AirPrint discussion.

12 Jun 2011 23:46:17

Gordon Clyne

Further to an email discussion about AirPrint, there are about a dozen HP printers that are currently AirPrint enabled, or soon to be so. There are free Epson apps in the store to fake AirPrint but you need to have a wifi printer anyway. Canon also has a free app but both of these are not general printing tools, they can print photos, but not other stuff like web pages or output from other apps.

The issue is that AirPrint is embedded in the OS and is a general printing architecture, tailored to the OS and mobile devices and doesn't have legacy support for older operating system environments. It's also an attempt to control output, so consider if you will iCloud coming..... Then having a restricted but robust print framework, it makes sense, and cuts down on support.

HP and Apple have an agreement to release AirPrint compatible products until sometime in 2012 when the code gets licensed to other print vendors. At least that's how I understand it today!!!

Re: AirPrint discussion.

13 Jun 2011 00:18:33

Gordon Clyne

Part two....
A mole told me that Apple originally had several printer folks on board, but someone happened at the last minute before the announcement, leaving only HP in the news. Their ePrint and AirPrint are similar but I don't know exactly how compatible. My other guess is that Apple may have asked for a commitment from the printer folks in return for exclusivity for the first year to sell to the demanding market, and again only HP showed up to the party. There are wifi printers on the market, but the whole point of AirPrint is that you shouldn't need a bazillion print drivers, all different in the way they handle formatting and colour, in order to print, so AirPrint is intended to be all driverless things to all printers, something we can all identify with I hope!!

There are apps to fudge it... Free, and I think you will be disappointed as they probably only do photos, like printjinni from epson that does some doc types but is not generic ( it's basically a fancy driver for the epson wifi devices.) Kodak's pick flick app just does photos as well.

Printer manufacturers have been getting away with massive bloatware in their drivers for years, and they have been tring to one up others to get the market with features, despite the obvious problem people hate them for which is expensive ink cartridges. however the cash cow is sacrosanct so ink will be expensive for ages.

I bought the brand new HP envy 410 recently, and was a guinea pig evidently. It couldn't handle HPs own photo paper, and chewed up plain paper so badly I got a replacement "paper eject handler" which fixed it, but there were dozens of software issues, including the software control of the fancy door, and the apps it has inboard, which seem to be totally useless in that they take you to sites to buy templates all the time, so it's frustrating, and I never use them. It switches off the touch screen from time to time, and sometimes the print quality is just atrocious and only fixes if you turn it off and wait ten minutes..... The two 70Mb software updates have vastly improved the performance, but I was in touch with the project lead directly, and told him about all the issues..... He is no longer with HP..... But it's clear the device was rushed to market to go hand in hand with the launch of AirPrint. It probably safe to buy the current version, but the one I got was from Staples, and should have been recalled to be reworked before it was sold to me, however staples refused to take it back, and HP to their credit have fixed every one of my issues after two hardware deliveries, three software updates, and a set of sixteen ink cartridges to keep me sweet I guess.

I persevered, because I know a lot about how products get built in the valley, and could ask probing questions and give precise answers and repeatable problems to illustrate the issues, but I will think twice about buying a first generation printer, however I needed it to test my own app!!!!!!