Product Review: Staples HP Officejet 7500A Wide Format e-All-in-One Printer & Print at Home Projects

This is a product review post on behalf of Staples and their line of HP Printers.

I have dreamed of having a wide format printer for years, so when Staples asked me to review to their line of HP Printers I couldn't wait to get my hands on the HP® Officejet 7500A Wide Format e-All-in-One Printer, Item: 894564 Model: C9309A#B1H.  This printer does a lot; and has all the bells and whistles I could ever want.  I used to have a scanner but it broke, so I was excited to have that ability again, but it also makes copies, and prints from 3"X5" to 13"X19"!

I can't believe I now have all that functionality in one machine.  It also can fax, not that I ever do, but in the rare case I need to I won't have to run to an office store any more.  Handy!  As if that wasn't cool enough, it also has wireless capabilities and has been hooked up to our wireless network at home, which means I can send documents to print right from my smartphone or our netbook which is downstairs from where the HP Officejet 7500A is currently located.  

Before I show you some of the projects I used the HP Officejet 7500A to make, let's take a closer look at the printer.  Here is the scanning bed, where you can also make copies, if you don't want to feed your papers through the top.  This tray is on the other side of the cover lifted up above, and can been seen in the top photo.  It fits up to legal sized documents and there are handy marks to help you position your paper properly.  It all works like the copiers/scanners you've probably come across at work or libraries so there's no learning curve to figure out how to use it.  I was most impressed by how quickly it copies/scans a document.

The 2.36" touchscreen on the front is used to access, store, and print your information.  With just a couple of presses you move through screens and are on your way in no time.  I am not much of a techie, I know that sounds strange since I'm a blogger, but I was worried it might be a little too complicated.  I was really happy with how intuitive it was to use and how quickly I could get the HP Officejet 7500A to print, copy, and scan.

It is a great All-in-One to have in your home office for the light user but it also is great for work at home or small businesses.  It has a monthly duty cycle of 7000 pages, prints black and white documents at a rate of 10 per minute and color documents at 7 per minute with high capacity cartridges.  While I don't do quite that much printing, it gives me piece of mind that this will be a high performing home printer for a long time.

At the bottom of the HP Officejet 7500A is the paper tray, which I really like because our old printer had the paper exposed while waiting to be printed on.  This looks a lot tidier to me, less visual clutter in the office, and it keeps the paper from getting all bent and crinkled.  Handy marking help direct users as to how to insert the different paper sizes.  It also pulls out to accommodate larger sheets of paper.  I don't like guess work and with so many more options for paper size than I ever had before, these are much appreciated.

Now that we've looked at the HP Officejet 7500A, let see what it can do!

First task was to test it's basic printing capabilities, because if a fancy printer can't actually print quality documents, what's the point?  Since you are reading my blog, chances are you read other blogs and many talented creative types share lots of free printables.  You've seen one for every season, holiday, etc.  I love downloading these, as my hard drive can attest to, but the results from my old printer weren't frame worthy.  I was getting these really annoying lines through the color no matter which settings I used.

This gorgeous free printable is from Jones Design Company, and besides this freebie Emily also has a monthly printable club you can purchase subscriptions to.  I've long wanted to try it out, but without a good printer I knew I wouldn't be able to really use all the cuteness she offers.  I was so ecstatic over how beautifully this art print turned out!  Colors were spot on and no yucky lines on the plain white cardstock I used.

Printing right from my smartphone has actually been the function I've used the HP Officejet 7500A for the most so far.  It is a huge time saver to be able to print out things like store coupons or emails without having to turn on my computer.  To really test it, I printed out one of my blog posts sent to RSS feed subscribers.  The color and quality on regular computer printer paper was great and again, quick!  Now when I'm off for errands and remember the coupon a store emailed me, I can send it to print while getting the kids ready and it's waiting for me when I run upstairs before dashing out the door.

The second most handy use has been making copies.  My daughter had a Kids in the Kitchen Summer Camp this past week.  She made some yummy snacks and my mom was interested in trying some.  In the past, I would've had to retype the handouts my daughter brought home.  Now it was a cinch to run off a copy.  The touchscreens lets you pick between black & white or color before it prints.

Here is a side by side comparison, the original at the top and the copy on the bottom.  It might be hard to tell in my photo but in my opinion the copy actually looks better than the original.  The colors are a little brighter and the type a little bolder.  I'm very happy with the copies the HP Officejet 7500A makes.

I used to teach kindergarten and was a resource teacher for a year, with many teaching resources that have been boxed up in our basement because it was too much work to copy my blacklines for my daughter to use for practice.  Now all those great books are back in use, as we brush up on skills this summer.

The main reason I had been wanting an All-in-One printer was because I missed being able to scan things.  Since we had both a printer and a scanner previously, I wanted to save room and combine the two.  It's really convenient to use the HP Officejet 7500A and so much easier than my older scanner was.

The touchscreen makes scanning so streamlined, no separate software to use for the scanner like before.  See the photo above for the following steps to scanning.  After choosing "Scan", you pick how you want to save your file, then where to save to.  Then almost like magic, for the non-techies like me, the image file appears on my computer without me having to do anything else.  I highlighted in red where the files I've been scanning have shown up in My Documents.

Here is one of my daughter's pieces of artwork from First Grade after it's been scanned.  At the end of the year I got a big file of work from the past year.  It's quite a collection, bulky and over-sized.  We also got a big pile after kindergarten and both years of preschool.  We have a lot and trying to find room to store it all can be a challenge.  Many will be saved for her to enjoy later but we also want to enjoy her pictures now and protect them in case the originals are damaged. 

I was inspired by this pin on Pinterest to use twelve to create a collage poster and scanning was a great way to make copies that are easy to manipulate in my photo editing program.   This one has been sized to fit a frame I had with a 11.75"X15.75" photo space with a wide border.  Click on the picture above to see better, as the white border of my poster's image blends in with the white of my post column.

After creating the image file using a layered template I created, I printed it out on HP Advanced Photo Paper, 13"X19", Glossy and popped it into a frame.  It's ready to hang and I made it all at home, so satisfying!  It showcases some of our favorite from the past year and now we can enjoy several of pieces of artwork in a fraction of the space it would take to hang them all up.  It's easy to update it each year with new favorites.

On Wednesday I will be sharing the template I used to create this Child's Art Poster Print, so you can make this project yourself!  Come back for links to the free template download!

I have one more project that I made with the HP Officejet 7500A from Staples, an easy to make Iron On Fabric Wrapped Canvas.  This fun little piece of personalized home decor was created with an iron transfer sheet printed out in the HP Officejet 7500A, white fabric, and a pre-made 5"X7" wrapped canvas from an art supply store.  I'll have the tutorial up for this project on Friday.  It's a neat way to incorporate your favorite photos into your home and another way this versatile printer can be used.

The HP® Officejet 7500A Wide Format e-All-in-One Printer, Item: 894564 Model: C9309A#B1H is available at Staples and retails for $249.99.  It's an excellent value for this multi-tasking piece of office equipment.  It saves room, increases efficiency, and saves money with the lowest cost per page in its class.  This printer gives me so many options makes it so convenient to be productive, share, and create documents, photos, and projects at home.  It's so handy and has already become an essential part of our office.        



Disclosure: This is a review post written on behalf of Staples and their line of HP printers. A complimentary review product was provided in order to test its abilities and give my own personal opinions on it. The opinions I have given are mine and may differ from others but were not influenced by the company or the free product provided.