Side by Side Comparison of: Canon vs HP

Am loving the printer so I. Was well packaged and arrived in good shape. Delivery was a day or so late but wasn't a big deal for me. Written setup instructions lacking in some areas.

I found setup easy with the exception of wireless connection. The display screen on the printer is very small. When you select your wireless network, you then have to enter your password. Since the screen is small, the keyboard for entering you password contains multiple letters, #'s, symbols on each key. Written instructions contained no info on how to use this keyboard. I ended up having an online chat with HP support. Found out you have to tap a key multiple times very fast to get the desired letter, symbol, etc. To me, is a somewhat clumbsy method as I have large fingers but got it to work out in the end.

Unlike some other reviewers, I love the Insta ink refill option where the printer notifies HP when your ink is running low & you get automatic refills at about half the price from store purchase. I personally have no problem with HP knowing how many pages I print.

Definitely recommend this printer. Was $10 cheaper than Best Buy's sale price.

I've had this All-in-One printer for about 2 months now. I love it more than any product that I've bought in the past 3 years. It blows my mind how good this printer is at this price point. My last All-in-one printer was a Canon MP540. After trying for about 7 hours, over 3 occasions, I gave up on trying to connect to it on Wi-Fi and always sat next to it with a USB cable attached. This sometimes would make me run late during a hurried morning. Not this printer! This HP 5540 prints remotely every time from every computer and phone that we have. We have a MacBook Pro, iPhone 5 and 6, and even an old computer running Windows 7. Our printer is up stairs and our computers are down stairs. We are using the router provided by our internet provider. The best part for me is that I don't even have to turn the printer on first; it wakes up from sleeping, even if I haven't used it in a couple days. A display on our computers tells us when the printing is finished, which is pretty quick. I'm completely blown away at the moment because I have just finished scanning a document. I went upstairs, placed a document on the scanning glass and pressed scan on the touch screen. It asked me which computer and automatically sent it to the scan folder on my laptop without my laptop expecting any scan was coming. It is right there in my laptop folder. I was concerned about reviews that said the scanning was not as good as some other scanners. I have never been unhappy with the scan quality. I cannot believe that all this comes at a price of $72.99 including $5 for instant ink. I am also crazy about the Instant Ink. I recently spent $56.99 just on color cartridges for my Canon printer, which did not include the large black cartridge, only to find that the printer was broken. Now I spend $60 a year for all of my color and black ink and HP sent me an extra set for when I run out. The computer automatically has HP send me new cartridges when the first set runs out. If my printer dies, I just cancel the plan which is $5 a month. I did not expect to have this complete of a setup on my budget.

Love this printer, purchased to replace a old HP I have had for over 10 years, when it finally died, i purchased the HP Envy 5540. Do not let the negative reviews put you off. This is a nice home printer, I set it up very easily within 1 hour, just follow the details and prompts from HP. Note do not use the disc that came with it, instructions tell you to download of HP website, its easier, if for some reason this does not work then you can use the disk. Very easy website instructions, please note you have a option to subscribe to HP Instant Ink or not, you just skip this part if you do not want it. I actually think you will save a ton of money joining. It costs 2.99 a month cancel anytime, for 50 pages, if you want more a month there are others to choose from. 50 is plenty for me. You get Genuine HP cartridges delivered to your door each month, with the first 3 months free and this is much cheaper than buy cartridges, so sign up. It was so easy to use from app on phone and my amazon fire, you do not need a cable if you have a WiFi set up in house. The color is fantastic, it came with some photo paper so i tried it out, wow the quality for a cheap print was awesome.

Our last printer was a HP and was 8 years old. What a long way printers have come in less than a decade. First, it has the ability to print wirelessly from computer or smartphone. I use a Samsung Galaxy S7 and it is super easy. No need to turn on the computer to print documents anymore. Also, when I am outside of the house, it has an eprint service where I can email a document to a specific email address assigned directly to my printer so it is waiting for me when I get home. Also, you can install just a black cartridge and start using. I have not installed the color cartridge, and plan to when I need to print in color. It comes with a few sheets of photo paper, but haven't tried that yet.

I primarily got this printer for my apartment as I was leaving for college once again. In the past, I had bought one of those cheaper HP printers that Walmart posts on sale during "Back to College" month. That was a huge mistake, so this time, I went on Amazon and was ready to pay just a little bit more for something much more reliable. At the time of Amazon's "Back to College" promotion, the HP Envy 4520 was advertised as their #1 best seller. I nearly bought it after I researched that printer and read all the reviews and came to the conclusion that the price was very fair for what was expected from that printer. I chose this one because I noticed it looked exactly the same as the 4520. I had to research even more about the differences between the two. I will tell you now that I found the major differences are size (The 5540 is bigger than the 4520 by at most, 20%), the printing speed of the 5540 is much quicker than the 4520, it can hold much more paper as well, and the kicker was they were both the same price at the time! I was a little confused, because essentially (at the time when I bought this) you were paying the same price for both, but one was smaller and less efficient, while the other was bulkier, but more efficient.
My decision to buy this one was due to the fact that I liked the idea of more efficiency and I couldn't figure out why they were priced exactly the same, when (disregarding the minimal size differences) the 5540 was much better than the 4520.
Maybe for others, a smaller, barely noticable difference in quality will entice them to buy the equally priced 4520.

Ok, so about the printer itself. I've used it everyday since the day I got it. And I love it so much!! It truly is very quick to print, BUT if the printing it too loud for you (i.e. someone is sleeping) there's a quiet function, which reduces the speed of the print for a quieter print. The quality of the print was very good and it is a very modern and sleek printer.
I love, love, love the fact that the black ink and color ink cartridges are separate, because the last HP printer I had, they were not, so even if I had some color left, but ran out of black, I would have to throw the WHOLE thing away! That is a waste of $40+ every time!
Setup was very easy and the wifi connection is very steady. The airprint function is very smooth and the eprint from anywhere is also a nice perk, although, for me, eprint take forever to actually print.

Now, my complaints are the color scheme HP went for with this model of a printer. Such a nice printer, but they decided on a black and white LCD that attracts scratches and fingerprints easily. Also, I wish there is an ethernet cord, specifically because I'm a college student. Now, this is a completely different issue, but I will mention it just in case you ARE a college student who MAY be living in a location with PUBLIC wifi.
DEPENDING on who is in charge of providing the internet (NOT the provider themselves; i.e. Starbucks, but NOT Google), you may face difficulties of connecting your printer to the public wifi because of the standard protocols that public wifi's use to ensure a safe connection.
In short, your computer/phone/anything else may not be able to find your printer even if both the printer and device are connected to the same wifi. This is intentional, according to tech support, whom I spoke with. Again, this is a whole different issue not really related to this printer, but it might be something you come across.

So,
The printer is awesome! Only reason you might be interested in the equally priced 4520 is because you want a smaller version of the 5540.
College students (also anyone else this might relate to): Public wifi may be an issue if the wifi is standard protocol and you cannot bring your own router.
To each their own, but I've already recommended this printer to my friends who will be using this at private wifi's such as at home.
Hope this helps!

Very quick set up. Not complicated at all. I love the wireless feature! I can print from any app--tried it out on my iphone, ipad and my desktop! Love love love it!! It came with the first two cartridges and I immediately tried out the photo papers and printed 3 of the 4x6 and they turned out really nice. I will see how the instant ink feature works. I am a schoolteacher and I've already printed out a couple of documents for school.

Easy to use. Adequate for the average need. Slow. Would prefer a paper feeder to speed things up. Display not user friendly. Crisp printing.

We found it to be a good printer for home use. We have another HP in the home which is more office oriented and is somewhat faster for printing and copy operations. However, this printer is fine for daily use at home. We love the wireless printing capability from your iphone or ipad.

After some delivery confusion due to a storm in the area, I received the printer. My son installed it for me while I was at work and it seems to work just fine. Pages print clean and clear. I like how the little paper tray extension automatically slides out when you initiate the print process. You just give it a little push to slide it back out of the way when you don't want it extended. Nice. I haven't tried the PDF copy function, but I've had HPs before and I expect it to work just fine.

My wife and I have got away from Windows and use Chromebooks and Android tablets and phones only. This filled the bill for a cloud capable printer and was easy to set up for Internet use.

I have had the printer since April 2016 and it was easy to set up, it has performed reliably up until about a month ago. It is a wireless unit and suddenly it wasn't connected to my network. The printer said it was and showed all the appropriate information, but my computer couldn't find it. I spent a lot of time trying to get it connected and then one day, it fixed itself. Then I printed some color pages one morning and by afternoon, everything was gray scale. it will COPY in color, but not print. I followed a long detailed procedure on the help forum to uninstall the printer, drivers and all traces of the printer before downloading the latest drivers and then reinstalling the printer. Still no printing in color. The information on the help forum points to an automatic driver update that went wrong; the option to select color vs grayscale is no longer available on the advanced tab. It is over a year old plus their page to verify the warranty won't recognize my serial number or product number.

So, if your Envy 5540 has lasted over a year, good for you. I will probably use this in B&W until the ink runs out and then I will try a different brand. Unless they have a driver update that fixes the problem.

It is really a pain to try to set it up wirelessly. So at present it is connected to computer by USB. It is a lot louder than I expected. My old HP printer was a lot quieter when printing. That is why I am only giving it a 3 star rating. Will see how it goes over time if it earns more stars.

Have mostly owned H-P printers. This one is inexpensive (H-P makes their $$$ on overpriced ink). Works well, is quiet and has some handy features. iIt is slughtly larger than the 10-year old model it replaced.

To answer some critical reviews: Use the provided CD to load its software & choose "custom install" to avoid H-P software you don't want.

Also, there is a USB input so you don't have to hook up to your home/ office network. Although this feature is nice.

This is a low volume printer that does a good job of printing, copying and scanning. Not so much for good quality photos.

Unfortunately, after less than 2 months use, and less than 50 pages printed at "draft" mode, I've gone thru 2 sets of ink!!!

Edit: I wanted to edit my review. I found out part of the problem was that the printer wasn't on our wifi network but was using its own wifi. Switching it to our network seems to have helped, so I'm going from one star to three. Help and support could be better.

Original: This is not a good printer. Perhaps it's because I use it along with my MacBook Air laptop. The printer is easy to set up, so I was really excited about it at first. However, it will not print; it always says the printer cannot be found (although simultaneously saying it's connected to wifi) or that the paper tray is empty when it's actually full and the drawers are closed. If it does print, it takes forever - forever to actually start printing (ten to thirty minutes) and then forever to actually print.

I really wanted to like this because set up is so easy and fast, but it's just too unreliable and I had to go back to my other, plug-in printer. I wish I could return this. I would never recommend it.

Good little printer... except it has problems staying connected to my home network. I have plenty of other devices running on the network, so I think the problem is with the printer. HP tech support was less than useless in fixing the problem... now, I either print via email or hard wire the machine to my computer. Basic printer/scanner functions are good.

Prints fine from wireless computer. After 5 months copy function failed. When through all the help menus. Called customer service still not working. Purchased this item in Nov. 2916. Would send back but had to by Jan. 2017. I guess you get what you pay for.

This printer does NOT print legal size documents. I did not notice that when I ordered it, because it is a very rare problem. I haven't seen this ever before. It's a total pain in the butt. We did not notice it until we had it all hooked up and used it for almost a month. Too much pain now to return and buy a new printer. If you are OK with that, then it's a very good printer. But, beware.

Revision 12/7/16: After more use, I am downgrading my original review from 3 to 2 stars. The reason appears to be a characteristic of HP printers: they don't stay connected to your network. The Envy now has shown this characteristic in addition to my HP 3510. They are both unreliable, and they have a bad habit of not working when you need them to most. I have never had this issue with Epsons or Canons. They just don't stay connected to your network and it takes up a lot of time trying to get them to connected again. It makes me unproductive at my work. I highly recommend you choose a different brand of printer.

<original review>The jury's still out on this one. I bought it to go along with a free 5 month Instant Ink subscription I obtained separately. I own an older model of HP and I swore I would never buy another HP printer again (my experience with that one is that HP stands for "hardly prints"). I have owned many printers over the years and HP is not my favorite. This newer model does appear to work better, but, like my older model, it has tendency to sometimes disconnect from the network (the older model disconnected from the network and the computer it was attached to about 20% of the time we tried to use it). You know these things have issues when HP encourages you to use a separate program call HP Print and Scan Doctor, which, to be fair, often corrects the problem. Still, I am trained not to expect 100% dependability with this brand.

Sitting next to my office computer, it has worked pretty well, so far. However, I have the following gripes:

1) The paper tray does not come out. It slides out 5" beyond the output tray immediately above it. You have to push in the output tray's extension arm to even get any access. There is not much room to maneuver this way. You can remove the entire output tray section for more room. But, I like the ability to remove the entire tray, to bring it closer to where my paper is stored, and to make sure I properly set the paper. I'm sure I can live with it, but prefer a fully removable tray
2) The photos are very poor. I guess I have to do more experimenting with it. I will have to buy HP photo paper to see if that works better. Unfortunately, I have a ton of high grade Canon paper that worked perfectly with my Epson (and Canon before that), but in the HP it comes out looking very soft, with low detail, despite me setting it for this type of paper
3) The photo paper tray has a fixed-width tray for 4" x 6" paper and is too narrow for Epson 4" x 6" paper. Or, rather, the Epson paper is a bit wider than 4". Still, if it was an adjustable tray, like on my other printers, I would not have a problem. I need to use the full size paper tray print photos (which I'm still trying to get to look good)
4) There is regularly a long delay between hitting "print" and it printing

I believe I have the Instant Ink subscription hooked up with my networked printer properly, and I am printing with abandon since it is supposed to automatically send ink when it senses it is down low enough. I haven't used enough yet, apparently, since no new cartridges have been sent. From what it says, though, it may actually be a much cheaper way to buy ink, so, I'm hoping for the best. But that's another product review.

It is not an easy printer to setup. How long do I have to return an item. Every time I go to print something it says fix paper trays and they are fine? It also sounds like a grinding ice machine when starts out printer.. It also is printing lousy pictures.. Not a happy person...

Do I call HP with all this info or whomever sold it??

Carol Chrzanowski

Black ink ran out. I know I did not print more than 60-70 regular looking pages without images. Now when I try to print something a blank sheet comes out. But when I tap on status reports from tools, there comes out a nice looking page printed in black ink - saying 113 pages printed so far. Black ink level shows up as empty on the black printout. What is going on here?

Awful printer, just as my HP printer before this one and just as all HP printers I've ever heard of from people in my life. They are affordable and do seem to have overall good reviews however, so I fell for it again. For the last time for real this time.
From the beginning I had severe connection issues with the wifi as well as with all computers I've tried to connect wirelessly. On top of that it constantly thinks the ink is low even if I had just installed a brand new pack (certified original HP ink). Towards the end it stopped printing in color completely, I've spent hours trying every cleaning program, reset, and whatever tricks I could find on the internet and nothing ever helped. I've finally had enough and after 1.5 years this printer needs to go. Going to try Canon next, crossing fingers.

I've had it since March of 2016. Worked okay for most of that time, but like several other HP printers I've owned in the past, at about the time the warranty runs out, it starts to act up. First, I got a "bad" ink cartridge from the HP automatic ink service. They took care of it, but ever since I put in the store bought (true blue HP cartridge for it), it's been barking at me about not having one of the ink service cartridges in it, then the print quality issues started. First a little quality issue here and there, reprint and it's okay. Now it has whole chunks of lines missing. At $60 some dollars, there's no repairing this. You throw it away and buy new. Ah but not HP this time. Last time I bought a Canon and it worked flawlessly for 4 years. Adios HP!

The printer came out of the box making loud grinding noises once it was turned on. I went onto the HP forums and this is a common issue with no true fix to it. This issue spans across multiple models. The tech support from HP on the forums would link people to a document that had a "fix", which majority of the posters said didn't work. Shortly afterwards the tech support from HP started to link newer more expensive models as the solution to everyone's problem. Looks like I lost the lottery on the HP printers.

Easy to set up and use, but you need an internet connection for full functionality. A really nice printer, when it works.
Update one year after purchase.
The printer failed the first time because it wouldn't recognize the ink cartridge. It wasn't a work stoppage because one printer cartridge can be bypassed. HP replaced the printer. The replacement has now failed because it doesn't recognize when paper is loaded. No way to make it print if it doesn't think it has paper.
This is either a poor design, poor materials, or poor workmanship. Whatever the reason, I would NOT recommend this product to a friend.

Touch screen stopped working within a month of purchase. Within 2 months the printer had to be turned off and back on each time that you wanted to print. At the beginning of each print it shows out of paper even though it has paper in it. Contacted HP, they are going to replace the printer with a "re-certified" one, but they wanted my credit card number before they would send it. DO NOT PURCHASE THIS PRINTER