The rapid HP Officejet Pro K5400 is an ink - spurt printer design for businesses . It can impress decent - quality gloss or gray - scale of measurement documents , as well as surprisingly good photos . And it print color or gray - scale documents at speeds like to those of many laser printer . The most significant feature film this printer lacks is Ethernet networking compatibility — it sustain only USB connectivity . Though the K5400 is the base model of this printer line , I found this deletion irksome ; I conceive of that most businesses would want to apportion this printer among several users . ( The Officejet Pro K5400tn , which costs $ 199 , is net - compatible . )
The K5400 is a niggling bulky but count only 20 pounds , so one person should be able to take out it safely . Setting up the printing machine is a quick and easy physical process . You set up the four ink cartridges into colour - coded slots , which are conveniently located behind a small room access on the printer ’s result side . Then you establish two print heads into their mounts , which are under the printer ’s hat . After you connect the K5400 to your Mac , just set up HP ’s included software , laden some newspaper , and you ’re quick to print .
The K5400 ’s design is streamlined and practical . The control panel has only three button : one mark with anXfor canceling print job , one that flashes when you ’re out of composition ( you press the button when you ’ve reload paper ) , and a powerfulness release . HP has thoughtfully equipped this printer with a larger - than - normal input capacity of 250 tabloid , so most users wo n’t be frustrated by having to constantly reload composition .
HP calls the K5400 the “ world ’s fast screen background printer . ” The K5400 is not the fast all - around printerMacworldhas seen , but it ’s sure comparable to some of the fastest desktop ink - reverse lightning printers we ’ve screen , such as the Canon Pixma MP960 ( ) . The K5400 ’s print speed are like to those of optical maser pressman . In my examination , it took 14 seconds to publish a one - page Book document , 61 seconds to impress a ten - varlet news document , 66 seconds to print a four - Sir Frederick Handley Page colouring PDF , and 214 seconds to publish an 8 - by-10 - column inch photo . By style of equivalence , the fast optical maser printer we ’ve tested — the Brother MFC-9420CN ( ) — drive 15 seconds to print a one - page Son text file , 33 second to publish a ten - pageboy Word document , 64 second to impress a four - page PDF , and 38 seconds to print an 8 - by-10 - inch photo .
Though HP emphasizes the K5400 ’s colour and grey - scale impression abilities , these are n’t the printer ’s greatest strengths . In color documents , print dots were more or less seeable in bright colors . And in hoary - scale text file , the printing machine ’s speed produce episodic smudges , and fonts look a little fleshy . The K5400 farm very good exposure : colors were exact , mental image were clear , and while photographic print dots were slightly visible in undimmed colors , they were less noticeable on photo paper . However , since this printing machine uses dye - based inks plan in the main for text file printing , you should n’t require long - lasting , water - resistive photos .
Timed Trials
Scale = Minutes : Seconds
jury tests
Scale = Superior , Very Good , Good , Fair , Poor
specifications
How We Tested : We ran all tests with the printer connected via USB 2.0 to a 2.66GHz Mac Pro with Mac OS X 10.4.8 install and 1 GB of RAM . We recorded the time it took the printer to print a one - page Word written document and a ten - varlet news text file , as well as the sentence it take to print a 22 MB Photoshop image and a four - page PDF . A jury of experts try the printer ’s output and rated its photographic print quality as Superior , Very honorable , Good , Fair , or Poor , in equivalence to the yield of ink - spurt printer we ’ve tested in the past.—Macworld research laboratory examination by Brian Chen
Macworld’s buying advice
The HP Officejet Pro K5400 ’s affordability , speed , and ability to print decent - timber text file and very just photos make it a upstanding choice . However , business organisation will belike be more attract to this printer line ’s midrange modelling , the Officejet Pro K5400tn , which includes networking capabilities and an extra theme tray .
[ Brian Chen is an assistant editor forMacworld . ]
