Which Canon printer over 10" wide?

[colindoust]

I have never printed my own photos at home and have had hardly any printed at a

lab. I am considering buying a printer for home but i know little about them

apart from i will most likely go for canon and it seems that inkjet is the way

to go.

 

I would love to read peoples views opinions on their home printers and any

recommendations.

 

While i do convert a lot of my digital images to black and white i also will be

printing colour iamges.

Would i be expecting too much to want a printer that does both colour and bw

equally well.

 

I would like the capacity to print up to 10" x 12".

 

Thanks for any input.

 

Colin.

[nickwhite]

I use a Canon i9950 and much prefer it to the Epson printer I used before, prints to A3+ size.

I don't do much b/w, but have no trouble when I do, I expect the monochrome specialists will tell you different though!

If you rarely have prints made now, it probably would not be worth it financially to go above an A4 size printer though?

[ben_goren]

A medium-sized printer such as the i9900 (or whatever its current successor is) only

makes financial sense if you're going to spend an extra couple-few hundred dollars on a

continuous ink system. And the only way you're going to get usable prints out of non-

Canon inks and papers is if you have a profiling system...which is either several hundred

dollars for the hardware to do it yourself, or at least $50 - $100 / profile for each of your

paper / ink / printer combinations.

 

If you're only printing occasionally, you could get quite good results by using only Canon

ink and Canon paper. The only compelling reason to go that route, though, would be the

convenience of having instant results. Any quality (aka ``pro'') photo lab will beat out-of-

the-box home printing in terms of quality hands down, and on price as well for low

volume printing.

 

If you're making a lot of prints, then you should be printing at home; otherwise, the costs

of the lab will eat you alive. Or, if you're the kind of person who'd install a darkroom in

your home, and you can afford the capital investment, then home printing makes a lot of

sense; with a lot of work, you can (perhaps) do better than the photo lab. Otherwise, it's

just an expensive way of not having to drive to the local one-hour ``foto'' print shop.

 

Black and white...is difficult. You're not gonna get acceptable results without an excellent

custom profile; even Canon's profiles don't cut the mustard. Your best bets for black and

white will be printers with multiple neutral inks. You can buy aftermarket ink sets for

Epson printers, and the high-end large format printers are shipping with multiple neutral

inks in addition to several color inks. The HP Z3100 is supposed to produce especially

impressive black and white prints, right out of the box.

 

So...I'd suggest you multiply the number of 10" x 12" prints you expect to make over the

next few years or so by the cost it takes you to get them made at the best local lab, and

add in what you think is a fair price for your time and effort in getting the files to and the

prints from them. Then factor in your desire to have full control over the printing process,

your willingness to become proficient in color management (or hire a pro for that), your

standards for quality, and the like...and then you'll know if you should even be bothering

considering getting a medium-sized printer in the first place.

 

If the answer is still ``yes,'' then you should base your decision on the availability of

continuous flow ink systems and the quality / price of non-Canon ink you can use. That

probably limits you to the i9900 (etc.) from Canon (an excellent choice), or something

from Epson (can't help you there). The good news is that nobody bothers making

continuous ink systems for inadequate printers, so you'll at least get something decent.

Plan on getting at least an Eye One Design for profiling -- coupled with the excellent and

free AgyllCMS software and a fair investment in time, and you'll be able to do very, very

well. Or budget at least $50 for a profile for each kind of paper you want to try.

 

Unless, of course, you're just looking for an expensive excuse not to drive down to the

local drug store...in which case you might as well make your decision based upon how well

the printer will fit into your office decor.

 

Cheers,

 

b&

[geoff_foale]

For what this is worth. I've just switched from an Epson R800 to a Canon 9000. So far, I've found it to be an excellent printer. Prints 12 ins. wide with really sharp prints. Perhaps a slight tendency to be over enthusiastic with flesh tones but that is probably just me not adjusting to a new printer yet.

 

But do you really want a printer which is this big or expensive?

[dakotah_jackson]

Be aware that the long life claims of the Canon printers is for prints kept in the dark. If you view or display them in light the life drops way, way down to about the same as cheap Konica photo papers from a one hour lab.

 

Take a look at the Wilhelm site for more info on how long the prints are expected to last.

[charles_wood]

If you matte Canon dye prints with acid free paper and use museum quality UV glass the prints will last 15-20 years, in my opinion. One of my printers is a 9900 and I have prints that are at least four years old, exposed to UV almost every day, and displayed in archival transparent bags and no fading or color change. Canon pigment inks are likely as archival as those from HP or Epson.