HP P1102W Wireless Laser Printer

Pay only P 640 a Month for 12 months.

Or pay only P 1,212 a Month for 6 months.

• Installment promo is available for locally issued credit cards
• Card holder must transact inside an Asianic store to avail of the installment

Features

Small, compact and relatively cheap, HP's new LaserJet P1102w mono laser printer is aimed at home users and small workgroups. It measures just 349 x 238 x 196mm and weighs only 5.3kg, making it perfect if space is of a premium. Decked out in an all-black chassis with a glossy front panel, it's also rather attractive.

The P1102w printer has very modest dimensions, mainly because it's input and output trays fold out only when needed. The 150-sheet input tray folds down from the front panel and the paper stop slides out to the front. Cleverly positioned above the main input tray is a 10-sheet priority feeder for envelopes or special media, which is unusual in a machine at this end of the market.

The size of the HP P1102w printer is small, it's no surprise to find the 150-sheet input tray isn't housed completely within the printer. Instead, whenever there's paper in the input tray you need to have the small flap at the front open. This does end up making it look a little messy, although unlike on other models we've seen the flap is reasonably securely attached and should therefore withstand a few knocks from passers-by. The 100-sheet output tray sits at the top of the printer and features a similar fold-out flap.

Setting up the printer is a relatively hassle-free process. The toner cartridge is accessed by opening the lid of the printer, and thanks to the step-by-step guide in the instruction manual. Both USB and wireless connections are offered. If you opt for the latter, you'll still need to temporarily connect the USB cable up so as to configure the wireless settings; impressively, HP includes a USB cable in the package. Given that many homes and businesses now use the wider-reaching 802.11n wireless standard, we were slightly disappointed to discover HP has only seen fit to furnish the LaserJet P1102w with 802.11b/g wireless. There's also no wired Ethernet option, which is a shame.

The output tray folds out from the top panel, where it looks a little incongruous and a small paper stop flips up to help keep output documents neat. The top panel has a textured black inset, while the surround is high-gloss black plastic, with a small control panel down the left-hand side, including indicators for wireless connection, errors and power and two buttons for wireless and job cancel.

The blue wireless indicator goes off when the printer switches to sleep mode, which is illogical, as the printer wouldn't wake to print if the link wasn't still active. Most wireless printers leave their connection light on, even when sleeping. Lift the top cover and you have access to the small, discreet drum and toner cartridge, which slots down deep into the bowels of the printer. This is an easy-to-fit consumable, rated at 1,600 pages and is the only consumable in the machine.

HP P1102w provides 32-bit and 64-bit divers for Windows XP, Vista and 7, and for OS X from version 10.4. There's also a Linux driver available for download. HP has made an effort to keep power consumption down, and when in standby mode we measured a power draw of just 2W, which is pretty low. In this mode, the printer takes just seven seconds to churn out the first page. Start the printer from cold, though, and the wait increases dramatically to over 50 seconds; something that could prove to be a pain if you need to print in a rush.

HP rates the LaserJet P1102w at 18ppm, which is a fair speed for a personal laser printer.  5-page text print took 27s, which is equivalent to a speed of 11.1ppm, but increasing the page count to a 20-page document took the speed up to 15.8ppm, which is over 75 per cent of the rated speed. The 5-page text and graphics document printed at 13.0ppm and a 15 x 10cm photo on an A4 sheet took just 13 seconds at the machine's top resolution, called FastRes 1200. At the normal FastRes 600 it took just 10 seconds.

While retired printers (human) might be able to tell the difference between this laser output and letterpress print, for most business users there will be little obvious difference and the quality is more than adequate for internal reports and printed materials aimed at the general public. Greyscale print of HP Laserjet P1102w is also very reasonable, with generally smooth greyscales available for all kinds of business graphics. Some colours translate to very similar shades of grey, which can be confusing, but for the most part business charts and graphs look smart and clean.

Even photo images, never a mono laser’s favourite task, look realistic and well detailed. While areas of sky appear a little mottled, at least they're not covered in light and dark bands, as is often the case with inexpensive laser engines. The level of detail in darker areas of photos is also better than average, with less of the image tending to black. The single-piece drum and toner cartridge comes in just one capacity, though HP manages to more than halve this by offering an introductory cartridge good for just 700 pages.

Technical Specifications