HP B9180 Problems

Google found you. My B9180 was sucking ink on standby after 30 months. Followed your and HP instructions, firmware update made the problem much worse, lost a lot of money on HP ink this afternoon, more than $100. Cleaned the NEDD with zero success on Tap Test 94.

Now we will see if Mackcam.com extended warranty was worth the $40. If not then Epson R2880

One question - did the reader above with the clean spit & wipe area and NEDD sensor clean them phsyically or did his machine not have the problems that we're experiencing?

On to the rant!

I'm glad that I stumbled across this post. My phone calls to HP were beginning to feel a little lonely. I've recently spent just under four hours on the phone (two calls, two days, same week) with HP regarding these issues. Of course, this is only a fraction of the total time spent researching and trying to take care of the issues by myself.

After the recent firmware update I began to see a lot of drops and pools of ink on the occasional print. I would say that approximately 20% of my photos were coming out w/ these drops, drips, strike marks and puddles. I'm not sure if the firmware upgrade and the problems are related but the timing was fishy.

HP's Canadian call group walked me through the whole gamut of printhead cleanings, calibration, etc.. I did explain that I had done these steps before (several of them just prior to the first call) but I understand they have a checklikst of items to run through on their help tickets. The calibrations and cleanings on the first call zipped through the ink and (of course) HP's Advanced Glossy paper. So much so that I had to replace four cartridges in under one hour. Keep in mind that zero photographs were printed here. This was just calibration and cleaning. Now, I know that one of the cartridges was nearly empty to begin with. I had the spare available. I had to run out and pick up the others. Several other cartridges need to be replaced soon.

At the end of the first call, the HP helpdesk agent mentioned something called the NEDD... as in "this call has gone on for so long and we've gotten nowhere. So I'm going to ship out a printhead for you and maybe you can check out your NEDD". Hmmm... I took photos very similar to the colorful mess above. I pulled out the gloves, spread some newspaper around the printer and began pulling out an unbelievable amount of HP's pricey pigment.

The B9180 is peforming better lately, but I still feel like HP should send a replacement printer or a full compliment of printheads and ink. Now that I know to keep my NEDD tidy, hopefully everything will work out.

I'll let you know. By the way... If anyone is a civil attorney or knows of a class action related to these very expensive problems, please contact me.

Thanks,
Michael Reaves
SF Pro Photo

I've been experiencing the same ink-guzzling experience and frustration with my B9180. I have been working with high-end inkjet printers for many years and while the 9180 performed well in the beginning , it's ink-consumption soon became so excessive as to make it impractical to use. As a consequence, I have printed only a handful of images during the past 6 to 8 months, sending the work instead to my epson 4000. Despite the fact that the printer sets pretty much idle, it continues gulping down ink as though it were churning out a significant quantity of prints each day.

Thanks for the article, and for bringing this to the attention of others . Echoing the comment of Michael Reaves, count me in if someone's in a position to initiate a class action suit; I think it's warranted.

Wayne Waller
California Institute of Technology

I echo experience across the board. After a little over two years of use, my B9180 died. I suspect the NEDD sensor became too gunked up to be useful. It's unfortunate I just found this article a little over two months after my printer died. I might have been able to salvage it.

When I purchased the printer two years ago, I also bought a warranty through Mack Camera (mackcamera.com) It was a wise $70 investment in blue sky. First, they requested I take the printer to a local, authorized HP repair station. The local guys were unable to replace a mainboard due to the inability of ordering a replacement from the HP parts dept. Then, Mack Camera had me send them the printer whereupon their own technicians had to admit to the exact problem the local company encountered, unavailability of repair parts. Mack first made me a monetary offer that in no way met the replacement value warranty I originally purchased. After presenting them with a case of what the original warranty offered and showing them the cost of purchasing a a new B9180, they relented and replaced the printer with a new model at no additional charge to me. Mack Camera lived up to it's agreement.

As much as I love the quality of the prints this printer makes, I fear I'm going to be stuck with another ink guzzler. And we complain about the price of a gallon of gasoline??!! If I can maintain this unit and garner another couple years of use out of it, I might break even on the cost of the ink dumped in the waste cups. Wish I would have known about this issue before I shelled out $700 for this unit a couple years ago. I would have bought the Epson. Oh well.

I too would join a class-action if it came about. Between $240 & 260 is about the best price I've been able to purchase a full set ink. And to add insult to injury, the cartridges aren't refillable or recyclable. They're throwaways! What a waste.

Same Problems with my HP 9180 - quite annoying - its definitely not a singular problem - and - i'm from germany - not limited to the united states....hp should do a recall on that issue...

I have also found that the printer used up far more ink washing itself than in actually printing. In two years of light printing I have had to replace 2 printheads, though they were supposed to be long lasting. In the last few days it has decided that it can no longer make a print or carry out closed loop calibration or print a sample page, though it can quite happily align printheads or print a test page which reports that all printheads are good and firmware is up to date. NEDD is now spotless, but that is no help, and it never was particularly messy. Connecting with a shorter usb cable and uninstalling and reinstalling the software were to no avail. When CLC or printing begins, it is promptly aborted with a message 'problem detected - reset required'.

Online chat with HP support was helpful but concluded that there was a hardware failure, though would not specify what that could be or how, since for me everything seemed to point to a software problem. E-mail support abandoned me with the suggestion that if the unit was still under guarantee HP would replace it; if not I should buy another one. Since I lived in Europe and the technicians were in India, it seemed, no further advice could be given except to phone the out-of-guarantee support number. I tried this, was informed that it cost 0.60 UK pounds/hour, had to listen to a dreary statement of company policy or such, got through to reception and then waited and waited for a technician till I gave up in exasperation.

I have been unable to find any indications that anyone within reasonable reach could repair the printer privately, and sending it a distance, plus repair costs, would probably be economic. Can anyone offer advice from experience of resolving similar problems, or should I just cut my losses and do without an A3+ printer or look to another brand and never ever again consider buying anything from HP or advising anyone else to do so?

PS It seems symptomatic of HP's shambolic approach that if you follow its website links to 'hard reset' for the B9180 what you get is irrelevant instructions for a totally different machine.

That should of course have been 60 pence/minute, not hour.

Hello, I currently have a new replacement B9180 which replaces my previous 9 month old model. I purchased from Gravis, Berlin who had no hesitation in offering a new printer. The problem I had was with the 4 printheads which finally refused to function. At the moment all is well mechanically. The latest firmware appears to be an improvement and the printer spends a lot less time and ink cleaning itself. Prints are generally excellent using Smooth Fine Art although I'm struggling with colour accuracy using the HP Watercolour paper. I suspect the profile is not good. I do believe however, the honeymoon is over with the HP and I'm going to upgrade to a Epson A2 printer soon.

You can add my name to the list! I too absolutely loved my B9180 until this past week. I do not print frequently, maybe 5 pages a month on average. (cards, photos, etc). But rain or shine, it has been dutifully performing it's cleaning everyday. This week it shut down telling me it needed 2 ink cartridges replaced, so I did. (Who am I to argue with my printer?) No sooner did I replace 2, that it told me it needed the other 6 replaced.
This site has helped me to understand where my ink and my hundreds of dollars buying it has been going.

Good job HP! You found a way to secure your revenue stream during a recession.

Google brought me here. The inside of my 9180 is immaculate after months of moderate printing (great prints, at that), so score one for my unit. However, I know this because I took it apart this morning in a last ditch effort to clean the "ink dumps" and remedy a terminal "Service Stall". No luck. Customer service was little help; they insisted via email and phone, from their distant cubes, that the error message flashing on the little screen in the upper left corner of the printer in my office must read "Carriage Stall" since "Service Stall" wasn't among their list of trouble-shooting options. When we finally agreed I wasn't hallucinating, they did offer to have a look for a $278 (my warranty has expired). That sum, plus another round of ink (cartridges were low and I can't imagine what's left will survive there and back), and I'm well on my way toward another printer. R.I.P. 9180. I loved you to the bitter end.

My 9180 stopped functioning with no warning. Opened it up and found the ink mess on the left inside. the carriage with the print heads apparantly could not move freely. I left it on as recommended by HP all the time and it would periodically go through its excercise routine. I tried HP help but dead ended at "hardware problem". I wish I had bought the extended warranty. I am a hobbyist and perhaps I over analyzed my need for this printer with the expensive ink refills. I recently refilled all cartridges and now they are sitting in the printer languishing. I gave up the device and purchase a much less expensive model that works.(I also bought the extended warranty- I've learned my lesson there. Prety much all new electronic stuff is made to be replaced, not repaired! Any suggestions on what I can do with this 9180? It's repairable I'm sure. In fact it may work fine with some cleaning but I believe I made an error purchasing it.

Thanks for identifying this problem. My B9180 has been using ink at an amazing rate for the past month or so. After reading your article, I did the NEDD test. The printer passed, but while not as bad as yours, there was a lot of ink on the NEDD and on the sponges. I cleaned the whole area and then ran the NEDD test again. The printer passed, but there were some other problems with the thresholds and z-factors identified, as well as some failed nozzles. When I tried to clean the printheads from the computer, I got an error message saying that the cleaning couldn't be initiated.

I phoned HP's tech support. After reporting all the tests I had done including a reset, the rep had me try to do the printhead cleaning from the printer itself. It would not do the cleaning. Since I had the extended warranty, HP is replacing the printer with a new one that will be here tomorrow. I give HP high marks for replacing the printer with no hesitation. The 2 year extended warranty was the best $40 I ever spent.

Throughout all of this, the prints were turning out fine.

I still love the prints from the B9180. I had an Epson 5500 that I ended up hating for its bad prints, bad software and slow and limited Mac support. I'd hesitate to get another Epson because of that experience. While this was not the first problem I have had with the B9180, HP has always stood by the printer and has treated me well as a customer.

Uh oh....

My brand new 9180 is due to arrive in 2 days. I *thought* I had done the right level of research but finding this site during shipping is not very comforting. Wish me luck?

Or should I send it back within the 30 day return?

Interesting to see the different issues of the B9180, I have always had good luck with the quality of prints from the B9180, and no issues with the thing sucking ink. I am hobbiest so this printer does not get used every day all day long although it should be capable of that kind of use. The problem I have, when I receive my next replacement printer from HP it will be the fourth one in less than two years, not a very good record. I also bought the extended warranty, the first printer broke down after ten months so it was still covered under the one year manufacturers warranty. The replacment one was not brand new but a refurbished one, it lasted a year. Original printer didn't recognize I had replaced a cartridge. Second printer started leaving blank and broken lines on text only, after performing all the test I could find plus redoing them from instructons from technical support,( I used a complete set of cartridges doing this)I also replaced one print head,(not cheap) they decided to send me another refurbished unit, the replacement had a carrage jam right out of the box. I finally went to a higher level of support because printer was back ordered, HP is now sending a brand new printer to solve issue, it has been more then a month since I first contacted HP. I am not sure if I will even open the new one or just sell it.

Mine died after less than 18 months, and a grand total of 250 pages through it. Constant paper jam errors - the paper sensor appears to have failed (endemic problem to this unit,,)

Indian help center is a waste of time.

If anyone is pitching theirs for ink consumption, I could really use the paper sensor from it - as getting any out of warranty service is impossible, as is getting any parts.

Not another HP product in my home ever,,,,,

I have owned a B9180 for just over a year having purchased it at the insistence of the floor staff at New York's famed B&H emporium. At the time of purchase the salesman assured me that he had printed over 300 "over size" prints on one set of ink cartridges. I print about 10 - 15 decent "oversize prints" a month and expect to spend $250 every 60 days for ink. The prints are Fantastic, and I have had a lot of negative experience with Epson in the past. I've taken a quick look to see if I can see any slop inside the unit, but cannot, but have noticed that the cleaning cycle has been getting longer over time. Can you direct me to a source for information on NEDD senors etc. I haven't a clue and it does not sound like I'll be getting much assistance from the call service in India. Any assistance is appreciated.

ms

I had the same problem you described above and I cleaned the NEDDS sensor several times, but still have the "Bad" NEDDS report. I just spent two days on the phone with HP representatives. I have a small business and use several HP printers. I was shocked when I spoke with the representatives at HP and they told me that they could do nothing for me since the printer was out of warranty. They said HP does not repair printers, they only replace in warranty printers or offer a $50 credit toward a new printer. So I suggests anyone purchasing a high end printer call tech support before the purchase to determine if the company will repair the printer. I had problems with a high end Epson printer failing also. The HP B9180 was the replacement.

I guess next time I go Canon.

peace and happy new year to all

I have had an HP9180 for 15 months at my winter home in Palm Desert CA (a few months beyond the warranty period). When I recently tried for the first time to feed heavier stock through the specialty media tray, I found that the printer failed to raise the print head assembly to allow insertion of a single sheet into the straight through path. HP customer service was not helpful, saying it is probably a mechanical problem requiring repair or replacement with a new printer. Feeding through the main tray works fine and I like the quality of the prints. When I was at my summer home (near Portland OR) for five months
I left the printer's power turned "on" and it used about one third of the cartridge's ink to keep the print heads from clogging. It worked.

At my summer home I have an HP Designjet 130 (24" wide and dye inks) which does a great job on special "swellable" paper designed especially for archival quality with this printer. After sitting idle for six months last winter it started up without a hitch and continued to print flawlessly all summer.

I love "snowbirding" but hate to regularly leave a quality printer idle for half a year.

Any ideas how I might get the B9180 to raise the print head assembly when the specialty tray door is opened?

Mason Nolan

I am on my third free replacement in 8 months. The first packed in, the next splurged magenta everywhere and this one started out with teh same problem as the rest - dull prints. I have done everything possible to solved this - meticulous attentionto detail, calibartion of everything but nothing seemed to work. As I print mostly black and white, which seemed unaffected, this wasn't a big problem. I am happy with teh print quality when it is working but irritations are the seemingly loose register of teh paper which gives uneven borders. After severla days without an attempt to print color, I tried on Monday and they are perfect - beats me, especially as I have just ordered new print heads (not yet delivered) in an attempt to solve it. I tried agian yesterday and perfect.
I did an A4 black and white from the speciality media tray on Advanced Glossy and it got banding. It is very frustrating.
What is satisfying is printing on Hp Hahnemuhle Smooth Fine Art but here in Luxembourg I have to order it and so I am looking for another paper.
If it goes again though I will probably move to a 2880 or 3800 from Epson.
I am not a pro but I use photgraphy to illustrate some of my articles, printing is a satisfying hobby. I am also a long time, over 30 years computer pro and am more than familiar with handling every sort fo computer.
It is hard to understand how HP have such problems. They have obviously tried hard with this printer. It is well built, yet it has the feel of a Friday car. As a company they are more than competentbut somewhere along the line something has gone wrong - perhaps just in teh final stages of devlopment. Very frustrating.

Hello James and others,
I'm wondering if those of you who've experienced the ink build up problems and problems cleaning the NEDD sensor, are you normally printing out borderless images? Just wondering if the overspray might aggravate this, and wondering if I would be as prone to this issue if I don't. Also, I presume based on all the comments, that an extended warranty is recommended. Would the HP warranty be preferable over the ones offered by retailers (Staples, Amazon, etc).
Thanks,
Kevin

I have been refering to your blog as I have been Preparing 125 trifold brochures for a conference this week end. I have spent over $300 in ink this week and now with less than 25 page sides to go I have received an Print Head Failure message. This printer is about 14 months old. In that time I have printed less than 500 images in total at an astronomical cost in ink. When it works it has beautiful ouput. But now I have what a consider a catastrophic failure at a time when I would thng the machine was just broken in after such a relatively small output. I am steamed beyond description and given the notes I've read here do not even want to attempt to communicate with customer service. I'm heading out to a commercial printer to have the last 25 side completed and then I'll tangle with them, but I am truly sorry I spent the money on this printer and the additional $1000+ in ink only to have it die on me today. GRRRRRRRRRRRRR.....

I too want to thank you for the info on the NEDD. I was going through ink at a great rate. Cleaned the NEDD and all was well until recently I would get an intermittent PUMP STALL message that would clear when pressing OK as directed. As of yesterday it no longer clears and I can't get past the PUMP STALL message. HP email support recommended taking it to a repair depot, but I thought I would as to see if anyone else has run across this and has a fix.
As everyone says: Great prints ... when it works!

mine also has the ink mess problem and I do not print borderless.

After 17 months with this printer, it's now a doorstop. I'd like to thank you for the explanation of the NEDD and cleaning, which I did a few weeks ago, which seem to have fixed my ink-hoovering printer. When I first followed the HP directions that you point out, I printed the NEDD test page and it got "Failure mode 1" and "Fibre" as the root cause. HP's customer support, as expected, was worthless. Now, about a month later, it's claiming all 4 printheads are bad and need to be replaced. I doubt that's true, more likely the NEDD up and died, but either way, I'm looking at either a repair or, more likely, a new Epson.

My main gripe is that the damn thing never tests the NEDD nor does it warn you of problems. I have no way to know if my "Fibre" NEDD failure was there from day 1 or happened after the warranty expired. If either the firmware or software could have detected this and warned me, preferably before the warranty expired, I could have gotten it serviced or replaced, but now I just have a heavy, expensive doorstop that needs to be taken to a special recycling place.

If, as it's clear, that a 3-year warranty is required for satisfaction with this junk, either HP should include a 3-year warranty as standard, extend everyone's warranty for free, or recall this printer and give everyone who bought it a refund. Yeah, and the tooth fairy owes me big-time too, I know, but it would be nice if HP's attitude was something other than "The Customer is always bent over."

My printer seems to have fallen victim to a dirty NEDD sendor, it began drooling magenta ink from the print head about a week ago and emptied the cartridge in about 30 minutes, followed by excessive cleaning and emptying of the yellow cartridges. My printer was clean, now its a mess!

Now that the two ink cartridges are empty and it would seem that the magenta print head is broken as it leaks ink even when off, i cant run any diagnostics! Heres the problem, the carriage no longer moves and makes a strange noise that i dont remember hearing in the past.

My question is, when an ink tank or two are empty, does the carriage become unresponsive and fail to move, even if ordered to by holding the on button? Or does my printer broken? I dont really feel like buying two new print cartridges and a new print head only to find out that the printer has died!

I hope someone on here can help me, i love this little printer and would hate to just throw it out which is looking more and more its fate!

Hi!
Thank you SO MUCH for your article! I was just about to buy B9180.. It is great that you opened my eyes.
I am Epson user. I use 2200 for about 7 years. Some times it stayed off for 3-5 months and one cleaning cycle easily put him back to normal. I printed huge amount of pages with it and only recently it started exhibiting hints of aging, that is why I was looking for an alternative.
Well I guess 3800 is the way to go...

Wow – I found this blog looking for help on a paper jam problem, but now you’ve got me even more worried than I was! I’ve had one of these for a couple of years, but as a hobby photographer it is certainly under-used. I run the odd colour print through it to keep it used, but have hardly used the specialty media tray. Now, trying to put 280gsm card through (well within the 1.5mm maximum), I’m getting a paper jam error message. The irony is that, if I press the X button, it happily opens its jaws and spits it back out, but without any ink on it!

Any ideas? (And thanks for all the advice on the ink side – just replaced 3 cartridges for the 2nd time since owning, so no problems here yet, and it is left on as recommended, but I shall be monitoring this.)

i USED to love this printer.... exactly the same experience... longer and longer cleaning cycles... cartridges sucked dry without only a few pages printed over a week's time... and i've finally had it after ordering and reordering cartridges, which are no longer available in stores... i have to find them on ebay now.... and empowered with your blog... i am now happy to begin my search for a replacement!
thanks
sg

I am reading this as I want to buy a good quality photo printer and all the professional reviews give the HP 9180 the edge. As I had a bad experence last autumn with my first Epsom printer (3 photos printed then the internals destroyed themselves) I am somewhat wary of Epson (I also have a new but defunct Epsom V500 scanner).
The comments above have certainly put me off buying the HP. That leaves the nearest equivalent as the Epson R1900. My experiences of Epson kit are not robust enough to make such a large investment.
The moral would seem to be to buy a reasonable quality, but much cheaper printer for run-of-the-mill stuff and pay a professional printer to print your presentation copy. Everybody above seems to have paid heavily for the convenience of making their prints at home.

This HP9180 printer has cost me a fortune in ink and now i get white dots on my prints. Anys ideas

what a great blog u people have going here!

I have been checking out the possibility of a new printer for a short time. I currently run an Epson R800 which I am satisfied with for colour output but for B&W it is terrible. Even after having a custom profile built for my inkset and paper I still get a shifting colour cast in all of my outputs. No completely neutral blacks or whites!

Prior to reading this blog I was leaning toward the 9180 from what I had read and heard it is a great machine. Now after reading the above I am in complete doubt.

thanks again

George

Echo the paper jam problem...My 9180 is out of warranty, has had 137-13x19's put through it.

I spent 2.5 hours on the phone with HP support, three reps in 3 different countries. The first rep offered to sell me a refurb for $259 or to "extend my warranty" for $99. I asked what the warranty included and he assured me it was a one year extension of the original warranty, covering parts and labor or replacement of the printer, at the discretion of HP. He then lowered the offer to $69 at which point I bought.

Two hours (and two techs) later, I demanded (and received) a refund because what I "bought" was a year of tech support...$69 for the right to call a tech as often as needed. They will not repair my printer, will not sell me any replacement parts for my printer. For $259 they will sell me a refurb with a 90 day warranty, admittedly a good price and I may be forced to do this due to lack of other options. Tonight, I plan to disassemble the printer, just to see if there are any obvious issues with the paper sensor. Nothing ventured, nothing gained and at this point, nothing to lose.

For anyone experiencing the "Paper Jam" issue:

If you have no warranty

If you are capable of a little mechanical/electronic rigging

If all else fails ye

Follow this link, scroll to the (currently) last post...worked for me!

http://forums13.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/bizsupport/questionanswer.do?admit=109447627+1240371330545+28353475&threadId=1298132

jb

Having problems with the B9180. Seems to consume tons of ink with little printing.

Cleaned the NEDD sensor and upgraded the firmware, hopefully that helps.

If not it is going in the garbage.

hi, I just brought one used and its giving me a nasty looking scratch on the surface of the print about 1cm long and about as wide as a hair. Sometimes there is 1 sometimes 3 or 4. Its happening perpendicular to the paper run so I dont think it can be the rollers pulling the paper through. Its only done 130 prints in its 2 years of life... any ideas anyone?

I want to thank everyone for the wonderful posts. I purchased my first B9180 in June 2007 from Amazon. It was DOA. I called HP support and was sent around and around on the phone support line for 2 hours. Called Amazon and demanded a replacement. 2nd one arrived two weeks later. I purchased the extended warranty for $75.00 directly from HP. After three months, horizontal head strikes on paper. Called HP and requested replacement printer after the one-plus hour of testing, which I had also performed, prior to calling. They begrudgingly sent another printer. 6 months later another replacement printer for the head-strike issue. I am on #4 printer now and am having performance issues. I agree that when my HP B9180 did its job, especially A3 prints, it was fabulous. But this printer does not seem to have a decent life expectancy. For $700.00 it should be performing better. This past Friday, I ordered a replacement printhead because the software indicated that one had only fair health and I was getting splotches and ink runs (magenta) on prints. Inserted the new printhead, the printer went through diagnostics with lots of glossy paper and then the lcd indicated that health of all printheads were bad including the new printhead. Called HP and they email me a RMA shipping label. I stated that I would like all the ink cartridges and all heads replaced based on the excessive testing that depleted the cartridges. They told me they could not help me. When I explained that I've been a steadfast customer; it fell on deaf ears. Ironically, I first tried to order the single printhead through Calumet. They informed me that there was a shortage of printheads and the wait would be three to four weeks. After week four I cancelled and ordered through HP.

I suspect there are significant production issues and part supply availability concerns with this printer. Sure, there are many satisfied customers out there, but with the advent of the global internet community, I'm shocked at the high percentage of problems for this printer from a large diversity of photo forums.

Count me in for a civil class action. The day has come for me to push it off the roof and watch it smash on my driveway. I will then have the satisfaction of recycling every little bit. How do you express frustration?

My next printer? An Epson 3800 or better. Epson has been very pro-active with their professional grade printers and resolving issues – like shipping parts to your home overnight and having the tech there the next day to actually use some of the parts to remedy the problem. And to think, HP wanted to run in the same heat ;~)

Shame on HP for this printer and their lackluster customer service.

I think the switch to pigment inks is what throws HP off. they never thought of inks drying up so fast.

I wonder if the Dye inks have the same issues?

The only HP I have in use is the DJ 130. It is dye based for 80-105 years archival. This printer does 24" wide prints and I think it is the one printer HP has made that is not a full commecrail level, but it works like one. Leave for 2 weeks come back no head cleaning no issues.

I think either the DAILY head cleaning is some way to run the inks down, or HP doesn't know how to deal with pigment inks. I was actually thinking of getting the Z series, but now I will pass on tht thought. How LAME such a comapny that can produce such good products, but only shoots itself in the HEAD by trying to make more money by having the ink used DAILY when not printing. Who the heck comes up with this stuff? Why don't other printers NEED to DAILY clean the head? I have lost so much respect for HP, its sad they are still afloat. They can thank their military projects for that.

I have been runnig a Canon 9950 for over 3 years. It has been faultless in operation. Apparently the prints fade before your eyes, but I haven't noted any material changes in any pictures yet. As an amateur it is terrific to be asked to take photographs for others. I am at the point where I need to consider the archival qualities of the work, especially when others are spending good money framing the pictures.

So I am looking at 13"printers. HP was high on my list. I know there will always be an occasional disgruntled user, but when the HP Web site openly shows you pictures of their flagship printer destroying its functional capacity, you can only think someone in design hasn't really worked it through.

Problem with Epson is you are forced to choose between printing styles. In itself annoying.

Canon would on my experience,give you a nice product that doesn't crap itself after 18 months, but unfortunately just does "nice photo's" not up to Epson standards.

Sounds like the amateurs need to fork our more orange drinking vouchers for a professional model. Hey, and do think the woife is going to take kindly to the loss of real estate on the home office desk!

I think, for now, I will keep running my 9950 - at least it works and I can always print a new picture if the one on the wall fades. If I get a bigger share of the office desk I think the Epson 3800 is the likely target for cautious purchasers.

Happy deciding everyone.

I spent 2 hours on the hp chat support. While they were telling me that I needed 4 new printheads I google the issue and found this website. I have opened the right hand hatch and sure enought there was the need all covered with black ink. I wiped it off and all the other ink I could see. I tried to print and I still have horizontal bands. They told me that I need to bring it to a service center. I am not under warranty either. Should I try to repair or just cut my losses and toss the B9180. By the way, i still have unopened ink. What would I do with that?

My B9180 is about 14 months old. It was an absolute bear to get it working with Windows Vista - I had a series of spontaneous driver de-installs, that finally stopped for no reason. Prints were very good, but, due to the constant cleaning, the ink cartridges emptied much sooner than I expected. Now that the warranty has expired, I have what I think is the killer problem: the lcd panel reads: "PROBLEM DETECTED. RESET REQUIRED", which is to say, the power plug is to be pulled out then re-inserted. I have "reset" a whole bunch of times - no help. As soon as the printer re-initializes (using ink), the error message reappears. And, the Little Blue Power Button has no effect - it clicks, and that's all. After much back-and-forth with HP (very pleasent, quite useless), we (HP and me) have decided that I have a hardware problem (which I figured from the get-go). But, no one seems to be able to tell me where to send the printer to get it repaired. I'm willing to pay - it's out of warranty - but the best that the HP web site could come with was, well, Best Buy. The printer is completely unresponsive - I can't get anything going, no tests, no nothing. If you have had this problem please tell. Sparing that, where do I send the thing for repair? I am going to get an Epson anyway, probably a 2880, but I'd like to be able to sell/give away a working printer. Otherwise, it's curbside.

While HP recommends leaving the printer on at all times ... what is your take on that? I print maybe 10 pages in a month (usually all on the same weekend after doing some photo editing). I've put maybe 75 pages through my printer total, and things are still perfect. Should I leave it running and clean the NEDD evrey couple of weeks or should I shut it off, and power it on that one weekend a month when I need it?

---Rob

Hello, I was wondering if anyone here would be willing to sell me their non working, ink guzzling HP B9180?

I can be reached via email p01nt4nd5h00t@gmail.com

I would be willing to give you some change and pay for the cost of having it shipped to me to get it out of your way. Thanks

Regretfully I have to give up my B9180 for the reasons described here. I bought the printer in june 2007, in okt 2008 ink consumption started to increase, only to find out a month ago that an ink tarpit had been created internally. I already had tried to clean the heads first, but they stopped working after some time I had them reinstalled. I thus cannot even print tests! I contacted HP (Netherlands) but the end of the story is that the printer fell out of guarantee. At least I hope this will therefore be a warning to those considering this printer; it can break apart after the guarantee period and HP does not take responsibility, so you end up with a heavy brick, lots of spent ink, and -for me- a set of unused inktcartridges.

similar problems, keeps on telling me to close the speciality media door, when I do so it ejects the A3 media. effing useless. also eats cartridges and takes hours to go through various maintainance functions. no more HP for me ever.

The B9180 is a potential fire hazard. We used ours for just over a year with a CIS - the cleaning cycles used so much ink that the base of the printer slowly filled up and eventually caused a partial short on the power supply link to the circuit board. The first thing we noticed was crackling followed by smoke billowing out of the printer. I managed to get it outside pretty quickly although it did not visibly flame. We were surprised at the volume of ink in the base of the printer - maybe over 0.5 litres. The circuit board connectors and some components near them were totally scorched. Who knows what could have happened if it had been night time or we were out. OK, so we were using a CIS but this did not cause the fault, it just meant a lot of ink had been building up.
HP should recall these printers - we will never invest in HP equipment again. If we were offered another B9180 for nothing we would walk away. This company should be ashamed of marketing such a product.

Dave

Duncan,

I sincerely appreciate your article about the HP Photosmart Pro B9180 and specifically your mention of the NEDD problem. I did some poking around on the internet and found several articles on the NEDD, hoping to fix a white stripe on the bottom of my printouts (about 1/4" from the end border).

I too had a problem cleaning the NEDD the first time. I did everything to make the top shiny and spotless and the NEDD report (test 94) still came out with the status: Fibre. My understanding that is that this is not good. So I poked around more and found a drawing of the NEDD here

http://www.inkjetart.com/news/archive/IJN_07-27-06.html

(scroll about half-way down the page where it says, "Here's how electrostatic drop detection works". To the right of this saying is a drawing that perhaps may be similar to what is inside the B9180. I postulated that not only should the top surface be clean, but there's probably also a sensor in the side of the well.

So I tried sticking a small instrument in with some paper towel (didn't have proper lint free tissue) and attempted to clean the sides of the well.

Well, maybe it was a coincidence, but lo- and behold! My NEDD sensor now tests good! Now I just have to wait for some new ink so I can realign and see if my white stripe goes away!

-Nate

Just a quick ditto to your article. Had a year or two of great prints (though not many), then the drinking of ink, and now a pool (an ounce or two) or ink underneath the printer (never thought to move it before, it's so big). Feeling foolish for having spent so much on ink.

I've had this printer for 6 mos and am ready to toss it. This thing eats more ink than a twelve cylinder
Lamborghini engine eats fuel. The fifteen to twenty minute print head servicing ruins any spontaneous project you want to print. If you keep it turned on to avoid the long servicing interruption, it continues to suck ink for it's daily servicing anyway. You're screwed with this machine. The gluttonous HP 9180 is a total POS pig.