Standalone printers are slowly starting to disappear from the market. This is because the prices on multifunction devices have gone down by a lot. When a user goes out shopping with $100 in their pocket, it’s only normal that they’d want to get as much as possible for that money spent. When you can get printing, copying and scanning for a price, somehow you wouldn’t pay the same price for a standalone, even if you never ever use those features. So why on earth would you want to buy such a simple device?

Well, first of all, a standalone printer is significantly smaller as size than an all-in-one. HP’s Deskjet D4360 proves this with a size of 128 x 445 x 342 mm. This means you’ll have more space on your desk than if you’d have bought a multifunction. It’s easy to move it from one room to another, if you need to do it, as it only weighs 3.5 kg. And obviously, it is cheaper. Multifunction prices may have gone down, but the price of standalone printers has also gone down as a result. When a more popular product hits the market it’s only normal that older technologies and concepts become more affordable.

As mentioned before, the D4360 is just a printer. You won’t be able to scan, you won’t be able to copy and you definitely won’t be able to fax. Sometimes jack of all trades means master of none, which is generally the weak point of all-in-ones. So by this rule, this HP standalone printer should be great at the only thing it offers. Well, not so much.

HP does advertise it as printing laser quality text, and it does do good for an inkjet, but in reality for a very low price you can get a small laser printer that will produce much better quality and crispiness. Photo quality is also rather disappointing. It’s true that you expect great photo quality just from a popular photo printer that you’ll have to spend a lot on, but a ‘good’ level of quality would have been enough.

A price well under $100 also means you will not get any networking features. You’ll just have to make due with using it on USB. It also doesn’t feature PictBridge so printing from a digital camera will also require a PC. There is also no card reader on the HP Deskjet D4360 color inkjet printer. So no direct printing from anything..but for a PC, obviously. Printing speed is pretty good though, at 30 pages per minute in black or 23 pages per minute in color.

As a conclusion, with the HP Deskjet D4360 color inkjet printer you get exactly what you pay for, which is sadly, not much. Normally standalone printers (ones that have great printing quality) are worth spending money on. In the case of this one, for a few more bucks you’re much better off getting a small, affordable all-in-one that will give much better quality, printing speed and yes, many more features.

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