Performance

As a printer the C6188 doesn't disappoint. The output is fast and it's good.

In our speed tests the MFD shot out 20 pages in three minutes ten seconds, which was the fastest result we've seen from an MFD so far. I guess it does live up to its 'fastest all-in-one printer' claim here. When it comes to photo printing, the C6188 was fast, but not the fastest. Averaging at six minutes per full page photo quality print, it was beaten only by HP's own Photosmart 3108, among MFDs. Still, six minutes isn't too bad, and considering it takes two minutes ten seconds for a 4x6 borderless photo print it's pretty fast by all standards.

The colours were crisp and bright. The blacks as always have a slight bluish tinge to them, which takes a bit of depth away from the dark areas of a photo, but that's something only a trained eye will notice. Otherwise the colour prints were bright and vivid in our photo prints. Our colour tests showed excellent reproduction of all the complex gradients present in the test document, which is very hard to come by. The six cartridges make a lot of difference, which is clearly visible here.

Scanning quality, on the other hand, was not as up to the mark, which is a shame, considering everything else performed so well. Though document scanning would not present any problem, our colour scanning test results were not too accurate. All colours seemed a bit washed off, and lacked the kind of depth that the subject required. Moreover, anything that was even slightly above the scanner bed came out looking blurred. This is a particular problem I face with most MFDs. They should really start concentrating a bit more on the scanners they incorporate.

Now the problem is, solely because of the scanner quality, even the quality of the colour photocopies were a bit marred. The colours in the photocopies, as expected, were somewhat washed out, and that same blurring problem occurred. Still it gave us the fastest black and white photocopying speed at thirty-four seconds. Colour photocopies took three minutes fourteen seconds.

Conclusion

Rs. 13,200 is an excellent buying price for the HP Photosmart C6188. Sure, you do get cheaper options, but the overall performance and the sheer amount of features that this one has to offer more than justifies the buying price. The cost of the cartridges can be considered expensive at Rs. 795 for the black cartridge and Rs. 495 for each colour cartridge (five total). The good thing here is that the black cartridge is literally double the size of a colour cartridge and you only have to bother changing one colour at a time as per your requirement, so the cost is cut down into smaller/more affordable bits.

Even with its weaknesses, the C6188 has just so much to offer that makes it worth it. If you're working from home, then the C6188 will be an essential workhorse by your side, and if you're looking for a good all-in-one solution for a small office, then I would highly recommend this - as long as scanning photos is not your primary requirement.

Gagan Gupta