Apple Reviews

My wife gave me a HP Deskjet 450CI for XMAS 2002 as I was travelling a lot and it seemed a decent solid printer that was compact if a little expensive. I was looking for a basic printer that could do most basic printing in a compact form. I was not looking for awesome performance in any aspect.

The good: Printer prints decently and quickly. Printer is pleasing in shape and compact.

The bad: Printer does not handle cardstock (fairly common deficiency here) or full size photo paper.

The ugly: Printer suffers NUMEROUS jams (to the point of being unuseable) - paper is pulled in approx an inch, jams, then software comms problems begin. I have seen the problem discussed in a number of online forums. This apparently is a design problem relating to the pinch plate which may have been corrected in printers made after July 2003. If you are in warranty, HP will fix the problem but if you are like me and the problem occurs after the warranty expires fixing this design defect is on you.

Bottom line: Before buying: 1. Make the seller take the printer out of the box so you can check the production date (only located on the serial tag on the bottom of the printer) (how many vendors will do this?). 2. Verify that "no kidding" this design defect has been corrected.

Postscript: I have been highly satisfied with every HP printer I have had until this one. This printer has not yet gone through a single complete ink cartridge and has never run card stock or photo paper. I do not want to deal with repairs so today I scavenged the ink from this one - threw away the 450CI - and installed the ink in my new HP PSC1350. The jury is out on the PSC1350 for now.

I'm not sure why some other folks have had trouble with this printer - I have never had a single glitch & I have put it to the test. I travel a TON & take my laptop & printer with me almost every trip - the HP 450ci has withstood the wear & tear of over 50,000 of travel (air, car & train) in the past 9 months & aside from a few scratches here & there you'd never know it wasn't fresh out of the box.

I also have used my HP 450ci to print almost anything you can think of - text docs on regular mid-weight paper ("new" or recycled, both work fine), 8.5x11 photo paper, 4x6 photo paper, transparencies, labels, even t-shirt iron-on transfer sheets - not a single problem. Hope I didn't just jinx myself! :)

Seriously though - if you're looking for a portable printer that's rugged enough to really travel, but also looks slick sitting on your desk or pulling it out of your bag in a client's office , the HP 450ci is THE way to go. IMHO. And no, I don't work for HP! I actually am not a big fan & have NOT liked some of their other products, but the 450ci hasn't let me down.

If you need a portable printer this is a great choice. It is well-built & solid without being too heavy to take with you. At the same time, it's versatile enough to be your everyday desktop printer too. I have tried a number of the "portable" printers that are available and so far the HP450ci looks the best, is built the best, and has lasted the longest even with a lot of use. In summary: It's well-built, light weight and the print quality for text & pictures is good.

My main gripe about this mouse is that it is somewhat picky about what surfaces it will work with. I have other optical mice that work fine on my standard grey desk; however, the Kensington Optical Pocketmouse just won't work on that surface. It will work on mousepads and many wood surfaces, however. It's a decent mouse otherwise, but I expect more versatility from a device designed for travel.

This is a nice little mouse. Large enough to use, but small enough to hide in the corner of your shoulder bag. It doesn't look like the white mouse pictured, but I don't mind - it's better, translucent with its red glow. The only gripe I have is that I don't seem to be able to customize the behavior of the scroll wheel, and its default behavior is to scroll a tiny bit (too little) in individual clicks, but large bits (too large) when scrolled more quickly.

I used to have problem with this mouse for the first year: it won't work on the light color mouse pad, the point is always un-steable,..... just SO Hard to control! We tried to install the driver, clean the exterior, change the mouse pad with dark color background..... It just won't work. My husband gave one last try by downloading the driver from their web site, and, this time, it WORKS!! My problem solved! This mouse has been like a pro ever since!! Steable, Sharp, and easy to control!

I purchased this monitor a few days ago. At first I found the picture quality mediocre but acceptible. However, after using the monitor for a few days I now realize that it is not acceptible and I plan to return the monitor. As I mentioned in a previous review, there are fuzzy halos around type. Also, reds and greens in certain areas are blurry. In general, this display is not nearly as clear and sharp as other LCD displays I've seen, such as the displays of laptops I've owned. I made sure that I had my machine set to 32 bit color. I called Viewsonic tech support, and after confirming that I was running it at the optimal refresh rate (60 hz) and resolution (1280 by 1024), they had no suggestions except to try it on a different computer or return it.

I received this monitor a few days ago. Setting it up was very easy. The software installed fine on my Windows XP machine. There are no dead pixels as of now. On the whole I'm pretty happy with it, however I'm not giving it five stars because the picture quality is only so-so. The colors are bright but there are minor artifacts around the letters in black text against a tan or grey backgroud. They're like the fuzzy blemshes that appear when you apply a sharpening filter in an image editing program such as Photoshop and you set the amount of sharpening too high. There may be a way to improve the image using the monitor's controls. I haven't been able to get a really good setting so far. The controls for adjusting the picture are fairly primitive and the documentation is minimal.

This monitor is OK but if I ever get another flat panel monitor I'll try a different brand.

I have never been disappointed with Viewsonic and continue to buy their high quality products.

This monitor has an exceptional picture and required no setup what so ever. It came with a cdrom to optimize the picture but if it can get any better than straight out of the box, I would not be able to tell the difference.

The picture is so bright and clear and colorful that it can easily be viewed from another room and from an obtuse angle. I can glance over from the living room while my 2 year old is playing Dora, Spongebob, or cruising on NickJr to see if he is stuck and needs help.

Simply plugged it in and it worked. Highly recommended. Very thin front to back and is currently on my toddler's Little Tykes wooden computer desk (also highly recommended). The screen angle is adjustable. The base is slotted to drop the cords through if your desk allows it. Very stable base. I have no concerns that it will fall over on my child.

One key thing to remember about LCD monitors is that they almost all have a natural resolution of 1280x1024 and are viewed optimally at this ratio. Setting to a larger picture ratio like 1024x768 can show some text distortion if you plan on doing a lot of editing in certain fonts due to a stretching effect. However, that will not affect the clarity or color. Analog monitors are completely different and you must manually adjust your screen anytime you change resolution, no so with the LCD, they auto scale if you change resolution.

After using this monitor for a couple of years, this monitor starts losing sync sporadically. The losing of sync is not caused by the video adapter as this happens with two difference video adapters.

The FE950 is a decent monitor.
It takes too long to startup (slow charging) and takes forever to sync to a new resolution setting. It also takes forever to turn off.

The CRT coating is excellent as there's almost zero glare but the quality is lackluster. The text and graphics are NOT crisp and I find myself squinting to see graphics clearly.

Overall I would not give it a STRONG BUY rating but rather give it a OK BUY rating. If you find one on sale for dirt cheap prices, go for it.

I've held 2 of these FE950s for around a year and a half now. Both display very crisp pictures. For gaming these are top knotch monitors. The standard resolution I run for desktops are 1280 x 1024 @ 32bit and 85hz. In games I usually run 1024 x 768 @ 32bit, mainly because of restrictions of my GeForce4ti 4600.

I have yet to have any issues with these monitors, I tote at least one to LAN Parties constantly, around once a month or more. I have abused these monitors to the utmost point and still they are going strong.

The only issue I have with them is the fact that they are very heavy... So if you are a LAN Party person you may look for a lighter monitor, but I've yet to have a problem with carrying it around.

Other than that they are very nice monitors.

I bought the mouse, followed the instructions, and "found" the device with no problems. However, since the mouse was "discovered" it was promptly lost. The mouse has remained dead. No response. I have re-discovered and reinstalled the firmware many times with no success.

This mouse is dead.

I will take the little white corpse of a mouse back to the retailer and stick with USB. I don't need wireless THIS bad.

Avoid this purchase at all costs.

When I first got this keyboard, I was very pleased. Functionally, I could tell no difference between using this keyboard and a wired one. However, after I used the keyboard for a couple of days, it suddenly stopped connecting to the Mac. I went into the Bluetooth preferences to work with the pairings, and nothing that I did re-established the connection -- every time I tried it, I got an "authentication failed" error.

I followed all installation instructions, including upgrading the Bluetooth firmware before installing the keyboard. I also followed all standard troubleshooting procedures. The keyboard simply stopped working and refused to start again. I would assume that this is an unusual occurrence, based on so many other people being so much more enthusiastic about the keyboard, but for my own part, this keyboard goes back to Amazon, and I'm sticking with USB for the foreseeable future. Based on my experiences with this keyboard, and my similarly dismal experiences with the Apple Wireless Mouse, it does not appear to me that Bluetooth input devices are "ready for prime time".

I bought this keyboard for a really dumb reason - to press the right arrow key to skip to the next song when I had iTunes (music playing program for anyone who isn't familar with Macs) open. Needless to say the keyboard has performed wonderfully for this function.

It doesn't eat too many batteries and looks extremely cool as well. The only complaint I have on this keyboard is the feel of the buttons, they're kind of crappy compared to say, the keyboard on the Powerbooks...

I directly compared my new Viewsonic P75F+B with my old NEC FE700+ and suprisingly found out my old NEC produced the sharper picture for text. The aperature grill design of the Viewsonic could not out-do the NEC.

I bought a budget Viewsonic model 5 years ago and was not satisfied. P75F+B is my 2nd Viewsonic monitor. I wanted to give a high end Viewsonic a try. On screen controls are good, but the Viewsonic P75F+B produces just an OK image, certainly not what I expected from their Pro series monitor. You can be sure that I will not buy a Viewsonic in the future, unless it sells for less than one dollar.

These reviews are very misleading, I am very disappointed with this purchase!It makes me wonder if some of these "positive" reviews are nothing more then "company represenitives" who are trying to assume the role of a satisfied customer.

I have tried viewsonics products in the past, and all I can say is "OVERPRICED JUNK"! I bought this monitor new, and it has horizontal black lines on the screen, which are VERY distracting.

But the most awful thing though, is the distorted "BOW" image!

Believe me there is no monitor I couldn't fix in the past, And I have had many monitors in my life. But there is NO FIXING the bow in this monitor!

The effects from staring at the distorted picture - messes with your vision.

If you are a graphic/website designer, or you enjoy working with graphics and building websites, then this monitor is a double NO NO! Because the image is distorted and can not be fixed. It does NOT display an accurate picture!

Aside from the above mentioned "major" flaws, the monitor color quality is nothing to brag about either. Even if the monitor didn't have major distortions , it would have still been a let down, but atleast I wouldn't be returning it.

So my advice would be, save yourself some disappointment and try a different monitor.

Better yet, try a DIFFERENT BRAND!
As I have been searching the internet for help on fixing this bow problem, and MANY people claim: they have the same issues with viewsonic monitors!

Do a search for yourself before you buy a monitor!
I only wish I had .

I'm getting a refund! And I will never buy another viewsonic product again.

This is for those people who cant decide between the NEC FE791SB 17'' CRT and the ViewSonic P75F+ 17'' CRT, I recently got both monitors and used them for several weeks using a VGA amplifier splitter, so i can see the same image on both monitors coming from the same PC at the same time to get the best comparison results.

In a nutshell, overall i'd say the NEC is the winner. Although both monitors are very good in different areas, the NEC wins it overall. Now ill go a little bit more indepth on the two monitors. Both use a trinitron aperture grille screen and have "extra" bright features which are very nice.

About the flatness of the screens. The NEC claims it has a virtually flat screen, while the ViewSonic claims it has a Perfect Flat screen. Well, guess what, neither of these two monitors have a 100% pure flat screen. The NEC screen curves in slightly at the edges, while the entire ViewSonic screen curves a little all over. Overall i'd say the NEC has a flatter screen, and does much better in this area.

About the brightness features, the NEC has three brightness presets (OFF, SuperBright 1 & 2, each preset can have different color, contrast, and monitor brightness settings, but still the same SuperBright technology in both presets with SuperBright). The ViewSonic has two brightness presets (OFF and UltraBrite feature ON, but nothing else, no color/contrast settings to go along with it). The NEC's extra presets and options to go along with it is extremely nice and makes the ViewSonic a lower class monitor. Both the UltraBrite and the SuperBright are basically the same in technology but slighty different. The NEC's SuperBright is mainly only good for watching movies or playing video games, turning it off when working in Windows is a good idea, cause when NEC SuperBright is turned on when working in windows, and a small part of the screen is white, it's very bright. However, if much of the screen is white the whites get dimmer and the darker areas get even darker, kinda anoying. That dont happen with the ViewSonic UltraBrite, so keeping the ViewSonic UltraBrite on in Windows is an allright idea. I kinda think that the NEC SuperBright Is a little bit more powerful (makes the screen even brighter) than the ViewSonic UltraBrite, i have not really decided if this is good or bad yet. But i'd be careful with turning the brightness/contrast up high with the NEC SuperBright, cause that can acutally hurt your eyes and make them strain, like it did mine, so turn the contrast/brightness down a bit when using the NEC SuperBright feature. Overall, the Brightness features are AWESOME for playing games! Nowadays, i would think that having an EXTRABright feature in trinitron aperture grille screens are a must have, cause they are dim without them.

About the anti-glare and anti-reflection. The NEC does slightly better in this area. You can see your reflection in the ViewSonic kinda easily. And you can see outside lights in the screen, this may be because the ViewSonic has a more curved screen than the NEC.

The NEC for some reason has a sharper screen, the pixels are sharper and clearer, this is one of the reasons why games look better on the NEC than the ViewSonic. Although reading text is easier on your eyes with the ViewSonic than the NEC. So, i'd say working in Windows and browsing the web is more comfortable with the ViewSonic than the NEC. The colors are also more vivid with the NEC. The NEC also has better contrast.

I'd say overall the ViewSonic is easier on your eyes than the NEC, you could really hurt your eyes with the NEC, cause the SuperBright feature maybe a little too bright, but this can be compensated by turning the contrast/brightness down a bit. I experienced less eye strain from the ViewSonic than the NEC. But having the contrast higher with the NEC does indeed make the picture so much more beautiful and brighter but at the cost of eye strain.

About the ON SCREEN CONTROLS. I belive this is one of the least important areas of judging a monitor. But anyway, both have slighty clumsy controls, although you can easily get used to them, i'd say the NEC did a better job in this area There are more color options with the NEC than the ViewSonic, for some reason they wont let you edit the GREEN color in the ViewSonic. When editing the controls with the NEC it gives you percentages which are more easy to remember than just a bar graph on the ViewSonic. You can more quickly tell what the refresh rate/resolution is with the NEC than the ViewSonic.

About the outside casing, Both are unique looking in their own ways, they both look good, but i think the NEC is a little more durable.

What the monitors are best for: The ViewSonic would be the better choice for someone who is only going to be working in windows and browsing the web and maybe playing a game any once in a while. The NEC is for someone who is looking for a gaming monitor, as this monitor is the bomb for playing games on it! Playing FPS games such as Counter-Strike is GREAT with this monitor! All games are fantastic with the NEC and it makes the ViewSonic look bad compared to it. So overall, the NEC is the winner!

We purchased this monitor and found out that it had a fault when it arrived, however we checked our video card and the rest of the system first. Because of this we did not return it under warranty until after the 30 day period for returns. So now we have to pay for shipping from east coast to west coast 55lbs. I recieved a very unsympathetic answer from the customer support and will now be consulting a lawyer. The new monitor seems ok now....but I wonder how long before we have to pay out again. If I had paid a little more and got a monitor from the local pc shop, I would have had no problem returning it and no shipping....as I have with other faulty components before. Shouldnt the point of online shopping these hard days for the internet merchants be to assure people that it is better than the local shop? Well, next time I need something I will buy local.

The statistics speak for themselves.18" viewable screen with only about an extra inch for box. Also a small footprint to boot. No pun intended but this is a bargain for anyone that works with graphics & has no time for distractions. Visual comfort with that little extra> good pricing!! Easy to set up, plug n play..If you have an older system, NEC has an easily downloadable driver for this NEC90 monitor. BUY IT NOW!!

Works great. Plug-n-play. No problems. This black monitor has worked perfect for the past 2 months. Dell has free shipping, so it was a great bargain. Text and images are sharp. Great for watching DVD movies on. It's not a flat-screen (slightly curved glass), but that's not really a problem.

This is the first and last Viewsonic monitor that I will purchase. This monitor was replacing a 19" Sony that worked fantastic (before being destroyed in my house fire). The Viewsonic P95f+ suffers from major and unadjustable vertical distortion making it worthless for any real graphic work. Even for general text the distortion is annoying. I've tried three graphics cards with the same result. I'm returning this one as defective to the place I purchased it and buying another Sony.

When I started looking for a new monitor my only requirement was that it should be capable of UXGA resolution (1600 x 1200) with a stable refresh rate. Unfortunately there aren't many monitors that fall into this category. It was either a $1200 lcd that wouldn't have accurate color reproduction and I would have to worry about scratching, dead pixels, etc... or this $300 monitor that would have great color and no worries about sturdiness. So I went ahead and bought it. I must admit I was a little disappointed at first. BUT I figured out that the distortion was caused by my graphics card, not the monitor. The RAMDAC in my card was pretty much maxed out at this resolution, so there were some small imperfections. I hooked it up to another card and those imperfections were gone. Still, the horizontal grill pitch of this monitor really ends up showing almost two pixels in each slit at UXGA, but the text is still very readable and it's great for graphics. So in reality it's more of an awesome SXGA monitor that's capable of displaying UXGA. For $300 I couldn't ask for more.

I sit at a computer 10+ hours per day, and I never tire of reading text on this monitor. Moreover, the graphics are superb, and I work with programs such as Flash, Fireworks, and Photoshop. Plus, I play video games! I love this monitor - it performs as advertised - and if it blew up, I'd buy another. Whenever I work from a different CRT monitor, I am usually disappointed.

By the way, I paid $549.00 (nearly half of the current price). Some LCDs are not even this nice. If you can spend $700 on a high-quality LCD, go ahead; however, if you only are in the market for a CRT monitor, the P95f is one of the most satisfying monitors you can buy.

I have owned my SnapScan 1212u for almost a year and I am, as of this moment, searching for a different brand. The help available is nil. The scanner has big problems interfacing with the SCSI drivers...and I cannot even begin to explain why I have waited this long to replace it. But to give you an idea...every time I want to make a scan...I have to unplug the machine, replug in, and then hurry back and hit the scan button so that the software can detect the scanner while the scanner is 'gearing up' for it's run. This is not an occasional problem....it is every single time I use it. Sadly I thought this was normal until I was more informed. It does not install well. And adding it to newer machines is hell on earth. If I could...I would rate this -5 stars. Good luck to all...but I am unhappy with AGFA. Thanks!

Brief history: I wanted a scanner, USB was a big plus, the price was right, so I opted for the Agfa 1212U. The scanner arrived, and the install was a breeze. The few test scans I did looked nice, darn nice. The software was pretty good too. I was happy.

When I settled down to do some serious scans (family photo restorations) I found a terrible flaw in my scanner. The underside of the plastic scanbed had trash and debris on it. Because it was under the glass, I couldn't clean it off. Every scan showed these little "shadows" from the debris.

I attempted to call Agfa customer service. Mistake. Agfa does a marvelous job of directing you circles, not answering emails, and making relevant information hard to find. Their 'customer support' is a joke. Had I known the low regard Agfa has for their customers, I would have bought another brand.

In the end, I went through the retailer and another scanner is on the way. If Agfa had the tiniest respect for their customers, I would have rated the 1212U four or five stars. But, I cannot recommend this product, or any other Agfa product, very highly.

I don't really have any complaints about this scanner. So far, it has done everything that I have needed it to do. I did have a little bit of trouble installing it. (Be careful to follow the directions exactly.) Also, the user interface seems a little clumsy to me. But, all in all, I'm satisfied with my purchase.

This is SCSI RW drive. Will burn 650M in less than 10 min. Great for servers with SCSI drives to daisy chain.

Bought this drive. Worked for 3 months. It was great for first 3 months. Broke on the 4th month. Contacted Yamaha. After numourous run around, gave me non-working number for RMA #. When it works, it's great. Their service/support people suck! Once it breaks, you're on your own. But if it doesn't break, you're blessed with fortune.

Just my experience, your mileage may vary.

This drive was exceptionaly slow, it also had poor re-write quality, and was a hassle to install.

I have this drive in the external scsi version and it is great. I make fast burns with never a problem. I have friends who have cheaper burners who sometimes get bad burns for no reason...