Photo Printers

[g-hog]

Hey guys since getting into digital photography I have been looking for a nice photo printer. I am currentlyusing a HP 930C and it does pretty good but I know there are better as this printer is over 2 yrs old. In some of my reading (PC Mag etc) I have found very good reviews on the Canon i960 photoprinter. Runs a little less than $200. I want this printer to be dedicated to just photos. I will keep the HP for text etc. Anyone have any others they would reccommend??

GHog

 

[Stu]

I am currently using an HP deskjet 5150. Does a reasonably good job.

 

[jmabbott888]

I use an Epson Stylus C42UX, cost about $50 or $60 at Comp USA, it's cheap but it works

 

[Lan-Lord]

I am pretty lazy, I don't print my own photos. I like to use www.imagestation.com. I upload my jpg files, and order the prints online. They come in the mail to me a few days later. I have had great results with them. I have several large prints hanging in my house that have been printed by imagestation.

I have absolutely nothing against the deskjets though. I have seen very professional results from them, I just dont like the hassle that comes with the territory (clogged jets, replacing ink resevoirs, ink resevoirs drying up, letting the ink dry, printer calibration, etc..)

If you are looking at printers, one thing to look into is a printer that uses "archival ink". What that means is that 5,10,30 years later, the ink will not fade or deteriorate. Of course the nice thing with digital is that you can always reprint the image without too much trouble, but personally, if you are getting a printer just to do prints, look into one that uses ink that is archival. If you just want to do Christmas cards and such it wont matter though. I think the canon 960 is a good printer for photos. I dont know about canon inks though. I do know that the epson printers that are comparable to the canon 960, DO use archival inks.

One caveat to the "reprint if it gets old" is that if you give the print to someone as a gift, they will not be able to reprint it when it starts to deteriorate. So if it was me, I would either make sure the canon inks are archival (and that the 960 supports those inks), or look at the epson. I have heard extremely good things about the epson 2200. I have no idea how much it costs. Let us know what you end up with and how it turns out.

 

[g-hog]

Thanks lan-lord, I checked out their site and the prices seem real reasonable. I will ask one more question to you...Currently when I print out a photo the printed version will be just a bit darker than what I am viewing on the monitor. I have solved this to a degree by manually lightening up the photo about 8 points on the slide scale in Photoshop. This will usually give me a pretty good duplicate of what I see on the monitor. Now when using imagestation do your finished prints look pretty close to the what you view on your monitor? I have also read where you can actually calibrate your monitor.....But have forgotten what the article said if anyone knows and cares to pass along this info...feel free. Thanks

GHog


Yikes...I just checked on the Epson 2200 sounded real nice...At a MSRP of $699 it should be.

 

[Lan-Lord]

The prints I have done at imagestation have always come back looking very close to what I saw on the computer. I dont know if that is by accident or what. Usually they have a "sign up and get 10 prints free" type of deal. I would at least give them a try with a few free prints and see how they look. Note you will probably have to have dsl/cable to upload the large jpg files, otherwise online photo development is pretty painful. If you dont have broadband, Sams and Costco do a good job too (and cheap)

Im not trying to talk you out of "rolling your own" prints, but I personally think that unless you have other uses like custom brochures, Christmas cards, invitations, etc, it is probably more worth while to have your photos printed by a Sams club (they do good prints at .19c/photo) or imagestation.

I've compared side by side an 8x10 printed at imagestation, and an 8x10 printed on my father in laws HP Photosmart printer. (not sure which model, but I know he paid quite a bit for it) The imagestation was noticably better. I kind of feel that unless you are willing to go with a high end printer, the photo labs will probably do a "better" job. Now that is not to say that the photos wont look good. They will, they will look very good. Good enough to hang on the wall, but the photo lab printers will do a better job from my tests.

Honestly, the best way to know is to print a few and decide if the differences are worth it.

Oh yeah, one thing that I noticed about imagestation on the last batch I had printed. My 8x10s had the white border. I personally dont care for that, so I am not sure if I selected the wrong option when I checked out or if that is their new style of prints. So I am also kind of looking elsewhere for my 8x10 prints. EZprints.com is a good one I have heard of, and so is shutterfly.com. So I like imagestation print quality (kodak paper, and the fuji frontier printing system) but I dont care for the white border.

Okay, I just did a big brain dump, does all of that make sense??

 

[Lan-Lord]

oh, on monitor calibration, I think adobe elements has a way to calibrate your monitor. The other thing is are you usinig a laptop?? laptop LCDs will look alot brighter than the actual image.

 

[g-hog]

Thanks lan-lord. Keep me posted on the border issue. It would be for the larger prints I would probably use them for and I like yourself would not want the white border. Not a bad option as there is not a Costco or Sams club close to my area. Wally world is about it.

I do have broadband so no prob there and no I am using a flat screen crt monitor. (silently wishing I could afford a flatscreen 19" LCD) I will have to look around more in Photoshop to see if has an option like that. May be another of those many functions I have yet to find.

Thanks again for the tips. I will keep you posted

GHog

 

[coyotebandit]

I take mine to a local place at $0.20 a print It's not worth messing with doing it at home. It saves me lots of time, and they come out looking way better too! I do have a photo printer, but I haven't replaced the $40 cartridge in it!

 

[TNhunter]

I bought the Canon i960 right before Christmas and all I can say is this thing is AWESOME. I'm using the Canon Photo Plus paper and the prints turn out looking as good as any commercial printer (i.e. Walmart, Walgreens, Sams, etc). Looking at them under a lupe and comparing them to the commercial printers you can hardly see any dots at all. It almost lays down a continuous tone. That being said - with the cost of the printer, ink, and paper - you can get them done cheaper commercially. But the convenience of having the printer here at home and being able to get a quick copy of one of your digital pictures makes it worth it to me to have the printer.

 

[g-hog]

Thanks TNHunter,

Always good to hear a review from someone that owns one. I agree about the cost of inks etc, but like you said it is really nice to get instant copies of what you want, plus I hate going to WalMart........

GHog