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Imaging Devices

Best Photo Printers Revealed – Jan 2013 (Part 3) : Epson stylus photo PX830FWD, Canon PIXMA Pro9000 Mark II

1/17/2013 9:16:24 AM

A photo printer with a head for business

Despite being badged as Epsom’s ‘top-of-the-range 4-in-1 photo printer’, the PX830FWD seems almost more at home in the office than the photo studio. For example, it has a multi-page Auto Document Feeder built into its scanner as well as offering auto duplex printing. It even has a standalone fax facility that connects via a phone socket rather than just over the internet. Sending multi-page faxes is a breeze, but of no practical benefit for photo printing. Computer connection options include USB, Ethernet and Wi-Fi.

Epson stylus photo PX830FWD

Epson stylus photo PX830FWD

What makes all the office credentials a little strange is that there’s no pigment-based black ink. Instead, the Epson runs on six dye-based inks, more conventional in photo-specific printers. In fact, it’s the only printer here to do so. However, while dye0based black inks are notorious for creating greyish text, documents do look pretty crisp from the Epson. With a six-ink mix, photos should be practically perfect.

“Real-life photos aren’t that great. Midtones can look too light, making prints look a little insipid”

Standard and high0yield options are available for the Claria dye-based ink cartridges, in cyan, light cyan, magenta, light magenta, yellow and black

Standard and high0yield options are available for the Claria dye-based ink cartridges, in cyan, light cyan, magenta, light magenta, yellow and black

Performance

There’s plenty of contrast on tap but, despite it being quite accurate in the tone steps of our test chart, real-life photos aren’t that great. Midtones can look too light, making print look a little insipid. Similarly, skin tones can look a bit washed out.

Normal quality photo print speed is the quickest in the group, and this Epson outputs a borderless 6x4-inch photo in just 17 seconds. That shaves two seconds off the time of the Canon MG6250. However, it’s a bit sluggish in top quality mode, taking about a minute longer to produce a borderless A4 print than the competing Canon.

The printer’s running costs are only marginally more expensive that the Canon’s, with more expensive than the canon’s, with the combined A4 ink and photo paper price working out to around $1.9.

Epson will introduce a smaller, but similarly featured, XP850 next month.

In detail... Epson Stylus Photo PX830FWD

In detail... Epson Stylus Photo PX830FWD

A printer well suited to home office jobs

·         ADF

The auto Document Feeder can take up to 30 sheets for multi-page faxing and photocopying

·         Photo tray

There’s separate input tray for photo paper, but it can only take postcard sizes

·         Control panel

A large touch pane for standalone operation is built around an 8.9cm full-colour LCD

·         Card reader

Wide-ranging support includes compatibility with CF, MMC, MS, SD/HC/XC and xD  memory cards

Ratings

·         Digital Camera

·         Features: 4 stars

·         Image quality: 3 stars

·         Build quality: 4 stars

·         Value: 4 stars

·         Overall: 3 stars

Canon PIXMA Pro9000 Mark II $585

A large-format glossy colour specialist

Running on eight dye-based inks, Canon’s Pro9000 Mark II is the only A3+ printer in this group that doesn’t use pigment inks. There’s also only one black ink and no grey inks, so the printer is best suited to colour output on glossy papers.

Canon PIXMA Pro9000 Mark II

Canon PIXMA Pro9000 Mark II

Indeed, with the addition of red and green inks as well as two cyan, two magenta and yellow ink, the colour range is spectacular and output on glossy papers is super-smooth.

The downside is that this printer is far from ideal for black-and-white photo output, and the relatively fragile nature of dye-based inks is a poor match for matte media, where there’s no protective coating. Build quality is very good, but connection options are limited to USB. Like the Pro-1, the maximum print resolution is limited to 4,800dpi, compared with 9,600 dpi on the Canon MG6250.

“The extended range of colour inks in this printer make for amazingly smooth gradations”

Using eight dye-based inks from Canon’s ChromaLife100 range, the line-up of 13ml CLI-8 cartridges includes cyan, photo cyan, magenta, photo magenta, yellow, black, red and green

Using eight dye-based inks from Canon’s ChromaLife100 range, the line-up of 13ml CLI-8 cartridges includes cyan, photo cyan, magenta, photo magenta, yellow, black, red and green

Performance

The extended range of colour inks make for amazingly smooth gradations throughout the printable spectrum, as revealed in the rendition of the graduated colour bars in our test charts. Skin tones are gorgeous, and vivid shots retain their full impact in print.

When it comes to mono photo printing, unwanted colour casts are hard to banish. There’s an option to switch to greyscale printing, but unfortunately this gives a lack of contrast in photo prints.

Print speed also slows to a crawl and, in the top quality greyscale setting, an A3+ photo print takes 11 minutes and 45 seconds to output. Compared with the speedy maximum-quality colour speed of four minutes and 25 seconds, this is quite a setback.

Stop press: Canon has recently announced the Pro-100, which will replace the Pro9000 and goes on sale in November. The printer has three grey inks for better mono prints.

In detail… Canon Pixma Pro9000 Mark II

In detail… Canon Pixma Pro9000 Mark II

The design is simple but effective

·         Manual feeder

The manual feeder accepts media in single sheets up to 14x17 inches

·         Input tray

The main input tray accepts everything from 6x4-inch paper up to 13x19-inch A3+ media

·         PictBridge

There are no direct print controls or an LCD, but you can print from PictBridge-compatible cameras

·         Computer interface

USB 2.0 is the only option for computer connection, as there are no Wi-Fi or Ethernet ports

Ratings

·         Digital camera

·         Features: 4 stars

·         Image quality: 4 stars

·         Build quality: 5 stars

·         Value: 4 stars

·         Overall: 4 stars

 

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