Do NOT buy HP products

[Berni]

Yep over here HP is also not well received at all. Lots of other people here stay away from HP laptops and printers like it's the plague. I think they are mostly in the corporate market for workstations, servers..etc these days.

Indeed the HP test equipment division should have kept the HP name. But its hard to argue that in a business meting when the new computer stuff thing is making way more money than the test equipment (since computers are a much larger market to begin with). None the less Keysight still makes very good test gear and stands behind it by supporting it properly. It's still not exactly cheap but neither was HP gear back when it was brand new, quality comes at a cost.

[rsjsouza]

Yep over here HP is also not well received at all. Lots of other people here stay away from HP laptops and printers like it's the plague. I think they are mostly in the corporate market for workstations, servers..etc these days.

Indeed the HP test equipment division should have kept the HP name. But its hard to argue that in a business meting when the new computer stuff thing is making way more money than the test equipment (since computers are a much larger market to begin with). None the less Keysight still makes very good test gear and stands behind it by supporting it properly. It's still not exactly cheap but neither was HP gear back when it was brand new, quality comes at a cost.

Not only that, but the name had a very strong mindshare with the consumer market, where brand name is much more significant than B2B.

[TimNJ]

Just don't buy HP consumer stuff. It's garbage. Same for Dell, in my opinion.

Their business laptops are pretty solid though. My HP ProBook 6570b is going on 9 years now, no problems, and has held up very well. (Well, I should say I replaced the CPU, the memory, and swapped HDD for SSD)...but fundamentally solid.)

This is where I got it from (below). I recommend the business refurbished outlet to lots of people. Better quality product at good prices.

https://h41369.www4.hp.com/pps-offers.php

[Wuerstchenhund]

Yep over here HP is also not well received at all. Lots of other people here stay away from HP laptops and printers like it's the plague. I think they are mostly in the corporate market for workstations, servers..etc these days.

Indeed the HP test equipment division should have kept the HP name. But its hard to argue that in a business meting when the new computer stuff thing is making way more money than the test equipment (since computers are a much larger market to begin with). None the less Keysight still makes very good test gear and stands behind it by supporting it properly. It's still not exactly cheap but neither was HP gear back when it was brand new, quality comes at a cost.

Not only that, but the name had a very strong mindshare with the consumer market, where brand name is much more significant than B2B.

Actually, in B2B the brand name (and the reputation behind it) is *much* more important than for consumers, which pretty much always go for the lowest cost option.

[SilverSolder]

Yep over here HP is also not well received at all. Lots of other people here stay away from HP laptops and printers like it's the plague. I think they are mostly in the corporate market for workstations, servers..etc these days.

Indeed the HP test equipment division should have kept the HP name. But its hard to argue that in a business meting when the new computer stuff thing is making way more money than the test equipment (since computers are a much larger market to begin with). None the less Keysight still makes very good test gear and stands behind it by supporting it properly. It's still not exactly cheap but neither was HP gear back when it was brand new, quality comes at a cost.

Not only that, but the name had a very strong mindshare with the consumer market, where brand name is much more significant than B2B.

Actually, in B2B the brand name (and the reputation behind it) is *much* more important than for consumers, which pretty much always go for the lowest cost option.

"Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM"

[rsjsouza]

Actually, in B2B the brand name (and the reputation behind it) is *much* more important than for consumers, which pretty much always go for the lowest cost option.

That is not my experience at all. Too many examples to count in the consumer market (Motorola, Siemens, Philips, Dell, to name a few) while in the B2B side of things the various subsidiaries were changing hands and brand names all the time.

It is much easier to have a FAE/rep to consult and help with the transition for a X number of developers and managers than to change the mindshare of X¹⁰ people in the consumer market.

[SimonM]

Since they started to surprise owners of HP printers with firmware updates preventing the use of non-HP ink or toner cartridges I certainly stay away from HP printers.

Interesting - since there is more money in the ink than the printers e.g. it's an ink business that needs a printer.

I also have switched away from HP. I have a Brother printer which I haven't replaced in years - so I must be happy with it.

I have also switched away from buying manufacturer's ink (I was probably the last person on the planet to do that).

The printer didn't break, catch fire, etc. at least I didn't notice any change.

Ironically, I now have brand loyalty to the "knock-off" cartridge maker and won't buy anything else.

Simon

[kaz911]

My experiences:

HP Servers - used to be great - but my IBM servers last longer

HP Desktops - as cheaply made as Acer - with plenty of issues - and a lot of "custom" parts that are impossible to get spares for

HP Printers / MFC's - work ok - but software is incredibly bloated - who needs 1.3GB of printer software for and MFC. Switched to Brother MFC"s and have never looked back.

HP Wideformat - ohh well - used to be the bees knees - but my latest Z9+ have been a nightmare. Unfinished firmware - printer have had 3 times onsite warranty service - and again software is completely bloated and written IMHO by people who have never done a commercial print in their lives. Printer software killed the built in paper management service/database - making it impossible to create paper presets. And it was done just by importing a genuine HP Paper profile....

Lenovo Thinkpad - I have owned a lot - and used to be a big fan of Thinkpad for their ease of repair and service manuals available. But Lenovo can't design working high speed ports on them. So expect TB3/USB-C/USB 3.1 ports to fail at high speed transfers. (Thinkpad P1G1, P70, P51 and P52) On the P70 the built in ports did not work - but the Dock ports worked (USB 3.1 HS) - I went through a 3 month debugging tour with Lenovo service staff - and they gave up.  But none of the models mentioned are quite right for high speed transfers - they would crash when reading disks (large photo imports) - get annoyed when sync'ing phones - and not work at all with Saleae Logic Pro (Logic Pro would fail and try to lower capture speed again and again) - then I'd put the Logic Pro into any other PC and it just works. Even ran it of Parallels on a MBP and it works fine much to the surprise of Lenovo... Same issues across the ThinkPad models with my Tektronix RSA306 that does some pretty high speed USB transfers. My personal opinion is Lenovo is not great at making "matched pair" PCB traces.

So now I have switched to a CrapBook Pro with bootcamp for Windows if needed - and most things work really well. I know the insides are crap, but high speed transfers works direct on the CrapBook Pro - as long as I do not use terrible TB3 docking stations like CalDigit etc. But the CalDigit TS3+ still work better than ANY ThinkPad ThunderBolt dock (40AN) I have tried. 

[SilverSolder]

[...]
I have also switched away from buying manufacturer's ink (I was probably the last person on the planet to do that).
[...]

Well, yes and no.  I still buy manufacturer's ink for my HP inkjet, because the cartridges "just work", generally -  but I buy old stock cheap on eBay.  - I have had a lot of bad experience with "generic" ink cartridges.  In fairness, I haven't tried any for several years, maybe they've improved.

[HighVoltage]

Others have similar posts ... really sad to read after it really was one of the best companies in the world.

HP Sucks: Comments from Disgruntled HP Customers
https://www.gaebler.com/HP-Sucks-Comments-Page.htm

[madires]

Well, yes and no.  I still buy manufacturer's ink for my HP inkjet, because the cartridges "just work", generally -  but I buy old stock cheap on eBay.  - I have had a lot of bad experience with "generic" ink cartridges.  In fairness, I haven't tried any for several years, maybe they've improved.

Alternative ink and toner cartridges are a mixed bag. You can get everything from the cheapest junk to reasonable priced high quality cartridges from known brands. Sometimes the alternative ink/toner is ever better than the genuine one. If you print a lot and prefer an ink based printer choose one with large tanks which are easy refill with less expensive ink.

[SilverSolder]

Well, yes and no.  I still buy manufacturer's ink for my HP inkjet, because the cartridges "just work", generally -  but I buy old stock cheap on eBay.  - I have had a lot of bad experience with "generic" ink cartridges.  In fairness, I haven't tried any for several years, maybe they've improved.

Alternative ink and toner cartridges are a mixed bag. You can get everything from the cheapest junk to reasonable priced high quality cartridges from known brands. Sometimes the alternative ink/toner is ever better than the genuine one. If you print a lot and prefer an ink based printer choose one with large tanks which are easy refill with less expensive ink.

I'm keeping an older model alive, one that can print on CDs...   I have some older cars that only accept CDs, and it is kind of retro cool so I like to serve them what they like! 

[Raj]

Sure, they did kill their prebuilt computer division, but their shareholders must be pretty happy with how their printer division is making money.
In the end, company exists for shareholders and HP won cause I see their printers everywhere, and more than any other brand.

[AaronLee]

I have heard this about Lenovo Thinkpads before as well. I have used only the professional "W" series Thinkpads and never had any problems at all. Maybe the EliteBooks are good but after so much bad experience with HP consumer products, I have not even trusted to buy an EliteBook.

... but I just bought an HP product:
The HP Calculator 11C what an amazing little calculator of the Hewlett-Packard Voyager series. 

Oh wait .... its from 1982.... the good old days!

Yes, I had an HP16C in the same form factor as the 11C and totally loved that calculator. I used it to death and bought a spare out of fear the original would break down and I couldn't replace it, but it just kept on going. Before that I had an HP41C which was also great. And I had the original HP LaserJet from the mid 1980's. That thing was built like a tank, and weighed like one. It likely would have kept on going, but unfortunately my office got flooded which flooded out the HP, and with the insurance payoff I got an HP Laserjet IIP, which was better feature-wise, but already I felt the build quality was declining. Later on I bought an HP laptop, but was very disappointed and I've mostly avoided HP ever since.

I always associated the HP name with the original company and their well-built products, so it was sad to see them split off the test gear to the Agilent name, and then further on to Keysight. It would have been much better in my view for the HP name to have gone with the test equipment, and a new name for the computer gear.

[voltsandjolts]

A few of those HP calculators are still available new, in cloned form, using STM32 micros I believe.
https://www.swissmicros.com/products

[wraper]

The last straw for HP's came tonight. I wasted four hours of my life trying to install a HP P2055dn printer on someone's Windows 10 PC via USB. HP's drivers are dreadful. Their driver website says there are 3 drivers, but only 2 are listed.... can't they even get that right? Their driver software hangs. I finally got the printer driver to be detected, but for the life of me, it does not print a test page. Their moronic HP Doctor software does not work in saying everything is OK when it isn't. There is nothing wrong with the printer hardware other than the logo "HP". I could not be bothered spending a moment longer on this piece of HP crap. In the rubbish it goes - after I put a hammer though it.

Depending on updates that computer received it could be a windows bug from last year.
EDIT: there is also a new Windows printing bug. https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-releases-cumulative-updates-to-fix-windows-10-print-error-issues/ Dunno if it affects the printer in question.
IMHO you unjustly lynched the printer without giving it a chance to defend in court.