The HP OfficeJet Pro 7720 Wide Format All-in-One Printer ($199.99) is designed for small or micro offices in fields such as architecture, graphic design, engineering, or advertising that require printing at up to tabloid size (11-by-17 inches). It is a similar but lower-price alternative to the $249.99 HP OfficeJet Pro 7740. For the extra money, the 7740 has double the 7720's paper capacity, split between two trays, and can also scan at up to tabloid size, while the 7720 is limited to scanning legal-size documents. The 7720 is a capable wide-format inkjet all-in-one printer, but be sure to give the HP 7740 a close look, as that Editors' Choice model's extra features are well worth the premium you'd pay for them.

Dimensions and Paper Capacity

Although smaller than the HP 7740 , the two-toned (off-white and matte-black) 7720 ($229.99 at HP) is still large and heavy for an inkjet, measuring 12.1 by 23 by 17.5 inches (HWD) when closed, and weighing 34.1 pounds. It's best kept on a table or bench of its own.

The 7720 has a single 250-sheet paper tray that can hold up to tabloid-size paper. This is in contrast to the twin 250-sheet trays found in the HP 7740, which not only gives you twice the capacity but lets you, say, fill one tray with letter- or legal-size paper and the other with tabloid size. The 7720 has a maximum monthly duty cycle of 30,000 pages and a recommended monthly duty cycle of up to 1,500 sheets, which is more than adequate for the printer's intended use. It includes an auto-duplexer for two-sided printing.

The 7720 has a flatbed, which can scan paper up to legal size, and a 35-sheet automatic document feeder (ADF) that supports scanning of documents up to legal size. It's easy to navigate using the 7720's 2.6-inch color touch screen found on the front panel, but it lacks the port for a USB thumb drive found on the front of the 7740.

Connections Galore

The 7720 has a good selection of both wired and wireless printing choices. It includes USB for connecting to a computer and Ethernet for connecting to a wired LAN. (I tested it over an Ethernet connection, with its drivers installed on our test PC running Windows 10 Professional.) It has built-in Wi-Fi, and supports HP wireless direct—HP's proprietary equivalent of Wi-Fi Direct. It is Apple AirPrint compatible, and supports printing from Google Cloud Print. You can print from, or scan to, a mobile device using the HP Smart app, available for both iOS and Android. While the HP 7740 ships with both PCL and PostScript drivers, the 7720's sole printer driver is PCL.

Zippy for an Inkjet

The 7720 is a close match for the HP 7740 in speed, printing the text-only portion of our business applications suite at 23.4 pages per minute (ppm), compared with 23.6ppm for the 7740. It printed our full test suite at a 9.7ppm clip, compared with 10.1ppm for the 7740. Although considerably faster in text printing than the Brother MFC-J5830DW ($474.00 at Amazon) , which we timed at 16.9ppm, the 7720 was bested by that model in printing the overall suite, where the Brother averaged 11.4ppm.

Output Quality

Output quality wasn't as good as the HP 7740. In my testing, it showed slightly above-par text for an inkjet, and slightly subpar graphics and photos. Text should be good enough for most any business use except ones requiring tiny fonts.

For graphics, the backgrounds on most of our test illustrations looked slightly faded. This was apparent when I compared the illustrations with those from the HP Envy Photo 7855 ($229.99 at HP) , which I tested at the same time. I also noticed banding (a regular pattern of faint striations) on some graphics. Output is fine for most in-house business use, but I'd hesitate to use the 7720 to print formal reports, or for PowerPoint handouts to distribute to potential clients I was seeking to impress. With photos, I noticed dithering in the form of graininess in some prints. It printed out our monochrome test photo with only a trace of a tint.

Running Costs

The 7720, which shares the same cartridges and running costs as the HP 7740, has costs of 2.1 cents per monochrome page and 8.1 cents per color page, based on HP's price and yield figures. These are decent figures, though not particularly low. The Brother MFC-J5830DW, which uses Brother's high-yield, modestly priced INKvestment cartridges, has costs of just a penny per black page and 4.7 cents per color page.

Conclusion

The HP OfficeJet Pro 7720 Wide Format All-in-One Printer has a lower purchase price than the HP OfficeJet Pro 7740, but is missing enough of that Editors' Choice model's features to make it hard to justify choosing it, unless you're really strapped for cash. With the 7720, you only get half the 7740's paper capacity, and can't switch between paper sizes without having to remove the paper and add a different paper type. You also can't scan at tabloid size, like you can with the 7740. It's also missing the port for a USB thumb drive. If you're on a tight budget, the HP 7720 is still a fine choice, but if you can spring for it, the HP 7740 is well worth the extra dollars you'll pay for it.

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