Dear HP,
I’ve been using your printers for years and years now. Since I started using Mac OS X more than 5 years ago, the process for installing a printer I thought would become drastically easier. Unfortunately, I was wrong.
Rather than just install a simple driver so I can use one of your printers over a USB connection, you make me install an unending number of applications. I don’t need your crappy editing software, fax software, copying software, or any software from you. I just want my printer to work.
But guess what? It still doesn’t. Even after installing everything and connecting the printer via a USB cable, my iMac cannot recognize your printer anymore. It used to, but I guess your Photosmart-series hunk of junk got mad at me and decided to become a pain in my ass. Now, every time I boot up my iMac, I’m forced to deal with some printer maintenance tool. There is no “Do not ask me again” option or anything. This is the last straw. I decided to stop using this printer and went to uninstall the software using YOUR uninstaller.
Your uninstaller hates me, too. It froze every time I tried to get rid of the Photosmart 8200 series option. I had three others that managed to uninstall fine, but this one won’t quit. Finally, I had to break down and search through every folder on my hard drive for anything related to HP. It was tedious, annoying, and shouldn’t have had to be done in the first place. It feels like you unleashed a virus in my iMac.
So from now on HP, I won’t be using any of your printers until you start fixing your software for the Mac. Your printers aren’t bad at all. I actually like quite a few of them and you make other fantastic products as well. Just get the ball rolling on some revamped software for OS X and you’ll be on the path to regaining myself and probably many others as customers. For now, I’ll be having drinks with a lady I like to call “Lexmark.”
Sincerely,
Vincent Veneziani
CrunchGear
I thought Macs were supposed to “just work”
Ouch.
Score one for the boys in Redmond.
@ilya: It’s the boys in Redmond that taught HP all they know about software.
No I mean, Isn’t it a touted feature of Macs that printers and other peripherals are supposed to work driver-free?
You’re trolling but I am going to answer anyways – every printer has a driver. Like WinXP/Vista – Mac OS X has tons of built in drivers that cover most things. For example – I needed to print to a canon laser printer at an office today – my mac just picked it up and i was printing in a few moments. But it had a driver for it already installed. The Windows 2000 box I was also using didn’t have a driver but Windows XP did. As for cheap throw away HP printers like the Photosmart 8200 they are a crapshoot. They tend to be highly proprietary and HP is notoriously bad at writing drivers for them – usually insisting on all this junk to be installed. Other vendors are more clueful. Btw my cheap throw away HP Deskjet 6540 works just fine from my Macs and my Windows boxes.
I have the same problem on the PC. I bought the hp psc 2510 photosmart all-in-one and now wish I never did. I am forced to install over 700mb of software I don’t want just to use the printer over my network. I should be allowed to just install the printer driver and network connectivity portion without all the extra software. I wont buy another hp printer until they fix this.
If I had a nickel for every time I’d uninstalled and reinstalled the drivers for my 2355- I’d have enough for a Lexmark!
Yea I hear that! I have a very good working 7410 wireless – but I just use the stock driver – since I don’t dare to load that bloat from HP – Please get
with the program and “update” your drivers/installers for the Mac. Please, please – I’ll even dump my new epson 2400 for one of those Z series if you do.
(Drivers and the such made me go the epson route for a good photo printer)
I hear you dude. I’m a Mac user as well and I’ve dumped my HP printers (which I have been a faithful user for years) for a Canon. No bloatware and I get to choose what goes into my box.
That’s why, for me, every printer must have network printing and PS3 suport, I to tired of drivers and related software to try anything that’s not Network and PS3 compliant.
As as cheap as it can get… For now a Samsung ML2151N.
themage
You mean the “genius” at the mac store cant help you? Ha Ha! Love it. I hear more BS about macs being better and I keep shovelling the crap over my shoulder. Get with the rest of the world.
I always thought about this but never wrote anything to HP. In my old PC I had to install like 400Mb of JUNK in my HD to just get a printer to work. The same printer in my Mac turned to be an easy install without any drivers luckly cos the OSX drivers disc provided by HP said it needs a lot of space. I just dont get why they force us to install all this software. In my dead’s pc even the photo viewer was replace by a HP one. Now I choose my printers by the way they need a driver. The one that doesnt need drivers is the winner.
Oh man… I love all these Mac trolls.
“You Macs aren’t so great! You should just give up and aspire to be as crappy as the rest of us!”
HP Printers are dinky toys,
Get a real printer, epson or canon.
Or better yet, save the planet and don’t print ;-)