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wyip 
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Joined: 02 July 2006 Country: United States Location: San Francisco Status: Offline Posts: 408 |
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 Topic: TP: Printer recommendations?Posted: 12 May 2007 at 08:37 |
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Seeing as I've had the same printer since 1994 (HP LaserJet 4L), I think it's about time I got a good photo printer. Can anyone recommend a good printer that would be dedicated to printing photos? (Amazingly, the 4L still prints text perfectly) I did a little browsing and I don't think I need any bells and whistles like an integrated card reader or LCD screen, since that's what my computer's for, right? (Then again, I am still using a 13 year old printer, so what do I know...?)
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a900 | ZA16-35 | ZA50 | ZA135
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brettania
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Dyxum factotum Joined: 17 July 2005 Country: New Zealand Location: Auckland Status: Offline Posts: 20650 |
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Posted: 12 May 2007 at 09:21 |
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For A4 the Canon iP4300 (incredible for such an inexpensive printer) for A3 the Epson 1400/1410 (really great bang for buck in the A3 range) I have tested both and own the 1410. - Edited by brettania - 12 May 2007 at 09:22 |
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brettania
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Dyxum factotum Joined: 17 July 2005 Country: New Zealand Location: Auckland Status: Offline Posts: 20650 |
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Posted: 12 May 2007 at 09:24 |
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My reviews can be found at d-Brief.com. |
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JEPEM
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Joined: 15 December 2006 Country: Netherlands Location: Groningen Status: Offline Posts: 154 |
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Posted: 12 May 2007 at 10:14 |
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A good A4 printer is the Epson R 800.
A good A3 printer is the Epson R 1800 or the R 2400. I use the R 2400 for B/W prints. If you want a good photo printer, it is important to have a min of 6 cartridges. But it depends on the money you want to spend. |
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brettania
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Posted: 12 May 2007 at 10:18 |
I think it is equally important to consider the lasting, or archival, properties of the inks/paper. Edited by brettania - 12 May 2007 at 10:18 |
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Dorset Mike
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Joined: 20 February 2007 Country: United Kingdom Location: Poole, Dorset Status: Offline Posts: 535 |
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Posted: 12 May 2007 at 13:20 |
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Epson are Ok if you use them almost daily, otherwise the heads get blocked with dried ink. I used to repair printers for a living before I retired, and Epson gave the most trouble in this area. Nowadays the cost of replacing print heads is probably more than the cost of a new printer.
HP inkjets have the print head as part of the ink cartridge so don't have this problem, but the cartridges are usually dearer as a result. Another thing to look for is separate cartridges for each colour, the cheaper printers with all colours in one cartridge plus a black cartridge, if you run out of yellow before cyan or magenta you have to ditch the lot. I did see somewhere that ink for ink jets works out at about L800 per litre when bought in cartridges, someone is raking it in at our expense. Cost per page should be a requirement on printer specs, just like we get miles per gallon/litres per 100Km for cars I use a colour Laser for most printing. |
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Cheers MIKE,
5D, A350: 50/1.7; 28-75/2.8;80-200/2.8 APO Kit; 500/8; Tam 17-50/2.8; 18-280; 70-300/4-5.6: 90/2.8; MC7 2X; Tokina 11-16/2.8: 80-400/4-5.6; Kenko 1.4X: Min A200 bridge |
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HBrotherus
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Joined: 13 December 2006 Location: Finland Status: Offline Posts: 42 |
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Posted: 12 May 2007 at 14:27 |
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I have HP's B9180 and have been very satisfied with it.
Photo-i.co.uk, a good site for printer reviews |
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colmo
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Joined: 05 August 2006 Location: United Kingdom Status: Offline Posts: 152 |
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Posted: 12 May 2007 at 15:07 |
If I was in the market for pigment (more archival than dye) A3 right now, that's the one I'd get. Ink costs (per ml) are par with Epson R2400/R1800, but the HP has the hidden advantage of 28ml carts (v Epson's 13ml), offering less ink wastage at cartridge changes, and explains the higher price per cart. It's also L100 cheaper than the comparable R2400, and comes with more ink to begin with. I sold Epsons in the late 90's and they had terrible reliability back then (with Canon faring better). HPs have always been ultra-solid (over the course of several years, we only ever had one HP inkjet develop a fault, from many dozens sold). While Epsons are (I'm sure) much improved now, HP have the breeding, and have now caught up in print quality. |
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Dynax 7 & A100|Monopod & 2xCF pods + pan & FLM 38 heads|5400HS|Minolta 24-105/3.5-4.5, 70-210/4, 50/1.7|Sigma 90/2.8, 400/5.6 Tele Macro|Sony 18-70/4.5-5.6|Sunpak 455|X700+50mm f1.4 and other MF stuff
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Michael Johansson
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Joined: 13 May 2006 Country: Sweden Location: Gullaskruv Status: Offline Posts: 714 |
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Posted: 12 May 2007 at 15:19 |
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I bought a S/H Epson R2400 about half a year ago. I am taken by surprise every time I use it. It produces extremely good prints and doing it without a lot of difficult calibrations etc. Maybe I am just lucky to have got the perfect combination of hardware and software. I have made about 100 prints so far, mainly A3 and A3+. The longest period of inactivity is about one month, but it made a perfect first print after that. So no problem with blocked priter heads. The only draw back is the tiny ink cartridges but the printer driver tell me when it is time to change one of the cartridges. It also tells me how many prints like the last one I can do before it is completely empty. This way it is not a major problem as I donīt print that much. Of course it would be a different story if I made dozens of prints each day.
There are OEM contious ink systems but I am not shure of their ink quality and reliability, as well as aging of the dyes. With Epson Archival paper (that I use as Iīm not so fond of glossy prints) I get prints that are guaranteed to last some 75 years. Unfortunately I will not be able to see if that is true :( I also use a Canon CP200 printer, mainly to print postcards (when traveling). It makes good prints but not at all as good as the Epson. |
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a7RII ~ V5.6/10mm ~ V4.5/15mm ~ S1.8/20mm ~ S4/24-105mm ~ V1.4/35mm ~ CZ1.8/55mm ~ V2/65mm ~ S2.8/90mmMacro ~ S1.8/135mm ~ 5600HS(D) ~ HVL43AM ~ Ring+Macro TwinFlash
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Sanjuro
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Administrator emeritus Joined: 19 September 2005 Country: United Kingdom Location: Sweden Status: Offline Posts: 5849 |
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Posted: 12 May 2007 at 20:25 |
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Nice info guys, I must say that I would like to buy one printer but mostly for BW.
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Rgds
Sanjuro "I paint objects as I think them, not as I see them." --Pablo Picasso |
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JEPEM
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Joined: 15 December 2006 Country: Netherlands Location: Groningen Status: Offline Posts: 154 |
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Posted: 12 May 2007 at 22:20 |
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I agree with Michael. I had to calibrate my hardware, but my A100/5D and R 2400 were perfect. I printed 500 photos and I had no problems with my printer heads or whatever.
If you are using an OEM system, the colors can be different as the cartridges, so you need to calibrate again. The R 2400 is specialy for BW prints. |
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wyip
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Joined: 02 July 2006 Country: United States Location: San Francisco Status: Offline Posts: 408 |
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Posted: 13 May 2007 at 00:31 |
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Wow lots of great information here. Thanks for the replies everyone.
I think I'll be reading reviews for the Epson 1410, R2400, and HP B9180 the rest of this weekend. Interesting that ink is more popular than color laser for photo printing; I always thought laser provided the best quality (this is probably just my out-dated thinking again). |
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a900 | ZA16-35 | ZA50 | ZA135
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wyip
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Joined: 02 July 2006 Country: United States Location: San Francisco Status: Offline Posts: 408 |
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Posted: 13 May 2007 at 00:33 |
What printer do you use? Any reason why you chose color (er... I mean colour) laser over ink? |
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a900 | ZA16-35 | ZA50 | ZA135
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Dorset Mike
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Joined: 20 February 2007 Country: United Kingdom Location: Poole, Dorset Status: Offline Posts: 535 |
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Posted: 13 May 2007 at 00:50 |
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I'm using an OKI C3100, I don't do many prints of photos, I use it mainly for printing decals/transfers for models. Its main advantage there is that toner is waterproof, ink jet is not, so the transfers made with inkjets need varnishing to seal them before use.
My other reason is cost, the initial outlay for the printers has dropped over the last couple of years, and although a toner cartridge costs way more than ink cartridges, the number of copies, 3000-5000, per cartridge is way higher than the number of copies for an ink cartridge, some as low as 300 pages. An additional advantage for me with the OKI is it can handle page lengths up to about 1 metre which can be useful for backscenes for models. (less joins than using A4 or A3) My only moan about the C3100 is that Linux drivers for it don't exist, or at least not last time I checked. We actually have 3 lasers, 2 mono 1 colour, 2 ink jets a Xerox and a Brother, and 2 dot matrix, both NEC one mono 80 column and one colour 160 column, sort of back up for the back for the back up! Edited by Dorset Mike - 13 May 2007 at 00:55 |
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Cheers MIKE,
5D, A350: 50/1.7; 28-75/2.8;80-200/2.8 APO Kit; 500/8; Tam 17-50/2.8; 18-280; 70-300/4-5.6: 90/2.8; MC7 2X; Tokina 11-16/2.8: 80-400/4-5.6; Kenko 1.4X: Min A200 bridge |
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