HP's Photosmart A646 printer claims its place right in the middle of the photo printer lineup that's currently available on the market. It isn't meant to be a pretentious, high-end device, but its price recommends it for the regular user. It also offers multiple options for just about everything, including the device you’re printing from, connectivity or photo formats. The printer is very compact and its design clearly states portability.

If digital cameras are becoming smaller and at the same time offering better specifications, the next logical step for the photo industry would be to provide the quality of professional photo printers in a small portable device, and the A646 is a good start in trying to achieve that.


Unfortunately what HP doesn't offer for this printer (yet) is an optional battery pack. So if the main idea of the printer is to be portable, and HP has been offering optional batteries for most of its lightweight photo printers, it's not clear why it didn't happen for the A646 as well. Most photo printers will only work with one size of paper. The Photosmart A646 however, supports three, including 4 x 6 inch, 4 x 12 inch and 5 by 7 inch. One of the great things about the HP Photosmart A646 photo printer is that it's so pleasant to use.

Installing it is pretty simple, especially if you're working with a Mac. On the top of the printer you'll find a display panel that incorporates a 3.45 inch color touch screen. After you've installed the A646 you'll mainly use the aforementioned LCD to navigate (which can be done by using either your finger or the stylus the printer comes with). Hence it can work just fine as a PC-free photo printer. If you’re using a PC, that won’t mean much to you, but if you’re printing straight from a memory card, you’ll find it nice to know that you have many editing options such as creating photo stickers, greeting cards or panoramas. You could also apply one of the many photo enhancements that the A646 offers.

When talking about connectivity, the A646 offers a Pictbridge port, hence works with digicams that have Pictbridge, and built-in Bluetooth support. You can easily print straight from your mobile phone (assuming it has Bluetooth), digital camera, PC or notebook. On the front of the device you'll also find two memory card slots, that can handle xD, SD or Memory Stick memory cards. It's a good choice among PC-free photo printers.



Moving on to consumables, you will find that it’s not very expensive to purchase new ink, so the cost /photo price is more than acceptable. Another nice thing about the printer is that it lets you know how many photos you can still print out of the ink cartridge till it is completely empty. So you will not get caught with an empty cartridge just when you needed to print the most. Now, the only thing you could complain about is speed. But the quality of the prints makes it worth the while, and it’s around $150 price tag, even more so.