HP DeskJet 4155e [4133e, 4152e, 4158e]​ Printer Review

The HP DeskJet 4155e feels poorly built. Though the body feels solid and its power cord is removable, it has no input tray, and the rear feeder feels flimsy. Printed sheets also tend to fall off the output tray as they come out. You can only access paper jams via the printhead compartment, and the ink compartment is difficult to access if you have big hands. The scanner lid's hinges also don't extend, making it hard to close the lid over thicker items like textbooks and magazines.

The HP 4155e requires frequent maintenance. Like most inkjet printers, there's a risk of printhead or cartridge clogging if you don't print for a long time. If you experience clogging or other print quality issues, there are a few maintenance functions that can help resolve them, like printhead cleaning, printhead alignment, and smear cleaning. Clogging aside, most of the maintenance has to do with the ink cartridges. They run out very quickly, which means you have to replace them often, and it isn't easy to do, as you can only access them via a narrow door inside the output tray. For paper jams, you can only access the sheet rollers via the same narrow door on the front, with no other access anywhere on the printer. You'll have to refill the paper tray often since it only holds 60 sheets of paper.

See the user manual here.

This printer has a bad display. It's a small LCD with seven physical buttons for managing printer functions. You can't adjust the tilt of the display, but thankfully, the viewing angle is good enough that it's easy to see the display whether you're sitting or standing.

The HP DeskJet 4155e has an awful ink cartridge system. Both the black and color page yields are terrible, so you need to replace the cartridges very frequently if you print a lot. You can increase the yield slightly with high-yield and extra high-yield cartridges (67XL and 67XXL), but it still won't match printers with a better cartridge system. Also, the XXL-format replacement cartridges are seemingly only available in certain regions.

The scanner has an automatic document feeder, but it's slow to process documents and doesn't support duplex scanning, so you need to flip the pages manually when scanning double-sided sheets. Additionally, it's slow to scan, so expect to wait a while for long reports or multi-page signed contracts. Its optical character recognition feature lets you save scans as text-searchable PDFs. It works well but makes mistakes occasionally when there are special characters.

The scan quality is mediocre. The text looks okay from a distance, but it looks 'dirty' up close, as if there's ink smearing on each letter. Colored areas look very grainy, especially in the grays, and some finer details don't show at all.

• Setup guide
• Power cord
• HP 67 starter ink cartridges:
• 1x black
• 1x tri-color

This is a corded printer without a battery.

The print quality of black-and-white documents is mediocre. Although the text is clear, and finer elements are present, there's visible banding and misalignment throughout.

The print quality of color documents is decent. Text looks sharp, but some fine details are too faint, and colored areas look grainy.

The cost-per-print is high. Because the cartridges need replacing often, running costs will quickly add up over time. It comes with six months of free ink through HP+, HP's ink subscription service. However, know that if you subscribe to the service, you can no longer use third-party cartridges, even if you cancel the service. Also, the printer must have a continuous internet connection to function, as HP continually updates the firmware to block the use of third-party cartridges. If you want a similar all-in-one inkjet printer with a lower cost per print, check out the Brother MFC-J1010DW.

The HP DeskJet 4155e has slow printing speeds. It doesn't take too long to initialize and get a single page out, but it's very slow when printing multi-page documents and photos. Also, it doesn't automatically print double-sided, so you have to manually flip the pages over when prompted; consider the HP ENVY 6065e if that's a feature you want. Unfortunately, the output tray only holds 25 sheets and doesn't hold the paper very well, as prints tend to get pushed off, resulting in out-of-order prints.

The color gamut is sub-par. The printer has a hard time producing dark colors. Its small color range makes photos look flat and lacking in detail. For example, the parrot's red feather in the sample photo looks like a single color, with no texture or depth. Also, the color transitions aren't very smooth, as there's visible banding and a lot of grain.

The preview photo above occurs when simply clicking "Print," resulting in large, uneven borders and cropped photos. You'll achieve better results if you scale a smaller photo up onto larger paper; see an example here.

The color accuracy is bad. Almost all colors are noticeably different from the originals, although skin tones still look relatively natural. This level of color accuracy is sufficient for printing casual photos once in a blue moon, but professionals seeking more accurate color reproduction should look elsewhere.

This printer is okay at reproducing small details. There's a significant loss of detail due to the printer's narrow color gamut and low contrast. Additionally, the halftones (dot effect) make edges look softer and distant objects less visible.

Although the printer supports Bluetooth, it's for setup purposes only, not for printing.

The HP Smart mobile app is very feature-rich. You can use it to print, scan (using your phone's camera), perform maintenance tasks like printhead cleaning, manage your HP ink subscription, and buy replacement ink. It also has a mobile fax feature. You can print photos and PDFs from an Android or iOS device; however, some file types, like Microsoft Office files, TXT, and HTML files, print only from the iOS version of the app.

This printer is fully compatible with most commonly used desktop operating systems. On Windows, you can print without manually installing any drivers, but you need to install the HP Smart application to scan. On Chrome OS, you need to add the printer directly using its IP address in the system settings, as the OS can't automatically detect it, and you also need to install the HP Smart app to scan. You don't need to install any drivers or applications on macOS.