. Within the RIP documentation, there is a good introduction to color management. This 137-page document also suggests workflows for various digital imaging and graphic design applications (including Photoshop of course) for both Mac and PC platforms.

Color Calibration.
There are nine sample sheets of 13” x 19” papers that come with the printer – 3 sheets of each: Photo & Proofing Gloss, Photo Satin, and Photo Matte. These can be used to calibrate the colors of the printer. To color calibrate one simply inserts the piece of media for which you want to profile, and select “calibrate” from a menu option. This process is similar whether you have RIP installed or not. The difference is that with the RIP, you color profile the paper from the RIP applications, whereas without this application you configure from the HP System Maintenance program. When calibrating, the printer prints a test target and then scans each color sample of the target. Once the printer finishes this process, it spits out the printed target. This was the first print that I saw come out of this machine, and I was quite impressed by the colors. So far, I have only calibrated and printed on the Photo Satin, which is roughly equivalent in texture and gloss to the Fuji Crystal Archive matte paper, and the HP Photo Matte, which is equivalent to Epson’s Matte.


Printing calibration image.

(NOTE: I do suggest cutting the 13” x 19” media in half to 13” x 9.5” because the calibration target requires only an 8” x 10” piece of media – see picture.)

Printing

After configuring settings in the RIP, I printed several test images, all on HP Photo Satin paper.

First, I printed two 8” x 10” images, scanned at 200mb on a Creo/Scitek from a 4x5 original, and compared them to the proofs printed on a Chromira and a Noritsu printers (both RGB devices printing on actual photographic paper), and the results were impressive. Although not quite as saturated as the Chromira prints, the HP Designjet 130 prints were every bit as detailed and sharp as those from the Chromira. After printing the two images at 16” x 20” / 360 dpi, I was even more impressed. The prints still looked every bit as good and sharp as those printed on the Chromira. Actually, the prints from the HP Designjet 130 were so good, it would be hard to differentiate a Chromira print from one printed on the HP Designjet 130. The dye-based inks are absolutely phenomenal, rivaling the gamut of the Fuji Crystal Archive photographic paper. Additional print tests and comparisons against proofs from a Noritsu printer proved to be just as impressive.

Printing the first 16x20 image on 18x24 paper.

All 16” x 20” images printed so far at 360dpi, using the Best setting in the RIP printed in almost exactly 13:00 minutes (1:50 processing on the computer, and 11:10 minutes printing).

Quirks
There are only a couple of quirks that I have discovered while using the printer. First, some of the RIP settings seem to reset themselves every time I print a new image. Also after creating the first profile, for HP Satin Photo paper, a second profile for HP Photo Paper Matte appeared. After deleting this “extra” profile, it promptly deleted the Photo Satin profile as well. After I re-profiled the Satin paper, it immediately added the extra profile. In addition, the HP Designjet’s media is currently limited to photographic paper, mainly to the media produced by HP, and it cannot print on thicker media such as canvas.

Ink cartridges, printheads and the Control Panel.

One interesting thing is that the printer has six print heads (each specific to a particular color) and six ink cartridges - all of which will need to be changed out on a regular basis - I am just not sure how often! In addition, HP ink has a bit of an interesting odor to it. It is not an unbearable scent, or overly strong scent, but noticeable when printing.

Conclusion

So far, I am extremely impressed by the tests I have performed. At the risk of being partial, I found the prints generated by the HP Designjet 130 just as good, if not better, than those generated by a Chromira or a Noritsu printer. Although not as saturated, the images appeared to be a little livelier and displayed more range in color. (I suspect it is probably possible to modify the files in Photoshop to generate a similar color range and saturation on all of the printers.)

At a list price of $1,295 for the HP Designjet 130, it poses serious competition to not only Epson’s 4000 (listing at $1,795) and only capable of printing up to 17” wide media, but also, the Epson 7600 (listing at $2,995).

If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to email me at: