Looking at the case of the printer anyone would appreciate its beauty and sleek design. It comes with a wonderful case which is eco friendly. For such a low price it would have been better if it works out with high quality printouts with low cost for accessories. The cost for one page is found to be most expensive of all the printers.
The entire unit is made of organic products and it looks very appealing with a cute little case covering it. The manual, the ink cartridge and a cable are placed well inside the pocket of the printer. In A646 photo smart the front panel is converted as the input tray for paper. You cannot find separate keys for controlling its functions. And there is a small stylus made of plastic for pressing the screen.
To start the working, you have to connect the wire to the socket, and just press the button meant for switching it on. You will be asked to choose a language and select a region from its menu for installing the cartridge.
The software driver is very quick and responsive in this printer. The program of installation is in built inside the printer. The printer was able to recognize the system immediately but our computer had some problem in acknowledging the printer. After manual installation it started running perfectly.
An important feature with this A 646 photo smart is you can save the pictures into the memory card writer for future use. It is possible to print photos from your digital camera or from your stored pictures in your computer and even from your mobile phone.
Any alterations or corrections can be made to the photos using internal menu or editing element. The printer has options of clip art, doodles and frames. It enables you to do lot other adjustments to your photo using photo filters which are in-built in the printer. Hence, it is possible to take clearer and designed photos using this printer.
Similarly you can do various layout settings for the photo depending on your requirement. Using in built themes you can print birthday card and wedding card also. The printer also supports huge paper sizes for photos unlike in other printers. Various fix can be made on your photos using edit menu.
The quality of picture in HP A646 is not good and the results were inconsistent. The colours are not accurate and matching the original photo. This feature is the biggest drawback with this printer. Being a photo smart the printer could not produce high quality photos is not endearing.
The speed of A646 is also not up to the mark when comparing with other printers. The printer printed with relatively lesser speed when it prints from SD card.
Comparing with other models its printing cost for one page is very high and expensive. You can reduce this cost by purchasing value added pack of both the ink and the paper. Even after cutting down the price the cost per page ratio is high for this A646.
Unless HP Company does some effort to bring down its consumables cost, this model will struggle to hit the user market.