HP Instant Ink subscription service for occasional snapshot prints?

<p>Both of my older photo-only printers and now my HP Photosmart C4210 all-in-one have developed problems this month. I stopped at Best Buy to look at small photo printers like the Canon Selphy and Canon or Epson inkjet photo printers, but the helpful blue shirt fellow pitched an alternative: HP multipurpose printers with HP's Instant Ink replacement service. They have specials ending this week so I'm pondering, but need to decide soon. The $2.99/month or $4.00/mo plans would probably cover all of our home needs, including occasional small prints.</p>

<p>I only need a home printer for 4x6 prints, most JPEGs straight from the camera so I can get prints quickly to family, friends and neighbors after taking snaps of people, pets and parties. Anything else I'll probably send out for prints - I don't generate enough high quality 8x10 or larger prints to justify a high end photo printer at home.</p>

<p>Has anyone here tried HP printers like the Officejet Pro 8610 or similar model for b&w prints? I'm sure the 4x6 color prints will be good enough for my purposes. But one consistent problem with my old photo printers was tinted b&w photos - they always resembled those minilab prints from C-41 monochrome films like Kodak T400CN and Ilford XP2 Super, with slightly blue, magenta or green casts. And the black ink-only options usually left slight but visible banding.</p>

<p>No experience of the Instant Ink scheme, it would seem the main advantage of this is automatic re-ordering of cartridges based on feedback from your printer to HP. From your remarks it would seem that you have had a number of printers sitting around and being little used, which is very apt to lead to print head blockages or worse and high costs. At the present time in my office I have an Epson 3880 and two HP deskjets (1000 and 1500).<br>

The two HPs are very cheap but make nice prints, obviously with no guarantee of archival properties, unlike the Epson. The Epson is the least costly in terms of ink, when printing text, the huge cartridges seem to last forever, although I use it mainly for art prints.I would say don't bother with the HP subscription service unless you find ordering cartridges very irksome, using just one printer more often should bring costs down. If I buy another printer it might well be one with a card reader that prints 4x6 prints automatically, my wife would certainly like this!</p>