The HP Sprocket Photo Printer ($129.99) is a tiny, cute, and convenient photo printer designed for printing from a smartphone or tablet. It can fit into your pocket, and connects to an iOS or Android device via Bluetooth. The Sprocket ($119.99 at HP) falls short of the Editors' Choice Canon Selphy CP1200 in connectivity choices, running costs, and print quality. But if you can make do with wallet-size prints, and want only to print from your mobile device's photo albums or a social media account, it's the height of convenience.

Design and Features

The Sprocket is a sleek machine with rounded corners, measuring just 0.9 by 3 by 4.5 inches (HWD) and weighing a mere 6 ounces. In size and appearance, it's very similar to the Polaroid Zip Photoprinter ($89.91 at Amazon) . The Sprocket I tested was black with silver trim; a white version is also available. It has a built-in rechargeable battery, which according to HP will let you print up to 30 photos per charge.

Controls are minimal. The Power button is the only control on the device. There's a micro USB Type-B port for charging, and an indicator light that glows white when the device is on, blinks once when the Sprocket is turned on and twice when a job is sent to it, and glows red when there is an error.

Connectivity is limited to Bluetooth, as is also the case with the Polaroid Zip. In contrast, the Canon Selphy CP1200 can print from a computer over a USB cable, a mobile device via Wi-Fi or a direct wireless connection, an SD card, or a USB thumb drive. The Sprocket can connect to an iOS- or Android-based smartphone or tablet, and printing is controlled through the HP Sprocket app, downloadable from the iTunes App Store or Google Play.

To connect, you first must pair your mobile device to the Sprocket via Bluetooth. Then you launch the HP Sprocket app. You can either take a photo by pressing a central button, and then print it out (or not), or print a photo from your social media accounts (Facebook, Flickr, and Instagram are supported) or your device's photo albums. The first time you access a social media account, you must enter your login information, and then it's saved automatically.

The Sprocket uses Zink (short for "zero ink") paper, which is embedded with clear dye crystals. The printer creates an image by using heat to activate the crystals and cause them to show color. Zink paper is only available in a limited range of sizes, and the Sprocket exclusively uses 2-by-3 wallet-size sheets with a peel-off sticky back. HP sells packs of 20 sheets for $9.99, which comes to 50 cents per sheet. The Polaroid Zip uses similar Zink media, at the same cost per print.

Printing Speed

I timed the Sprocket at an average of 42 seconds per 2-by-3 print, matching the Polaroid Zip's speed. Timings for individual prints ranged from 39 to 46 seconds. This is faster than the Canon Selphy CP1200, which I timed at about a minute over a direct connection to a computer, and 1 minute, 32 seconds, over a direct wireless connection. Unlike the Sprocket, which prints out a photo in a single pass, the CP1200 takes four passes, one for each color—feeding the paper through, pulling it back, and then feeding it again—to complete a print, as is typical of thermal-dye small-format photo printers.

Output Quality

The Sprocket's print quality was unimpressive in my testing, similar to that of the Polaroid Zip. About half of the prints were of drugstore quality, while the others fell below this standard. Colors, especially reds, tended to look muted, and there was a loss of contrast in some bright areas. There was obvious banding (a pattern of faint striations) in the background of several prints. Quality is okay for quick snapshots to hand out to friends, but it's nothing special. In the portable printer world, dye-sublimation thermal photo printers usually have better print quality than Zink printers, as is the case with the Canon CP1200.

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Conclusion

If you want to print small snapshots exclusively from your phone or tablet—whether from its photo albums or your social media accounts—the HP Sprocket is a convenient and appealing choice. Very similar in most ways (price, dimensions, speed, print quality, connectivity, printing technology, and running costs among them) to the Polaroid Zip Photoprinter, the Sprocket adds easy integration to Facebook, Flickr, and Instagram to the mix. In terms of print quality, though, it's no match for the Editors' Choice Canon Selphy CP1200, which can print larger photos (up to 4-by-6) at a lower cost per print than the Sprocket and has a wide range of connectivity choices, while the Sprocket is limited to Bluetooth. The Sprocket wins on portability, though—you can't fit the CP1200 in your pocket.

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