HP Photosmart Plus b209a

The HP209a does not include AirPrint support and therefore one can not print from an iPad to this printer using AirPrint. One may print through an intermediate computer as others have described elsewhere in this support board or one may print from an app, such as iPrint, that directly includes support for this printer.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4356

Like you I am hoping for the same, Roberto. Two weeks ago I bought a 13" MacBookPro and got the printer for free as part of a promotion. I guess Apple was clearing out the useless printers to make way for the e-printers.

I have this printer and my iPhone says no printer found. Which is odd because even HP has an app that can print from the iPhone to this printer from older 3G on v1.3 OS. Maybe it will happen soon as they have time to develop it out more.

Roberto,

Not an answer to your question but an alternative.... I could not be bothered to wait for Apple to come up with their latest software release so looked for an alternative to make full use of my iPad. There are many OEM printer apps but I went for PrintCentral. Works on many printers, including my Epsons, but perfect on the HP Photosmart Series. Good luck.

I am sorry to say, but the Photosmart B209a will not be supported by a firmware update to make it AirPrint compatible. Only the ePrint capable printers can accept the update. There are a couple alternatives to making it work though, check out my [FAQ|http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2658560&tstart=0] thread.

Just trying to help

Andrew

Poor show.

I've had this printer for less than 6 months and you expect me to go out and buy a new one for a single function? It's not like it cannot work... you have an app called iPrint which works (for printing, goodness knows why scanning doesn't).

I'm not going to throw out a perfectly good, plastic printer to help fill land-fill wasting fuel to take it to the local dump (for you guys to pretend you're recycling it - seriously, how much of that printer is recyclable?) when you could update the software to accept the instruction.

Next printer... Epson or Kodak I think.

Harry (et al),

No one is asking you to throw out your old printer. There are solutions, as I and other have pointed to. HP iPrint Photo is app that we publish on the Apple App store. It has drivers for HP printers built into it. AirPrint is a new printing protocol from Apple that requires no drivers on the iOS device. Printers must be updated to enable AirPrint (you can think of it sort of like having the driver on the printer instead). There is simply no way we can update the HP Photosmart Plus B209a or any of our older printers with AirPrint because they were not designed to accept AirPrint or any other major new features. When HP introduced its ePrint capable printers, they included the ability to be updated, that is the reason that our ePrint line can be updated to support AirPrint.

Again, AirPrint is a new model of driverless printing introduce by Apple, doing away with the Gigabytes of Printer drivers located on the Mac OS X install DVD. It may be hard for users who don't have AirPrint capable printers (myself included) to see the benefit of this, but in the long run it will make all of our lives better.

And I'm sure over time you'll see other print vendors adopting AirPrint as well (its a model that just makes sense). Some may offer it on older devices, some may only offer it on new devices, and some may choose simply not to offer it at all. Those vendors will be making these decisions based on the value they see in supporting AirPrint as well as the capabilities they have built into their printers.

Just trying to help.

Andrew

Andrew,

Like others on this thread, I too picked up an "HP Photosmart Plus" printer when I bought my Mac Mini a few weeks ago (with promotion) and then came home to find out that it wasn't working with ePrint of AirPrint. I was aware though that I needed an "HP Photosmart Plus" printer for ePrint to work, but low and behold, the software reports that this printer is version 209a and not the required 210.

My real problem with this whole mess is that the model number (209a vs 210) isn't clearly marked on the box, and thus its hard to figure out if you are buying a 209a or 210a version.

If it were more clearly marked on the outside of the box (or even on the sticker in the Apple Store), consumers would be more properly educated. So here I am, a rather technical user feeling duped by poor packaging and marketing on both Apple and HP's part.

I agree 100% with your complaints on the model numbering. As for clearly identifying AirPrint compatible printers, you will see the boxes of the supporting models start showing an AirPrint logo. In the meantime, most boxes are clearly labeled with ePrint on them. If you find a printer with ePrint (in the US at least) it also has AirPrint.

I do understand the problem, and know that many people are working to make it more obvious as quickly as possible. Hopefully too many people won't be getting the wrong printer this Holiday season.

Just trying to help.

Andrew

Roberto,
I do not know if it will make you feel any better (sarcasam) but I just bought an HP B209a a few days ago and in the store there was an HP sales rep and an Apples sales rep 3 feet apart and they got arguing if the printer would work or not. The HP guy said to go on and buy it because it would work. Well, it does not obviously!!!!

Anyway, apart form all the valid concerns posted, from recycling to buy a new USD150,00 printer, the fact that 2 companies like Apple and HP come to the market with a new standard and do not clearly know what to do is very troublesome. Worst yet is that we, consumers, are paying for it.

Secondly, all this said "support" that we seem to be getting but at the end of the day the guy who is giving it (yeah, I do not particularly care for your name) is saying it cannot be done. Well, a printer is hardware and, provided that the supplier - HP and apple -are willing, any software can be installed and I am sure that ePrinter drivers could also be installed as well. If the suppliers are willing.

Finally, the HP iPrint at the Apple store is neat, but it would be even better if did not crash most of the time and actually work with other type of files other then pictures.

Oh! You all are wondering why I do not take the printer back and get my money. That is what you get when you live in developing nations like Brazil (by the way I am brazilian) where the shop where I bought it, FAST, HP and the newly stablished Apples Store are pushing to each other the blame for the wrong sale and I will be stuck with the wrong product.

So, the best thing to do is not to buy HP again.

The guy whose name you do not like is just volunteering to help here.

As far as your supposed argument between the HP guy and Apple guy, I don't believe your story.

People buy electronics all the time just before some new technology comes out. Are you supposed to get an automatic refund each time? There woul be no companies left in business. When did you buy this printer?

So to get AirPrint your solution is to not buy HP? Good deal, go buy a Canon printer today and report back and tell us how your printing via AirPrint is working.

Finally, the earlier printers have different logic boards/chipsets that are not compatible short of rebuilding the printer and making it a 210..

Well,

We all shouldn't be jumping on the HP guys case. He's trying to be helpful here.

What would be nice if HP could/would make a small external box, that perhaps interfaces into older printers via USB, that would allow AirPrint.

I'm having another issue now. After setting up my B209a (Airprint less) using a wireless connection, it takes roughly 20 minutes to print a single page! This happened both with the stock OSX driver, and happens after I install the HP software.

The installation went nicely, and the MBP found the printer over Bonjour, but its just unusable slow printing. Any ideas?

Koensayer,

First try Resetting you Printing System (System Preference, Print & Fax, right click on the Printer list). This will remove any print queues you have a flush everything out. If that doesn't work, what kind of wireless router do you have and how is you wireless network set up? You may have better luck manually setting up the print queue using your Printers IP Address.

Just trying to help.

Andrew

Im Not any IT type here but I got an iPad for christmas and I had an hp209a. The first day I used it it printed my email and some coupons off a coupon app. Two days later it stopped finding the printer and hasn't worked since. So it IS possible for this printer to work with an iPad. IT people just have to figure it out. Someone is giving out some incorrect info at corporate. I swear this is true.