Nick,
I recall reading somewhere that the short edge first issue is a flaw in HP's drivers, and that they're working on a fix. Check with HP if you can obtain a beta or something. However, I'd try updating OSX to 10.3.4 first. It fixes various issues in 10.3.3. Do it unless you know something specific that it breaks.
Thomas
AC4.1-AC26SWE; MacOS13.5.1; MP5,1+MBP16,1