Hands-On: HP Photosmart Pro B8850

If you're getting serious about making big color and black-and-white prints, we've got good news. You don't have to spend $600-plus for such well-proven workhorses as the Epson Stylus Photo R2400 ($730, street) or Hewlett-Packard's Photosmart Pro B9180 ($630, street).

You can shave least $80 off those prices by going with one of the latest 13-inch-wide inkjets, such as the Epson Stylus Photo R1900 ($530, street; tested in our June 2008 issue) or the new $550 (street) HP Photosmart Pro B8850. Like the more expensive stalwarts, these new machines use pigment inks that produce long-lasting, pro-caliber output on glossy and matte surfaces.

In fact, it's easy to mistake HP's new B8850 for the B9180, since about the only differences are in body colors, and in place of the B9180's front-panel LCD display that guides you through the printing process, the B8850 has just LEDs and a few buttons. Among them, a "toolbox" button brings up an on-screen view of the information that would have been on the B9180's display.

The unit has no Ethernet connection (it just has USB 2.0), and the maximum thickness for media through the Specialty Media Tray is 0.7mm, roughly half the thickness accommodated on the B9180.

Still, this new printer can handle a range of papers. Up to 60 sheets of photo paper (or 200 sheets of plain paper) from 3.5x5 to 13x19 inches slip into the main paper tray. This tray sets the B8850 apart from all others in its class. At the end of a day's testing, we filled it and ordered up 15 of the 13x19s. The next morning, all the prints were waiting, stacked nicely in the output tray.

If you have unusual media, such as canvas, or a paper rated over about 250 gsm (grams per square meter, also sometimes abbreviated as "g/m²"), just flip down the front panel and load the Specialty Media Tray. We had no problem feeding HP Professional Satin Photo Paper (a 300-gsm semi-gloss paper) or Hahnemühle Museum Etching (a 350-gsm watercolor paper). Panoramas up to 44 inches long also can be printed through the tray. Just leave clearance behind the printer almost the same length as the paper. And for best results, make sure the paper or canvas is flat (without much curl on the top or sides).

It took 30 minutes to unpack and install inks and print heads. The printer's automatic closed-loop calibration process aligns the print heads and ensures that prints made using the profiles supplied by the HP (or third-party paper manufacturers) are more consistent from printer to printer. If you see a color shift in your prints, recalibrate. This can save you from making (or buying) a new profile.

Like the B9180, the B8850 uses the 8-color HP Vivera pigment ink set, which Wilhelm Imaging Research (www.wilhelm-research.com) estimates yields an astounding longevity of 250-plus years when displayed behind glass.

In addition, matte-black and photo-black inks are always in the machine, so there's no need to swap them out, as on the Epson R2400. In fact, three of the eight colors are gray, and all three are laid down when doing black-and-white prints on matte and watercolor papers. Two of the gray inks are used when printing on gloss/semi-gloss papers. The black-and-white prints we made had a very even tonal range and deep shadows (especially on watercolor and fiber gloss papers).

The printer's eight individual ink cartridges (27 ml; $30 each, street) will, says HP, yield 855 4x6-inch or 80 13x19-inch color photos. After making 100 prints of various sizes and checking the ink levels, HP's estimates seem conservative, though each cartridge depletes at a different rate, and subject matter changes the actual page yield. All of the 13-inch-wide printers from Canon and Epson use smaller ink cartridges, so this printer ships with about $50-100 more ink than its rivals. Also, you won't need to replace inks as quickly.

Colors? Excellent in our prints. Skin tones rendered beautifully, bright colors really popped, and areas of fine detail and subtle gradients looked great. The Vivera inkset has a wide color gamut (703,163 color units for HP Professional Satin Photo Paper using ColorThink Pro 3.0 test software). That exceeds almost all other color gamut tests we've done, and nearly matches the 708,000 color units of the Epson R1900 on Epson's Premium Glossy photo paper.

We tried various quality settings in the Mac OS X and Windows Vista driver software, and we found that "Maximum dpi" produced a slightly sharper print with mildly better shadow detail compared with "Best." The "Normal" setting also produced great prints, at faster speeds.

What do we wish it had? An on-board gloss enhancer (as on the Epson R1900) to reduce or eliminate the gloss differential and "bronzing" that can occur with some glossy papers, and even some semi-gloss media. We ran various types of paper through the B8850, and found that gloss differential and bronzing were noticeable on some gloss papers, though we never saw more than traces of these on semi-gloss surfaces. Matte papers weren't affected.

In all, an impressive performance, and an excellent choice for size, versatility, price and longevity.

Andrew Darlow's 301 Inkjet Tips and Techniques: An Essential Printing Resource for Photographers (Course Technology, PTR; $50) packs 500+ pages of advice. Visit www.inkjettips.com.

PRINT SPEED

Big Color: The B8850's very large color gamut has some colors that exceed the gamut of Adobe RGB (wireframe shape). Multicolored shape shows gamut of HP's Professional Satin Photo Paper.