What is your experience with the HP latex printers

[Precision]

We have a 8.5 year old HP 360 Latex, it's been great. Has been under warranty since we bought it. However this year we have had to use that warranty on more occasions than not, and it always seems like when we are in the middle of a large project. So looking to upgrade to a newer machine and sell this one while we can. I would like to hear anyones' opinion on the HP 630. 700 and 800 machines. We are not really interested in the white option, seems more trouble than not.

I'd love to hear your take. Thanks!

 

[BigNate]

We LOVE our 700w.

We have had a 700w for 2 years now. It was a bit rough in the beginning as supply issues caused some 800 parts to be used in 700s -- at least that is what HP told us when it kept blowing out printheads. Within 2 months they had everything worked out on ours... (and I am told the new machines do not have the same problems....)

It works great for white, but I found we really do not use it more that 3 or 4 times a year - the holder to keep the white printheads fresh when not in use is a good thing. Unless you have specific projects in mind you are right to forgo the white option (but it does seem to be able to sit idle with the white turned off for significant time and just comes back...)

I have heard horror stories about issues from the 700 - so there may be some 'lemons' out there. (in fairness all brands can find haters on this forum.) Whatever you buy make sure to get the service plan and then hold the techs accountable to make sure it always stays in spec.

 

[ozpall]

I got a hp360 as well and even thou its been great and we still have it but we ended up getting the hp700w. so far so good, i came from solvent and UV inks and Latex its so much simpler easier less maintenance. if you like your 360 you will be happy with a 700.
also i have had the 700 for a year now with no issues at all, i know there are a few horrible stories out there.
best of luck.

 

[Fbermudez]

I had a Roland and switch over to a 570, the company that I work for got the 800 with the white and it was nothing but trouble they returned it and now they have a colorado.
but I have nothing bad to say about my 570 most of the issues I had was my error.

 

[Robban]

We have solvent today but intend to update ourselves to HP, maybe.
As we have quite small locations, I wonder a bit about the heat development from latex printers, is that a problem for you?

 

[Fbermudez]

We have solvent today but intend to update ourselves to HP, maybe.
As we have quite small locations, I wonder a bit about the heat development from latex printers, is that a problem for you?

I run my side gig out of a 500 sq. ft, garage and the heat does not affect me, I'm in Maryland, but I do have AC in the garage to use in the summer.

 

[ozpall]

We have solvent today but intend to update ourselves to HP, maybe.
As we have quite small locations, I wonder a bit about the heat development from latex printers, is that a problem for you?

My 700w runs a lot cooler than my 360 but no issues at all.

 

[Cricket]

we run a 630 W. aside from some generic issues, I quite like it. the ink cartridges are a little smaller than the last machine we had, so it seems like were replacing them very frequently. Printing white has been really nice though. a bit of a learning curve to figure out how flexi handles white ink placement. but all in all I wouldn't kick it out of bed for eating crackers.

 

[RabidOne]

We are on our 2nd 800w. Ran the first one pretty hard for 3 years and had a few issues towards the end. Bought an R2000 and swung a new 800w in the deal.
No off gassing time, 3 litre ink and fast printing are the pluses. We had some minor consistency issues with the first one. Just ran a 30' wall on the new one and every panel was bang on.
The white is pretty slow and we did find a couple of times the white ink expired before we used it all. But we were satisfied enough to get a 2nd one so that says the positives outweighed the negatives.

 

[nolanola]

I recommend getting a new 300 Latex series. You already know what to expect, and your software is set up for it. We used a 335 for six years and loved it. After trying a different *new* model for our second shop, we decided to return to the 300 series and love it again. The color might not be perfect, but it’s very reliable.

 

[Geneva Olson]

we run a 630 W. aside from some generic issues, I quite like it. the ink cartridges are a little smaller than the last machine we had, so it seems like were replacing them very frequently. Printing white has been really nice though. a bit of a learning curve to figure out how flexi handles white ink placement. but all in all I wouldn't kick it out of bed for eating crackers.

do you find you use the white ink option often? and out of curiosity, what kind of learning curve do you have with flexi and the white ink?

 

[ozpall]

I recommend getting a new 300 Latex series. You already know what to expect, and your software is set up for it. We used a 335 for six years and loved it. After trying a different *new* model for our second shop, we decided to return to the 300 series and love it again. The color might not be perfect, but it’s very reliable.

for a business i would think Color accuracy and reliability go hand to hand. the 700w does both so far in my end.

 

[dypinc]

for a business i would think Color accuracy and reliability go hand to hand. the 700w does both so far in my end.

The color consistency problem with the 300 series was from having one lc/lm printhead. Depending of the colors and what speed you were printing at it couldn't keep up. Plus there few extra nozzles to replace ones that got clogged like when having two printheads. Finally HP figured it out and have two lc/lm printheads in the new printers.

 

[Sergio GP]

Usamos una impresora de 630 W. Aparte de algunos problemas genéricos, me gusta bastante. Los cartuchos de tinta son un poco más pequeños que los de la última máquina que teníamos, por lo que parece que los reemplazamos con mucha frecuencia. Sin embargo, imprimir en blanco ha sido muy bueno. Es una curva de aprendizaje un poco complicada para entender cómo Flexi maneja la colocación de la tinta blanca. Pero en general, no la sacaría de la cama ni por comer galletas.

Hola tenemos una 360 y pensamos adquirir una nueva 630. En lineas generales nos gusta HP y sus tintas. Al ser relativamente nueva la 630 no hay mucha información me gustaría saber cuales fueron esos pequeños problemas. Gracias

 

[Sergio GP]

Hi, we have a 360 and we are thinking of buying a new 630. In general we like HP and its inks. Since the 630 is relatively new there is not much information. I would like to know what those small problems were. Thanks.

 

[Cricket]

do you find you use the white ink option often? and out of curiosity, what kind of learning curve do you have with flexi and the white ink?

its not something we use every day, (or even every week) but it has come up a fair bit. and we've gone out of our way to advertise that we can print white, which brings in some extra business that way.

When we switched to the 630W we also switched from onyx to flexi for our rip software. so some of the learning curve was learning flexi in general. but theres specific settings to get it to print white under everything, print white only under color, print white that scales with colors fading in and out, etc. Personally I'm also newer to the industry so I haven't picked up every trick yet. That may also be part of it.

 

[Cricket]

Hi, we have a 360 and we are thinking of buying a new 630. In general we like HP and its inks. Since the 630 is relatively new there is not much information. I would like to know what those small problems were. Thanks.

As mentioned the ink cartridges are smaller, which is mildly annoying to replace them more frequently. We also have some trouble with the media profiles. for example; we use IJ35 the most, and the IJ35 media setting we downloaded from HP makes the ink run a lot more than the "Generic self adhesive vinyl" setting that comes stock on the machine. which is fine, and we typically just use that over the more specific setting. However the machine wont let you do some calibrations while on a "Generic setting", which is also annoying if were trying to test colors.
We've also had some issues with loading it. at one point it seemed like something was jammed in the machine and wouldn't let us load any of the longer medias unless we cut the corner off of the front. eventually it stopped doing that but the issue comes back seemingly randomly every once and a while.
In addition, at one point the machine was giving us some trouble and refused to start a print. gave us some error about the print heads. I looked at the status of the print heads and the machine said they were all 'green' and 'in warranty'. after shutting the machine off and turning it back on it listed one of the print heads as 'damaged' and 'out of warranty'.
Now, all of these things are obviously not ideal, but the way I see it, every machines gonna have something wrong. all of the things i listed are fixable, or at the very least can be worked around. so I would still give the 630W a green light.

 

[balstestrat]

You replied to him having a L360 which has 20% smaller ink cartridges so not really true. 775ml vs 1000ml.

Also you can simply clone the generic and calibrate it if you wish. Also little tuning to that IJ35 should fix it as well.