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HP LJ 3050 ships with no USB cable!

Posted by: on Mar 23, 2006 | 5 Comments

It’s years since I bought a printer. My old mono laser NEC SuperScript 870 has lasted over 7 years and it is still working fine. However it’s a bit slow, and worse, has a parallel port so won’t play with my Macs without a USB to parallel connector bla bla. My sister will enjoy getting a new (old) printer from me.

Anyway I ordered an HP LaserJet 3050 yesterday, and to my surprise it arrived this morning. Great service I thought. It’s a cheap and cheerful mono laser printer with fax and scanner, hence copier too, and is sheet feeding for scan/fax so it takes less desk space. It connects via USB to the computer, and is Mac compatible.

Unpacked it all, ready to connect it up to the computer and… no USB cable supplied. Find a note buried in the docs “USB cable not included”. Turns out you have to order an HP-specific USB cable to even connect this thing to a computer.

Utter, utter, madness. Destroyed any good will I had formed towards HP – to trick your users into falling at the first hurdle is brain dead.

So, if you’re buying HP check that it includes all the cables you need, and if it doesn’t order them at the same time… or maybe better still find another printer that is actually ready to use out of the box and doesn’t have an artificially lowered price by excluding vital cables!

5 Comments

  1. Maki
    October 6, 2006

    Hi ok I sopose you did get the cabel eventualy so what do you think is it a good printer?

    P.S.
    I ask becaus I ma thinking to buy one!
    :)

    Reply
  2. Marc Palmer
    October 18, 2006

    Yes it’s ok. It’s cheap and cheerful, and the scanner has been useful, as well as the copying. The print quality on photos (to black and white) is not that good – it tends to come out a bit “griddy” like it has a pattern of squares overlaid on the photo.

    Apart from that its fine.

    Reply
  3. Heather
    October 30, 2006

    I couldn’t agree with you more about the cheapy-factor of HP not including a printer cable – it seems absurd if you ask me – to ship a printer without a way of connecting it to the computer to confirm that it actually works. I’m so annoyed right now b/c the same thing just happened to me! :( I’m debating returning the printer based on what you’ve written here though… maybe I should just go find a better quality printer with a better quality scanner attached to it. Thoughts?

    Reply
  4. kail shah
    December 10, 2006

    I have purchases HP LJ 3050 about five days back, the scanner is not working, on calling the hp representative from ur work center, I was told that the scanner part has to be replaced. I am very disappointed , that there is a problem with the brand new printer, and it is not being replaced with a new one. Please do the needful and oblige.

    Reply
  5. Stewart Mckenna
    May 24, 2007

    No USB cable supplied with Samsung models either. Just bought two after 24 mile round trip to collect only to find I have to make another 24 mile round trip to buy cables so I can use the damn things.

    Under condumer law I am not sure that printers sold without cables are “fit for purpose” as a the specific USB printer cable is not something that the average consumer could reasonably be expected to already possess (unlike say paper or an electricity supply) Are there any experts on Scots Law reading thiswho might comment?

    There is nothing in writing on the packaging outer to explain this although Samsung “Technical” advise me that “Its not their policy to provide cables”
    - so that’s that problem sorted!

    Reply

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