- Now AirPrintcompatible. Simply print from iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch.
- Browse the latest e-book bestsellers or old favorites, using the wireless touchscreen.
- Use customized apps to quickly get the prints you want from the Web.
- Access and print, using apps for Yahoo!, Facebook, and Snapfish.
- Print at your convenience-whether it''s from across town or across the room-using HP ePrint.
- Print at your convenience-whether it''s from across town or across the room-using HP ePrint.
- Access and print, using apps for Yahoo!, Facebook, and Snapfish.
- Browse the latest e-book bestsellers or old favorites, using the wireless touchscreen.
- Now AirPrint compatible. Simply print from iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch.
- Use customized apps to quickly get the prints you want from the Web.
OK, I would actually go for more of a 3 1/2 star rather than a 3 or 4. (UPDATE: I would go with more of a 4 1/2 after a week of use and getting used to how this works and figuring in how it fits into the home.)
First off this is a home device. This is not something that you want for an office. That being said, if you have it in your mind that this is a device for the home, then your perceptions of this will change.
Also this a hybrid device, so as such, you really have to look at each part and see if they are worth it.
The printer sans touchscreen. The printer itself can be used to Scan, Copy and Print, all wirelessly, and with a built in double sided printing module. The prints seem to look good and it prints fast. Photo prints looked fairly good as well. Replacement ink cartridges run around $10 for the regular capacity (bout 300 prints) to around $27 for the XL (about 750 prints). I do like that each color has its own cartridge so you only need to replace what you run out of. I can even use the HP iPrint app on my iPod touch and print PDFs, and photos from there. I can also scan directly to the iPod using the App. When Apple does the Airprint in the new iOS 4.2 it should also support printing from many more apps. What was especially neat was that when I used Docs to Go and choose to open a PDF from there in the iPrint app, I could print it. The printer also has the ability to use the ePrint feature without the tablet, which enables just about anything sent to a specific email address for your printer to print. Say you were at a local hotspot reading an article that lets you email it to somebody . . you need to go and want a copy of the article for some reason . . just email it to your printer and when you get home it will be there in the paper tray waiting when you get home. Overall, I would compare this to other $200 to $250 dollar printers out there for this functionality. However while I''m doing all this, somebody could be using the tablet to browse the web.
Which leads to a brief review of the tablet itself. Now I''ve used an iPad and let me tell you this is no iPad. That being said, a better comparison would be other $150 android based tablets out there that are this size. (UPDATE: I would compare this more with a NOOK with some extra bells and whistles I talked to a manager at the local staples about it. He stated that he was just at a conference where the HP rep indicated it would have more android capabilities towards the first part of 2011).
It has the standard Android buttons, headphone jack, volume up and down, power, a mini USB port, and SD card slot. The screen is like that of an iPod or iPad in that it is based on the touch receptive glass (not sure of the fancy technical name for this). Yahoo and Barns & Noble must have paid a bundle as it is very centric to them, which is a annoying at first, but you can actually remove or at least hide some of this by customizing your home screens and favorite apps. Also if you start thinking of it as a 7" Nook with some extras then you''ll be happier. Fortunately there is a generic email client under the hood so that you can set it up with something other than Yahoo Mail (almost returned it right there). I have it set up for both my wife''s and my Gmail accounts and we can switch accounts easily to see our mail. There are a handful of apps built in that are nice such as QuickOffice for viewing MS Office files (no editing tho) and PDFs. There''s also a calculator, web browser, RSS News feader (limited though),and a Facebook app that I like better than the one on my iPod Touch. There are also a number of other apps that are not the Print Apps. I Would like to see a Twitter App, and a YouTube App as well as some simple games like Sudoku, or even a (cough cough) a Kindle App.
HP has it''s own custom Android skin and you can only download apps that it has listed. Most of which are the ePrint Apps as they call them. There are lots of these for all the different holidays, kids activities, recipes, etc. When you consider this a home device, these apps can be nice to quickly print off an activity for the kids to do if they are driving you nuts and none of the coloring books you have are good enough for them as . . oh sorry . . .let me get back on focus. I''ve never been a big facebook user, mostly as I don''t care enough to take the time to turn on my computer and I don''t care for the app on the iPod. I''ve actually check my facebook a couple of times this weekend and even replied to my sister for once. Anyway. the device can be a bit sluggish when using the web browser or news headline apps, but seems fairly responsive in the email, facebook, reading ebooks, and eprint apps. You can also print from the device when it''s not docked, and control scanning as well. By the way, YES you can scan photos directly to an inserted SD card slot. This can be handy when grandma comes by with photos she''s taken and didn''t think about getting you a copy or getting you the digital file. Just pop''em in and scan them to the SD card. No need to turn on the computer.
When the tablet is connect you can then do eFax as well. No remember this is a HOME device and not an office device. Because you can send/receive 20 faxed pages per month for free. After that you can still do more, but there is a charge for it. That being said, in the past 2 years I''ve rarely sent or received and faxes. Only when we were taking advantage of the lower rates and decided to refinance our house. I probably went over, but there is no phone line where we have our printers set up and with the previous print/scan/copy/fax, I would have to pull a very taut phone line to it, make sure the kids weren''t anywhere around to run it to the line and knock it all over, and pray that it would work. For me the 20 page monthly limit of efax is a non issue and is actually a plus. (UPDATE: I was also looking at Windows 7 and there is a built in fax application there. I can plug my laptop into a phone line and scan wireless the documents as a PDF and attach them to the fax. I little bit more fuss than using a doc feeder as you scan each page separately BUT that''s all I really need.)
Would I buy this for an office? Absolutely NO.
Would I buy this again for the home? Probably. Mind you, I''ve only had this two days. I like what I''ve seen so far, but I still feel guilty about spending this much money. It is really cool tho. (UPDATE: Yes I would buy it again, provided I like the idea of getting a bundle of the Printer with essentially a powered up Nook with some extra capabilities.)
(UPDATE: After using the printer several days I was having a problem with ePrint from HP saying that the printer wasn''t connected for email printing even though everything worked in my house. After reading the forums, I ended up disabling the power saver using the IP address for the printer in my home network. Then turning the printer itself (not the Zeen) off then back on and it has been up and running since. Seems like this is a problem with the printer going to sleep and HP''s servers not being able to wake it up to print remotely. But I have it working now so that''s a relief. Seems this a problem that effects ALL the HP printers capable of ePrinting and is not specifically a problem with this printer.)
Buy HP Photosmart eStation All-in-One (CQ140AB1H) Now
This is one of the most exciting products I have seen. It is a printer that can print and scan from a computer, as does any multifunction printer. It has a removable tablet computer called the Zeen which is the control panel. Using the Zeen, you can copy, scan to SD memory card or fax via eFax (if you can get it to work). The Zeen can have a home page which can display WIDGETS you install on it which can have such things as the time, date, temperature, etc. There are many to choose from. You can have up to 8 home pages. The home page also has room for 6 "APPS" at the bottom in the APP TRAY. There is a tab with an arrow that can be clicked above the apps to give you access to the available apps, which contains up to 100 (I think) apps. These apps are mostly used to print content and which come directly from the WEB. Additional apps can be installed from HP''s app library. Android apps cannot be easily installed. The printer (and Zeen) are web connected through WiFi. The printer gets its own email address assigned and it is possible to send attachments such as .DOC, .DOCX, .PDF, .JPG files, etc. It then prints the document/image as if you printed it off your computer application. My daughter, who is attending college, says this would have saved her a lot of hassle last semester had I had the printer then. Using the Zeen, you can read books (from Barnes & Nobel or from your SD card (.PDF format)) and view image files from your SD card (I have had trouble viewing images using GALLERY. It may have been caused by the large, 6GB size of the folder). You can (if it works) send or receive up to 20 faxes each from a phone number which is assigned to your computer (Zeen).
It uses HP 564/564XL ink cartridges. It comes with "setup" cartridges, which don''t seem to have much ink. I have had another printer which uses these same regular cartridges (not setup) and can testify that they don''t last long and are very expensive to provide. Don''t even bother with the 564 cartridges, they don''t last very long at all. Buy the larger capacity 564XL versions. It uses 5 different cartridges: Black, Yellow, Cyan, Magenta and Photo Black. Don''t confuse the Photo Black with Black as they are two different things. On my other printer, which uses these same cartridges, I have found that they tend to run out of ink at the same time. They are very expensive to replace and they don''t last long.
I have had my C510a eStation printer for 48 hours and had the following experiences:
I have been unable to register with eFax. When I attempt to register, I get a "cannot get a fax number" message. After two days, I have been told that the server is down and they don''t know when it will be working. They said it could be several days. The engineer said to keep trying to register.
Except for eFax, everything was working until late last night when the "PRINT APPS" stopped printing. Everything would seem normal until the paper exited the printer. All it printed was a thin line at the top of the page. It should have printed something like a coloring page, according to which app I was printing from.
After calling HP support several times, I was finally contacted by an engineer who had me do a hard reset on the Zeen by powering up while holding both volume buttons. This caused me to lose everything I had spent hours setting up. It also caused all home pages to disappear, leaving just one blank home page with only one app showing (Yahoo! mail). I will now have to create new home pages and reload the apps to the home page. I assume I will have to set up various apps again which is a pain to do using the virtual keyboard. I think touch screens are overrated. After resetting the Zeen, the Print Apps now print properly.
I have read a review on the WEB for this printer who said it wouldn''t read from his SD card. I had the same problem, but found it was my fault. You simply have to press the card in all the way until it "snaps". When I did that, it worked fine.
One thing I don''t like is that the Zeen cannot be turned off when it is docked on the printer. If you take the Zeen off the printer and turn it off, after you put in in the dock it turns back on. Even after it dims, light still comes from it. Our printer is in our bedroom and my wife is very light sensitive. I have been taking the Zeen off the dock, turning it off and leaving it on my desk at night. The printer LEDs (3 of them) can be turned off. I am strongly considering purchasing a holster from HP to protect the Zeen ($24.95)and a power supply ($19.95) to allow longer operation when not docked. They also have a neoprene sleeve for $19.95 which seems less bulky than the holster. HP has an anti-glare screen protector for $19.95.
The engineer told me that the eStation C510a is a very new product which is still in the testing phase. I would have thought the product would have been tested before being released to the public. She told me to report any other problems so that they could improve the product. She also said that a newer version of the Android operating system would be available soon which would make it faster (it can be very slow).
I love the product. I just wish it would work properly. If you buy it, be prepared to spend a lot of time on the phone with support. This is especially important if you have a cell phone without unlimited minutes.
Update 01/15/2011
I had expected HP to update the Zeen tablet to correct some problems that I had been having. They were supposed to upgrade the Android operating system from ver 2.1 to 2.2. I had been told that by HP Support.
Today, I was told that the group at HP that had been supporting the eStation C510a/Zeen were no longer supporting it and that they would not support the applications I had been having trouble with (Internet, eReader, Home). (The Zeen will lock up and I will get a message such as: "Activity Internet (in application Internet) is not responding". I get the option to Force Close or Wait. This happens often. I believe this is an Android operating system problem.
The HP Support person told me that I would need to call Google Android support and try to get them to solve the problem. He said I should download the new version of Android myself, which I am not qualified to do.
HP has lowered the price of the printer substantially and are offering a free gift card with purchase. I think they are closing the product out and it appears that support will be limited.
I had really liked the eStation and Zeen and was sold on its promise. I now can no longer recommend this printer and wish I had not bought it.
UPDATE 01/16/2011
I received an email from HP Support today telling me to do a FACTORY RESET on the Zeen which would cause me to lose all data and work I have put into it to resolve the Not Responding problem. I have done the reset 3 times with no real effect and have no intention to do it again.
I replied asking about forthcoming updates to the Android operating system and received the following reply: *****, I would like to inform you that as of now there are no updates for zeen. However, as you are not happy with the product, you can return the printer to the store you have purchased or you can contact the phone support department, they will remotely access your system and troubleshoot the issue.
It appears that the eStation C510a/Zeen is now an orphan product for which no updates will be provided in the future. That is sad, as this product had great promise.
UPDATE 01/22/2011
The applications on the Zeen continue to stop responding (Internet, Home & eReader). HP has essentially told me that they will not issue an update to fix the problems. (I think HP buying Palm with their WebOS operating system is why they have no interest in fixing their product using the Android operating system.) While I really love the product, it is simply too frustrating to continue using. If HP is going to sell a product, they really should support it. I am going to return this product to where I purchased it. I consider the product to be defective.
UPDATE 02/26/2011
I have decided to keep the printer and have solved the problem with applications stopping responding. See details in the comments below.
UPDATE 03/31/2011
I have heard from a reader that he hasn''t had any problems and that HP still continues to support this printer.
I am glad that he hasn''t had problems and am sure a number of people haven''t. HP hasn''t discontinued answering the phone and trying to support the printer. However, when I first started calling, I was told that a special group did all support for this product. The last time I called, I was told that the group was no longer supporting the printer. In the past, I have found that the regular support people know very little about this model printer. Early on, an engineer from the group told me that a newer version of Android would be available to update the printer/Zeen. That has not happened and the last time I called the person said no updates were available. Maybe they will continue to update this printer. I hope so, since I have decided to keep it.
I wouldn''t want to misinform the public. It is currently working very well.
UPDATE 06/08/2011
I am currently using this printer just as an all-in-one printer and am having no problems with it other than high ink costs. I find that the Zeen tablet isn''t really worth using, other than to control the printer.
UPDATE 06/11/2011
My Zeen tablet reset itself for some unknown reason resulting in me losing all customization I have made.
I happened to check for Product Updates afterwards and found that one was available. I went ahead and installed it. It took a while. Now the firmware version is showing (2.2). I wonder if it upgraded from Android 2.1 to 2.2? Maybe it will become more stable now.
UPDATE 06/28/2011
I just noticed an option on the Zeen I hadn''t noticed before:
Take SETTINGS -> TOOLS -> ADVANCED -> APPLICATIONS -> UNKNOWN SOURCES (Allow install of non-HP applications.)
This will give you a warning that HP isn''t responsible for loss of data, etc. if non-HP applications are installed.
For what it is worth.
Read Best Reviews of HP Photosmart eStation All-in-One (CQ140AB1H) Here
Don''t believe the low reviews on this printer. I bought this printer first and then read the reviews. The low reviews scared me, but now that I''ve used the printer, I know that the low reviews are because the users didn''t know how to set up the computer. Listen, it''s an easy set up process. It takes about 20 minutes, but it''s easy. Just follow the tablet instructions & videos. Another complaint from some was there was not a manual. Well, you can download it on the HP site. It explains everything! I think it rather funny that the people who complained about no manual didn''t even think to read all the literature you can download from the HP web site. Nothing electronic anymore comes with a priinted manual. Manuals are all on pdf files now a days. I think the manual is also available on the CD. If you''re having trouble, at least go to the HP web site. There are steps there to walk you through set up and everything, if you you really want print.
When you register at HP there is all kinds of support. There is a FAQ list. A "How To" list. And even, a very short list of problems and how to fix those. HP has listened to their customers and have addressed them. And, no I don''t work for HP. Like I said, i was ready to send this back until I did the research, so I want to dispel the myths from the low reviewers.
This is a great home station! I have printed an email from work with Adobe & Word attachments with no problem. The attachements came out perfectly formatted.
I have sent pictures through eprint from my cell phone email. The photo quality is AWESOME! Brilliant & vibrant colors.
The tablet (Zeen) is basically a Nook with loads of extras. The touch is sensitive, but it''s a learning curve. It''s an android tablet, so you can download some other apps, I''m told. And you can take it with you to a wireless cafe & browse your email, the internet, facebook, read an ebook, whatever, and then email what you like to your printer at home. It''s not an IPAD or a Zoom, so don''t think of it like that. If you think of it as a super cool Nook reader with extras, you''ll love it. Hey, you''re getting a cool basic tablet pc and a wireless printer for a great price. I don''t think you can print wirelessly from those pricey tablets.
This printer is for home use so a dedicated fax line isn''t necessary unless you fax tons. I occassionally fax, so the EFAX 20 free faxes per month is great for me.
It takes time to learn all that the printer and Zeen can do. Just be patient and you''ll love this. Oh, and if the tablet is not attached to the printer, you still have print, copy, and scan functions available to you.
The SD card slot on the tablet can be used to read all your SD cards and send stuff to the printer or just listen to music, watch videos, and view photos directly from the card. Awesome!!"
Want HP Photosmart eStation All-in-One (CQ140AB1H) Discount?
I''ve recently been a user of mostly Epson all-in-one printers, but ours is a very high-tech household and we found Epson''s design to be a bit long in the tooth. We have several computers, iPhones, an iPad 2 that we wanted to be able to print from, we dropped our (expensive, seldom used) landline long ago in favor of cellular-only phones and we struggled to find a printer that fits our lifestyle.
Most of them don''t have DIRECT support of iOS devices (some have apps that work so-so), they all seem based around the idea that you have a landline if you want to fax anything, and the user interface for setting things up and accessing print functions is often hard to use. Sometimes you''re even lucky if your printer installs on the latest hardware and operating systems! Luckily, the eStation blows the competition out of the water in all those areas.
First, as always, is installation, which is BY FAR the easiest of any printer I''ve setup. The tablet makes for beautiful, easy data entry and instruction. Picking timezones, choosing networks and entering in network passwords is all as easy as possible thanks to the tablet''s gesture support and virtual keyboard. Competing printers like my released-this-year Epson touch-screen printer didn''t even have a virtual keyboard! Setting up the web-services (e.g. getting an email address for the printer) was simple, too. I didn''t even have to read a manual, I just ran through intuitive setup screens and, because you have a tablet, there''s even instructional videos to walk you through the processes if you get stuck.
Installing drivers on my computers was equally painless. When installing my other Epson printer, I was nagged by 20 security dialogs on Windows 7 64-bit and had to make a tech support call to even setup scanning from my Mac! By contrast the eStation setup was a dream. The Mac interface is smooth and clean with no errors or hiccups while the Windows setup screens were not quite as refined as on Mac but without the security prompt dialogs found in the Epson setup.
What about my iPhones and iPad 2, you ask? No setup required! They were able to locate the printer via AirPrint instantly and print emails, documents and web pages without issue, even given the option to use double-sided printing if desired! You simply have to push the same button you''d use to email the content and there''s a "Print" option at the bottom that finds the eStation as long as it''s connected to the same network.
You also have the ability to have the printer receive an email from a (long, convoluted) email address assigned to it by HP''s ePrint services. It works perfectly and can even be done remotely, say if I had to print out a form for my wife to fill out while I was at work! The eStation simply prints the email you send and/or prints the attachments you send with the email. It''s brilliant!
The eFax feature is one of my favorites, too! Like I said, we''re among the 20% and growing that have only cellular service with no landline. Thus, the ability to fax directly over the internet is very welcome, indeed, espcially when you get 20 faxes for free each month! Before I owned the eStation, we''d use our old printer to scan documents to the computer, then use a service we paid $80/year for to fax them. The eStation will completely eliminate that expense and eliminate a step in the process by faxing directly from the printer (instead of scanning to computer, then faxing).
Unfortunately, faxing (and scanning) isn''t perfect since it appears like you have to scan one sheet at a time as there is no document feeder. That came as a surprise to me, however, given the fact we almost always send 1-page faxes, I''m okay with the limitation. I can see where the 1-page at a time limitation will become an infrequent annoyance with scanning, but it''s forgiveale given the printers other strengths.
Lastly, it''s worth mentioning the included Android tablet. As I mentioned previously, I have an iPad 2, and the answer to the question of if the eStation "Zeen" tablet stacks up to standalone tablets, the answer is a resounding "No". The tablet is slow, heavy, and not great as tablets go. It''s of absolutely no suprise however, and shouldn''t be counted against this amazing printer/tablet combo. Look at it this way: as of the time of this writing, the cheapest iPad 2 is $499, the somewhat similarly capable HP Envy 100 printer sells for $250 on Amazon, while the eStation sells for $300. Certainly a printer/tablet combo won''t stack up against a more expensive standalone tablet and if the question is whether or not it''s worth the extra $50 over another printer for eFax services and a 7-inch wireless Android tablet the answer is abso-freakin-lutely.
The tablet makes for a great control panel, with video and easy-to-enter text, it provides an easy touch-interface for faxing, scanning, copying, etc., it displays weather widgets and other items if you choose, it browses the web and prints web pages directly and it can even play Angry Birds and other games you can download from Amazon''s Android Appstore! My kids even use the included apps to look up and print coloring sheets of Disney characters! Not a bad value if you ask me.
In short, HP hit it out of the park with this printer, which stands as a perfect example of innovation within the market segment. AirPrint for iOS, ePrint, eFax are all huge selling points, usability is better than any printer I''ve used and the 7" table is icing on the cake! It even comes with an enclosed paper tray to keep my kids out of printer paper! The main drawback is the lack of document feeder, which may make heavy faxers and scanners frustrated. Despite that limitation, however, the eStation is easily the best printer on the market, in my mind.
Oh, and one last thing worth a mention: the whole printer comes wrapped in a pretty nice, large reusable HP-branded grocery bag. Sweet!
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Arrival:
When the printer arrived along with two others, I have to admit that I was worried. The shipping box was pretty well battered. Thankfully, after a full inspection, I found nothing had gotten to the HP box inside, only the Amazon box has been damaged.
Inside the box along with the printer was a full compliment of printer ink cartridges, a zip up bag with cables, and even a carry all bag for the printer itself. The bad seems to be the thing for the new HP printers. I''m not sure how many folks would carry around a printer this size, but, it''s a decent enough bag.
Setup:
Setup took about 30min, most of which was spent unboxing, taking off the protective tape, and waiting on Vista to load up the drivers and software. Pretty much, just plug it in and follow the onscreen instructions. That was all there was to it, which is a plus for the non-tech types. It found our home network quickly, and the onscreen instructions and demo movies for setup were spot on, and repeatable across Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7.
Usage:
For this review, I''ll be comparing against HP''s similar models, the C410a and CN216A#B1H. I feel this is a fair assessment of HP''s current top to bottom all-in-one wireless printer lineup. As of the time of the CN216A#B1H runs $90, the C410A $160, and the CQ140A#B1H $345.
Each of these units has the ePrint function, which lets you print from pretty much anywhere. You can use HP''s phone app or email the printer directly and it will do the rest. The printer figures out which paper should be used based on what you sent it and spits out the print. It worked pretty well, lag between sending and printing was minimal, maybe 1-2 min max. Being a free service, I can''t complain about it a whole lot.
Given the included 7" tablet, the CQ140A blows both the other models away as far as easy menu navigation goes. The tablet doesn''t even need to be connected to the printer, and of course you can print directly from it while you lounge in another room. Like the C410A, it support double-sided printing but lacks an auto document feeding, dedicated fax support, and built-in wired networking. READ: If you don''t have a wireless network, this printer may not work for you! Minus the tablet and duplex printing, the CA140A has pretty much the same specs as the much less expensive CN216A. The C410A outclasses them both, besting their 1200dpi scan resolution with 4800dpi. Pages per minute printing in both black-and-white and color varies by 2 or less across all three models. They all use the same ink cartridges, though the CQ140A and C410A utilize a special photo black cartridge while the CN216 doesn''t. This should result in replacing the black cartridge less often if you typically print a mix of text and photos. Finally, while there is no dedicated fax support like with the C410A. The CQ140A has an eFax service instead. You get 20 pages a month free, and pay per page after.
The tablet:
Of course, the "big deal" about this printer is the 7" Android based tablet. This is the feature that is supposed to set it apart from the rest. Called the HP Zeen, it was a bit flaky when it first arrived and I was really disappointed. Being the geek that I am, I checked for updates and sure enough there were some. Afterward, the flakiness disappeared. My observations are from this point, as ragging about problems that have already been fixed is silly.
The tablet is supposed to replace the built in LCD on the other models, and then add some. That, it does very well. All the same apps are included, and for anyone used to an Android based system, it''s very easy to use. There is an included video to walk you through usage, in case you''re new to Android. While the Zeen has a bunch of pre-loaded apps, that''s all your get. There is no access to Google''s Marketplace or even an HP equivalent. At least they included Facebook, eh? If you''re a Yahoo user, you''ll be happy to hear that Messanger, Mail, and Daily Digest apps. Barnes & Nobel also make an appearance, so you can get your ebook reading on. The Zeen can play back music and some video files as well, and you can set the Zeen to act as a digital picture frame. All your media needs to be manually loaded to an SD card, and the Zeen will take care of the rest.
As far as performance goes, the Zeen is very lacking in my opinion. I did some time trials with it, along with a Nook Color and Samsung Epic phone, (all three are Android based devices with the same base version). Both the Nook and Epic outpaced the Zeen loading web pages, refreshing Facebook newsfeed, and general device navigation. Though Zeen and Nook have the same speed processor, the Zeen is very sluggish and I found myself tapping the screen a few times to get it to respond to my input. Often I thought it had hung up, only to have it respond 5-10 seconds later. Even some of the included live wallpapers refused to run. In short, don''t expect this to be overly speedy.
Ok, so, I''m a geek and decided to see what else I could get out of this tablet. What I found was that though HP chose not to include an app store of any kind, they left the door wide open to sideload apps. I was able to get AndAppStore up and running, and tried various apps. Some would install, some wouldn''t. Of those that did install, it was still hit and miss for getting them to run. (The apps were after all designed to run on a smaller screen.) Widgets and live wallpaper suffered the same fate. I''m happy to say that I had Angry Birds playing just fine though, (damn addicting game).
Bottom Line:
As a printer, the CQ140A is pretty much the same the much lower end CN216. About all you get for the $250 price difference is the Zeen tablet and duplex printing. Is that worth it? In my opinion, no. The Zeen is slow performing, app limited, heavy, and for $350, I''d want real fax support and hardwired networking. Myself, I''d prefer to get a Nook Color and the CN216 if I needed/wanted a tablet or similar. If you''re not interested in the tablet thing, I''d suggest going with the C410A, which offers much better performance at less than half the price of the CQ140A. Dropping the price, improving the hardware, and/or make the Zeen a full Android tablet with decent speed would change things up.s
