Printable View
I have been using computers for a fair few years now but I have never owned a printer, so I thought it was about time I got one.
I have a lot of photo's that I have taken with my digi camera over the last year or so that I would like to print out, so the printer would have to be quite good for photos and the odd bit of text work.
I have no idea what to start looking for in a printer so I was hopping that a few of you would make some suggestions.
Cheers.
I have an HP 990CXi, and it *will* kick the ass of any printer that comes near it...if not it will call back up with its infrared port...lol
Always go HP mate...defo worth it.
the Epson Photo 830U is a great photo printer, currently selling at about £85
;) Someone was asking about a printer and scanner, check my comments there. Basically Canon i550 is untouchable. Speed, quietness, quality (text, colour, photo on plain, photo on photo), running costs etc. Not that I trust TomsHW fully but take a look there as they did a roundup.
I agree with Austin. I have the older S750, previously had an Epson Colour Stylus 400, and it seriously kicked its butt in quality and speed. Printing black and white text in draft mode is nearly as good as normal if you don't look too closely.
Austin is right here again, I have myself the i550 for some time now, printing quality is amazing especially for pics, and the speed is quite fast compared to most other printers.
i550 wins hands down
for color prints, you need an inkjet.
there are 4 manus out there - lexmark, hp, canon & epson.
lexmark, forget them right now. their color accuracy is awful & running costs are astronomical.
epson? well there are many reasons not to go for epson, not least of which the fact that the printers are designed to break down after a short time, and designed to prevent you from using the last 10-35% of the ink in a cartridge. i briefly owned an epson & it was the worst printer i've ever owned.
hp are still the undisputed kings of black & white, but their photo printing is still below par, and running costs on the new series (4 digit) of printers is pretty high.
this leaves canon. i own a canon. the driver support is superb (HP still sell devices which aren't XP compatible), the printer is quiet & cheap & works fine on a network (HP block network printing on all "budget" printers). running costs? official cart for my printer, compatible cart.
in summation, get whichever canon fits yer budget :)
--jo
The Epson 900 is supposed to be good and also has Direct CD printing as a bonus - Currently on offer at PC World for £75 atm!
hi
if i were you i would check out the price of ink for the printer you are thinking of getting as you will see some can be very expensive
i know you can refill with a syringe but that ink is thinner and tends to run out the button of ink cartridge
so i would recommend a Epson 915 photo you can get ink on e-bay 6 colour & 6 black for £27 cheep as chips :D
I just got a EPSON 915 and it rocks
Was looking at this on ebay
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...category=14301
import from US but the price. Am going to find out if they are switchable voltage and how much shipping is to UK.
Does anybodty have a I850??
Cheers
Flibb
Thanks very much for the comments peeps :)
Looks like I just gotta choose how much I wanna spend on a Cannon printer now then :)
;) Running costs (ie ink) is not as simple as all that though. You have to factor in how much ink is in the carts, how much the printer uses, how much gets wasted in cleaning cycles, how the printer monitors ink levels and how good/bad the compatible carts tend to be.
:confused: Epson are reknowned for wasting loads of ink each time you power the printer on and any time a clean cycle is run. They are also notorious for reporting ink tanks as empty VERY prematurely and making it very hard for you to replace them when the printer isn't prompting you. Other downsides are a noisy feeding mechanism, disgustingly poor fast mode and finally the text quality is pretty poor when compared to Canon or HP.
:cool: HP are very good, it took them a long time to catch up. Throwing away the print heads with each empty cart makes the carts very expensive, they also use quite a nasty method of offering better photo quality by using a cludged black+light_colour tank in combination with the normal colours. Nice result but simply not worth it, esp cost-wise.
:( Lexmarks are just poo, plain and simple. Quality and speed are noticably inferior to the big three and they cost a fortune to run.
:P The reason I think Canon are so good is great perf in ALL areas. Very fast, very high quality prints (in all areas), very quiet (they even have a night-time mode), great drivers and incredibly cheap to run. Most compatible carts are top notch, I've found Jettec to be absolutely as good as Canon branded ones. Canon also seem to care more for the older printers too, HP and Epson are so slow on this (drivers eg for WinXP).
PS. Don't bother refilling as it involves a whole world of problems including damage to the printer, not worth it esp if you choose wisely in the first place. Flibb IIRC Canon i850 is simply a faster version of the i550 and has the tiny 2pl droplet size ... probably THE best inkjet printer you can get. Watch out if it's designed for the US though, power lead etc.
Anyone know anywhere that stocks the i550?
Found every other printer on the planet apart from that one, it's not even listed on kelko :(
:( If you can't find it then consider the current i450 which is basically the same but slower and a little more pricey to run (still way lower than Epson or HP) ... on the plus side you do get 2pl droplet size which gives awesome quality (even better than the i550). Also look out for 2nd hand S750 ... as said that's 99% as good as i550 ... the i550 was based on it!
So a i450 is just as good as the i550 but slower? I can handle slower, it's not gonna get used a great deal anyhows so I am not to bothered about how much the ink is either.
I'll start looking for the i450 then :)
EDIT
http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/produ...=47827&_LOC=UK
Is that the right one? Seems a little cheap for a decent printer, but then again I do know nout about printers.
I brough an HP660C in 1995 I think...I was still gettin newsletters from them (which I choose to recieve so it wasnt really spam), and out of the blue they said "You have had your printer for a long time, so we are sending you a free printer cleaning set". Ordered it online and came completely free few days later. This was litterally years after I had stopped using the printer (2001 i think...)Quote:
Originally posted by Austin Canon also seem to care more for the older printers too, HP and Epson are so slow on this
/me loves HP...lol
:D Yep the i450 has the quality of the i850 (4800x1200dpi inc 2pl droplets) but speed well below the i550. It also uses the combined smaller ink tanks so costs more to run than the i550 but we're still talking very cheap running costs. The i550 never came with a USB lead though, it had both parrellel and USB connectors so maybe that's why ... just be prepared in case the i450 doesn't come with one either. Twigman that's great news. I was more talking about continued support (ie drivers) for any printer non-current really but top marks to HP.
Not sure if its true withh all canon prointers but many allow you to replace the print head if it become blocked. Consequently non original carts can be used without worry, epson printers are impossible to replace the heads unless its goes back to the factory and it aint covered under warranty.
Flibb
Lol ok Austin...
http://h20015.www2.hp.com/en/softwar...bmit.x=0&cc=us
Drivers for the 660C from 3.1 to XP...sorry to rub it in but i *really* like HP printers...lol
I wont go on about it any more now...promise
For some of the canon printers you can get replacement print heads, but they arent exactly cheap. Im not too sure about their latest printers if you can get the print heads but I know that ones which use the BCI-21 black/colour you can get for roughly £35-£40. Most other printer makers (excluding epson) put the print heads on the cartridges which makes them more vulnerable and more expensive coughlexmarkcough ;)Quote:
Originally posted by Flibb
Not sure if its true withh all canon prointers but many allow you to replace the print head if it become blocked. Consequently non original carts can be used without worry, epson printers are impossible to replace the heads unless its goes back to the factory and it aint covered under warranty.
Flibb
;) Having the print heads on the cart also makes it nigh on impossible for compatible carts to offer the same kind of quality as the branded ones.
:cool: Twigman the point is WinXP has been out for ages now. I had an Epson SC 640 which was the best printer for a LONG time. Good speed, great photo quality, cheap carts (before Epson went mad) but it took Epson over 18 months to come up with WinXP drivers and the Win2000 drivers (only other choice in XP) were a little quirky with XP. I rec'd Epson printers for ages as they were the best printers but I'd say HP and Canon have certainly surpassed them now ... that's not to say that Epson aren't good because they are. Before the 1440dpi Epsons it was HP who were clearly the best but now-a-days I think Canon have the lead.
hi
so has anyone had any luck looking for canon i550 or i850 if so where??????????
hi
found this http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/...973848-1931622
canon bubble jet i560 £124.99
:( Unfort I've heard the i560 isn't anywhere near as good. IIRC Canon tried some new funky idea whereby they use the lighter colour inks (as found in true photo printers) but with the darker std ones. From what I hear they aren't good. I'm not sure about that but would advise sticking it out for an S750, i550 or i850 with the i450 being a very decent alternative.
How many people have used the Jettec cartridge?
I might try to find alternatives to the Epson cartridges (from the sound of it, they eat ink pretty quick - although so far, I am still at "100%").
I know Jettec make Epson compatible cartridge so I might have a look at how much cheaper they are..
The Epson cartridge I use cost ~£20-25 for black (bigger cart then color though) and £12-13 (x3) for colour.
Come to think of it.. The cartridge cost almost as much as the printer :eek:
(I don't see it as a bad thing right now - as it suggest that I didn't have to pay much for the printer itself. But in the future...).
I recommend Epson 895 or above. got the roller film and borderless features, cool!
replacement heads come with a complete set of cartridges, and cost about £10 more than the separate cartridges.
;) Jettec Epson carts are also very good. IIRC MMC are the ones to steer clear of as they are of inferior quality. I stick to Jettec, you should find them to be half the price of the branded (Epson or Canon) ones and just as good esp the Canon ones.
hiQuote:
Originally posted by Austin
;) Jettec Epson carts are also very good. IIRC MMC are the ones to steer clear of as they are of inferior quality. I stick to Jettec, you should find them to be half the price of the branded (Epson or Canon) ones and just as good esp the Canon ones.
could you post a link to the site you get ink from please
:) I'm sure there are other co's that are just as good but I buy from ...
http://www.inkfactory.com
There've been a lot of anti-Epson comments here, but I'd like to add a perspective of my own.
I have tested a LOT of colour printers, going back to the days when the ONLY way to get colour prints out of an inkjet, was to refill black cartridges with colour ink and use postscript separation software. That was, IIRC, 1991.
Also, I do a fair bit of photo printing, and over recent years, if your priority was photo printing, then nothing touched the quality of Epson injets for photo quality.
I have, currently in use :-
Epson Stylus Photo 2100 (A3+)
Epson Stylus Photo 2000P (A3+)
Epson Stylus Photo 950
Epson Stylus Photo 890
Espon Stylus Color 900 (NOT the Photo 900, different printer).
Canon i800
Olympus P-400 (dye sublimation)
Alps MD-1000 Microdry
..... (and a couple of lasers :))
The ONLY Epson printer that has ever failed on me is one I lent to someone, and that for whatever reason, came back totally dead.
I have to say that recent Canon photo printers are very impressive, but to counter the anti-Epson comments here, the above list suggests where I put my priority for photo printing.
Make of that what you will :D
Now I have a dilemma, do I get the i450 or the Photo 900 :/
Anyone know of any review sites for printers?
hi
well at least you are down to a choice of just 2 printers namely i450 or the Photo 900 so i guess you will have to just pick one and see if you like it as the more reviews you read the more undecided you will become
:cool: Hopefully I haven't been too negative towards Epson. They are still very good printers just like HP but I think Canon currently have the lead in all round quality, speed and running costs esp if you choose your printer well. IMHO Canon simply have the same sort of lead that Epson held for so long back in the Epson SC 640 days (when 1440dpi hit). It took a few years for other printer manus to catch up in photo quality, speed and running costs. In fact the printer Epson released next were a step down mostly because they cost a LOT more to run and wasted even more ink. TBH all modern Canon, HP and Epson inkjet printers are excellent buys and are a big step up from the top end ones of a few years ago. Having used and seen quite a few printers over the years I can definitely say Canon are currently the wisest move.
Just to muddy the waters a bit (more), I did a fairly comprehensive running cost test on printers a few years ago. These machines are ALL now well out of date, but the test still has one point of relevance.
Running cost has been raised as an issue, and the cost of cartridges quoted. The cost of cartridges is, on it's own, of little direct relevance.
I had four printers (one each from Lexmark, Canon, HP and Epson). Each was fitted with a new set of cartridges, and the SAME test page printed repeatedly until each cartridge ran out of ink. The print used was a photo, about 8" x 6", and was anAdobe test image. The results were as follows :-
Canon - 83 pages
Epson - 63 pages
Lexmark - 49 pages
HP - 124 pages.
So, if you just rely only cartridge life, that makes HP the cheapest to run. However, the HP cartridges were, at that time, £59.98 compared to £18.99 for the Epson (PC World prices). By that token, the HP is the dearest, not the cheapest.
If you take the cost per page, you got :-
Epson - 30p
Canon - 34p
HP - 48p
Lexmark - 67p
Then, of ocurse, you have to remember that some printers work well with papers that others don't work well with, so you have to factor the cost of photo-grade paper into the calculation.
At that time, and again at retail prices, Epson paper was £14.99 for 100 sheets, whereas HP was £15.99 for 20 sheets - more than 5 times the cost :eek: ) (PC World prices, and equivalent grades of paper).
Now, I'm not suggesting that these cartridge life figures hold for any printers OTHER than the ones tested, or that these relative prices are still accurate. They probably aren't.
However, when assessing running costs, don't be seduced by simple cartridge costs - it is a LOT more complex than that.
EDIT - Incidentally, I established when each printer ran out of ink using by inspecting visually, AND using an X-Rite Colour Densitometer. In all cases, my eye could catch the change in colour balance of a page caused by a cartridge expiring on EXACTLY the same page as the densitometer did :D
fair enough sara, but you didn't rely on the epson drivers writing "empty" onto the cartridge eeprom when it got down to 33% capacity, or the recent S & I series of canons (some of which have lower color print costs than basic color lasers). the test is still fairly valid - lexmark are still the most expensive to run in current models, but the eeprom'd epson carts are an excelent way to force users to buy more ink...
;) Just to reiterate what I said on Page 1. My old Epson 640 I mentioned earlier had quality (at least on photo) not far off what printers today can achieve (although speed was way down) and it was at the time one of the cheapest printers to run. Straight after Epson went mad with chips (to prevent compat carts) and (unrealistic) ink monitoring which really pushed the price up. My 640 did guess when the carts were empty ... I found I could just reinsert the cart manually as it was still 30%+ full EVERY time. Anyway even with manually ensuring the carts are empty on my Epson 640 I can say without doubt that my current Canon i550 carts last a good 5 times longer, most likely more. They aren't expensive either AND have the added bonus of using a cart for each colour (CMYK) so waste is virtually nill. I couldn't believe the speed, quality and running costs of my Canon i550 ... it really blew me away and I'd seen many modern alternatives too.Quote:
Originally posted by Austin
;) Running costs (ie ink) is not as simple as all that though. You have to factor in how much ink is in the carts, how much the printer uses, how much gets wasted in cleaning cycles, how the printer monitors ink levels and how good/bad the compatible carts tend to be.
:confused: Epson are reknowned for wasting loads of ink each time you power the printer on and any time a clean cycle is run. They are also notorious for reporting ink tanks as empty VERY prematurely and making it very hard for you to replace them when the printer isn't prompting you. Other downsides are a noisy feeding mechanism, disgustingly poor fast mode and finally the text quality is pretty poor when compared to Canon or HP.
:cool: HP are very good, it took them a long time to catch up. Throwing away the print heads with each empty cart makes the carts very expensive, they also use quite a nasty method of offering better photo quality by using a cludged black+light_colour tank in combination with the normal colours. Nice result but simply not worth it, esp cost-wise.
:( Lexmarks are just poo, plain and simple. Quality and speed are noticably inferior to the big three and they cost a fortune to run.
:P The reason I think Canon are so good is great perf in ALL areas. Very fast, very high quality prints (in all areas), very quiet (they even have a night-time mode), great drivers and incredibly cheap to run. Most compatible carts are top notch, I've found Jettec to be absolutely as good as Canon branded ones. Canon also seem to care more for the older printers too, HP and Epson are so slow on this (drivers eg for WinXP).
PS. Don't bother refilling as it involves a whole world of problems including damage to the printer, not worth it esp if you choose wisely in the first place. Flibb IIRC Canon i850 is simply a faster version of the i550 and has the tiny 2pl droplet size ... probably THE best inkjet printer you can get. Watch out if it's designed for the US though, power lead etc.
I'll just add my opinion to this rather daunting thread :eek:Quote:
Lexmarks are just poo, plain and simple. Quality and speed are noticably inferior to the big three and they cost a fortune to run.
I agree that Lexmarks are slow and expensive to run, but IMO the image quality is FAR superior to Epson's. The quality of Epsons in my experience has been nothing short of bloody awful. All washed out and lacking any depth.
:ugh:
I would say to get a canon i850. Pc World were selling them for £99. Its much better built than any epson I have seen and it looks nice with the aluminium lid. Its also quiet and fast and gives very good photo results just like epsons. It has individual colour cartridges with visible ink levels and no chip on it and you can replace the print heads unlike epsons for around £20. My last epson died because the print head got clogged up and epson wanted to charge more than I paid for the printer to fix it! :eek: The cadridges are £6 or £2.50 for fakes.
I used to have an Epson Stylus Photo 750, it produced very good results, but as someone mentioned before, convieniently after the warrenty period expired the printer started to have alignment problems, then cartridges would run out *very* quickly, then it failed completely.
HP are stupidly expensive with average results on photo quality work, Lexmark are cheap for the printers, but expensive for everything else and the quality can be poor.
If you want photo quality work then I've heard *very* good things about the Canon i950, the only problem is the printer isn't exactly cheap..
Another heads up here for the Epson Photo 915. Owned it for a fortnight and quality is superb - I keep printing photos for my m8s at uni - the photos as only as good as your camera! pretty much the same quality as commercial prints.
Also, it's pretty stylish too in sleek black n grey :)
I paid £115 from Dabs
Eek... 30p per pages is a lot :eek:
I am better off just using the uni's b/w laser printer.
For b/w they are probably better in quality than ink-jet. And price per page is 5p.
The 30p/page figure will be for a colour page.
In b&w it should be more like 2-5p + cost of paper.
Whilst the uni's laser is likely the cheapest option, what if you want to print something when the uni is shut?
Can anyone find me somewhere that has stock of the Epson Photo 900?
I can't find it anywhere :( If I can't find that then it will have to be the 915. Does the 915 still do the CD/DVD printing?
The only place I've seen it at £75 is PC World. I guess availability might vary branch-to-branch.Quote:
Originally posted by Trash Man
Can anyone find me somewhere that has stock of the Epson Photo 900?
So far as I'm aware, no, the 915 doesn't. The only two machines in that range that do that are the 900 and the MUCH more expensive 950.Quote:
Originally posted by Trash Man
I can't find it anywhere :( If I can't find that then it will have to be the 915. Does the 915 still do the CD/DVD printing?
There is, however, a new machine due (the Stylus Photo R300), which will print direct to printable CD/DVD and has a number of other advantages too. List price is £149 (or £179 including a 2.5" colour LCD).
hiQuote:
Originally posted by Trash Man
Can anyone find me somewhere that has stock of the Epson Photo 900?
I can't find it anywhere :( If I can't find that then it will have to be the 915. Does the 915 still do the CD/DVD printing?
if you want a long drive PC WORLD ABERDEEN :D had a pile of then at the weekend
but failing that www.pcworld.co.uk
It's out of stock on the web site :(
I'll give my local branch a ring tomorrow.
hi
i supose it was a bargin at £75 so you will have to be quick:D
i suspect if sold out on web they will be sold out everywhere but no harm in trying
pc world aberdeen tel 0870 242 0444 think this is right phone now i think they are open to 8 pm
Hewlett Packard Color Laser 1500L Printer, Model Q2488A $659.00.... Ok it may be out your budget.... but the next printer I get is going to be a color laser jet as they have come down to a reasonable level.
print quality for photos on sub-$2000 lasers is dire. seriously.
;) Yup lasers are cheap to run and can use practically any media right down to loo role and produce excellent mono results. But when it coems to colour either pay HUGE wads of notes or buy a cheap inkjet printer ... that's why inkjets are so popular ;)
None in stock in any of the PC Worlds near me at all :( Tried Reading, Swindon and Oxford.
I ain't driving to Scotland to get one.
Really want CD printing now for some reason, looks like the i450 it is then.
I've seen Colour laser printers for about £700 I think...
And thats not looking too hard. Not cheap, but they are getting cheaper ;)
BUFF: The "Uni is shut" is not exactly a very likely scenario really..
Its open every day, every hour..
Its more of a case of whether or not I can be bothered to walk there at 3am ;)
Then again, how often do you need to go there at 3am.
I guess my initial reason for not getting a printer (I was sure it wouldn't end up being cheaper) was correct. Still, oh well, at the very least, I got myself a cheap scanner (deduct the ink from the printer, and I've paid like £5 + postage for the printer/scanner :D).
Without wishing to muddy the waters, Trash, you might want to keep an eye open for the new Epson Stylus Photo R300. It looks interesting :D
:DQuote:
Originally posted by Saracen
Without wishing to muddy the waters, Trash, you might want to keep an eye open for the new Epson Stylus Photo R300. It looks interesting :D
I went for the 900 in the end, bought a new one off eBay for £82.50, which I did not think was bad at all.
Thanks for the advice everyone :)