HP Envy Inspire review: all you need
HP’s Envy Inspire 955e
MSRP $220.00
“The HP Envy Inspire 7955e is as full-featured and high-quality as it is painless to set up.”
Pros
- High-quality photo prints
- Fast document printing
- Versatile scanning
- Easy Setup
- Good Value
Cons
- Tri-color cartridges are wasteful
- Mobile app lacks some features
If you’re shopping for a printer, you’ve likely come across HP’s Envy Inspire 7955e all-in-one printer in your research. It offers high-quality printing of photos, fast document printing and flexible scanning at a low cost.
It’s become a staple of the remote work and small office world, but I wanted to test it out myself to see if it really lived up to the hype, looking through the design details, print performance, special features, and software to find out if it’s a good value at the current price. Spoiler alert: it’s every bit as solid as you may have heard.
Design
HP’s Envy Inspire has an attractive but functional design with a soft, off-white body and light beige accents. It will look great in most home offices.
Since it’s an all-in-one printer, it stands taller than a print-only model but doesn’t seem overly large or obtrusive. The dimensions are 18.1-by-15.2-by-9.2-inches, and the weight of 18 pounds.
It has a 2.7-inch touchscreen, which makes it easy to access various functions without the need for a computer or mobile app. The copy button is the most useful. It only takes one touch to start a copy in color, first scanning and then printing.
HP has been manufacturing printers for nearly a century, long before the Internet existed. The smallest details have been perfected. The device has clear instructions on how to insert ink cartridges.
Notes and markings on the printer will indicate how to load and print paper, how to use flatbed scanning and feeder scanning, and how to adjust guides on both to accommodate different paper size.
When adding paper, for example, there are icons that remind you which side should be printed. That’s important when using photo paper and other specialty paper.
Printing performance
The HP Envy Inspire printer 7955e produces excellent prints when using HP paper. It’s hard to tell in the photo above, but the printed photo matched what I saw onscreen. Details are sharp even on multipurpose paper.
High-brightness paper offers more contrast, with whites that are brighter and blacks that are more accurate. Photo paper can also produce more intense colors. Less expensive sheets, however, still provide accurate tones and vibrancy with less vibrancy.
A tray dedicated to small prints, such as 5-by-5, 4-by-6 and 5-by-7-inch photos, accepts these sizes. The main paper tray is capable of holding up to 8.5 by 14-inch legal paper as well as standard letter-sized papers, envelopes and other sizes.
This is good enough unless you plan to print in large quantities or sell your prints.
The ink dries quickly and doesn’t spread even with standard paper. I didn’t need to play with settings to get good results, and everything I printed came out looking great on my first try.
The fonts on documents are sharp and readable, even when printing grey text. No banding or any other issues were encountered. The HP Envy Inspire 7950e can print up to 15 pages per minute in black and white, which is more than enough for casual use or home office. Color speed is 10 PPM.
If you don’t plan to print in large quantities or sell your prints, then the quality and speed should be sufficient.
Special Features
The HP Envy Inspire is more than just a printer. It’s also a great copier and scanner. Scanning the flatbed (a bit larger than a standard letter-sized document) at 300dpi takes approximately 20 seconds.
The mobile application has a scan mode for multiple items that automatically crops and saves each photo scanned. There’s also a document feeder that accepts up to 35 pages. It’s slower, but it allows you to walk away while multiple sheets are scanned.
The only area that is problematic is the optical character recognition (OCR), which HP calls the text-extract option. OCR is prone to small mistakes that make editing difficult. You’ll want a third-party OCR app if you anticipate an ongoing need to turn scanned documents into editable text.
The HP Smart mobile app also has a fax feature that’s currently free. HP says that this is just a test, and there could be a future charge for faxing. HP will notify you if this is the case.
Software compatibility
It was easy to install the software and set up this printer. I was able to connect and use my iPhone, iPad, Windows PC (with Android phone), Chromebook, MacBook, and Chromebook within minutes. It doesn’t get any simpler than this.
I unpacked and plugged in the HP Envy Inspire 7950e. The packaging told me how to install the app. The app asked me to create or sign in to an HP account. It then told me how to connect to the printer and install the ink cartridges.
You can use a USB cable (not included) to connect, but Wi-Fi makes more sense and allows you to place the printer wherever it’s most convenient. This printer is very quiet, but I placed it in my secondary bedroom because there was extra space.
Most things are easy to do or automatic. When I looked for borderless printing on the iPhone app, I couldn’t find it, but it’s relatively simple to enable on Android or a computer. I got the edge to edge result when printing from Windows, macOS or Android.
You can print through the HP Smart mobile app or your operating system’s standard print system. HP guided me through installing a print-service, but you might also need to install the app.
Uncertainty about ink levels is a minor complaint. The app shows a bar for black and color ink, which lowers as the ink is used, but doesn’t quantify that with a percentage or estimate of how many pages you can print. HP+ offers a subscription to Instant Ink that eliminates the worry of running out.
The price is right
The HP Envy Inspire printer retails for just $220. That’s a bargain, especially for a printer with so many features. HP and third-party vendors have periodic sales to bring the price even lower. If you aren’t that particular and just want a printer that is cheap but good, we have a comprehensive list of the best cheap printer deals.
A printer, especially a color inkjet, is always going to require ink supplies. As usual, black ink lasts for a long time and the indicator barely drops even after printing several sheets.
Each color print takes a toll on the starter color cartridge that’s included. I printed four full-page photos and seven 4-by-6 color photos, some at the highest quality, before receiving a warning that the tri-color cartridge needed to be replaced.
When this happens, you can still print but the colors may be off. Pink flowers were printed well, but the green leaves were muted due to the partially empty ink cartridge. Still, it’s nice to have the option to print even after the warning.
Thankfully, HP Envy Inspire 995e comes with a 6-month Instant Ink subscription through HP+. After creating an HP account, and entering my billing and shipping details, I received a black cartridge and a tricolor cartridge.
The idea is that ink ships before you need it so you don’t run out. Sign up as soon as possible to receive six months of ink for free.
HP Envy Inspire is a fantastic all-in one printer.
After the six-month Instant Ink bonus, you’ll be billed according to your estimated usage. You can adjust your plan if you need ink sooner or later.
The service will ship more cartridges as you need them. HP should alert you to the need to upgrade based on your usage. Monthly changes are possible. HP says that HP cartridges can cost up to 50% less when purchased off-plan.
Is this printer right for you?
The HP Envy Inspire 7950e is an excellent all-in-one at a very affordable price. Setup is easy and quick, and it works with all your devices.
The ink is available in two cartridges: a black cartridge, and a tricolor cartridge. If your color prints average out to use roughly the same amount of cyan, magenta, and yellow, you’ll enjoy the best value. HP makes its printers energy-efficient and eco-friendly and that’s worth consideration.
If you have a preference for certain colors, a printer with ink cartridges that are specific to each color will be more efficient. I’m more likely to print nature photos that feature greens and blues with pops of reddish tones. As expected, cyan and yellow ran out faster than magenta. That’s a little thing, but it can add up over time.
The HP Envy Inspire 7955e is a wonderful printer, and it very well may be exactly what you’re looking for.
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