Canon S520 or ?

I currently have an HP 932C printer, but it is dying and I need a replacement. Has anyone tried the Canon s520? How good/bad is it on ink when printing photos? Can you use refills? Which printer in this price range would you use?

Paul S.

I don't have a definitive answer to your question, but it is coincidental that you should ask about this Canon model. I just received my copy of Consumer Reports and it rates the S520 as the best in comparison to the likes of Epson 820, Canon Photo Printer s820D, HP Deskjet 995c.

Consumer Reports said .. "The $150 Canon Color Bubble Jet S520 produced excellent text, photos and graphics at a reasonable cost. And it churned out 8x10-inch color photos in just 2 minutes"

Of course, whether the criteria they use to give it this ranking matches you needs remains to be seen. Probably some current users will give you more of the detailed information you need.

Here is a link comparing the S520 to the more popular S900. Things look almost identical except for the number of color cartridges. Good luck.

http://ccsits.jsmplus.com/compare.php?which=printers&p%5B%5D=s520&p%5B%5D=s900&x=51&y=36

Paul Stuckless said:

I currently have an HP 932C printer, but it is dying and I need a
replacement. Has anyone tried the Canon s520? How good/bad is it
on ink when printing photos? Can you use refills? Which printer in
this price range would you use?

Paul S.

Click to expand...

Lykele said:

Paul Stuckless said:

I currently have an HP 932C printer, but it is dying and I need a
replacement. Has anyone tried the Canon s520? How good/bad is it
on ink when printing photos? Can you use refills? Which printer in
this price range would you use?

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

I replaced a "free" (I won it) Lexmark Z53 printer because the photo cartridge would get screwed up if you didn't use it all right away. Most likely the lame holder they provided for the cartridge wasn't good enough to seal the heads.

In any event I did a lot of research and in my price range had reduced the decision to the Canon S520. I had read about the new 6 color printers that HP has coming in the pipe and was interested in those. Then lo-and-behold I go to the store and while waiting to have the sales guy get the S520 down for me the HP rep comes in with some demo prints from the HP DJ 5550. The Canon is $129 and the HP is $149 where I live. The output from the HP 5550 without the photo cart looked very good, better than any HP I have seen before this. The dots were visible but only with close examination in areas of rather uniform light color. I also have better than 20/20 vision... my wife still swears she can't see the dots.

With the photo cart the prinouts look like photographs and I could not find dots at all. I used Kodak Glossy Photo paper for the output media.

I like the fact that HP has the print heads in the cart despite the fact that the inks cost more. Though if you use your inks fairly evenly you won't really save money in the long run with Canon because the color cart for the HP is $30 and the three carts for Canon would be $33.

I showed four of the prints to some co-wokers (one of whom is a digital photography NUT) and they were all suprised that they weren't actual photos. The digital photo guy recognized the logo on the back as inkjet paper for Kodak after I told him they were prints. He then assumed it had come from the Epson 2200 (He is an Epson fanatic as well.) I think that speaks fairly highly of the new HP printers... they were never in the league of Epson for photo printing before this.

Paul Stuckless said:

I currently have an HP 932C printer, but it is dying and I need a
replacement. Has anyone tried the Canon s520? How good/bad is it
on ink when printing photos? Can you use refills? Which printer in
this price range would you use?

Paul S.

Click to expand...

I have an S520. It was purchased primarily as a general purpose printer but I am amazed at the quality for the $. When comparing the same image printed on the same photo paper with an S900 there is not a huge difference to my (untrained) eye.If you are buying primarily as an all round printer you couldn't do better than the S520 in the bang for buck equation.

I use the S520 and sell the pics from it without a prob!!

Recommend it highly for it's dollar value and print quality!!

Unless you view each picture with a magnifier (this would defeat the purpose of printing and displaying pics but it seems some here do it!)
you will be very pleased!!! using PPP you get a fantastic result!!!
My friend has a S900 and some of our friends prefer my prints!

Hope this helps!!!
--
Cheers: Brettski...
http://www.figjamdesign.com/directory
(Panorama Express - Free Upload Showcase)

It sounds like the s520 will do the job from all of your reponses. My next question is with the $33 for the 3 carts of ink, how many 8 x 10 can you do. I know the HP half full carts ($30) can only do 20 8 x 10's and the more expensive full carts can only do 40 8 x 10's. If the Canon can do at least 40 for the $33 price, it might be worth switching.

Again thank you for your responses.

Paul S.

With my S750 (Same Cartridges) I usually get 80-120 8x10's before haveing to replace one of the cartridges. All depends on what you are printing.
--
Have a great day
http://www.pbase.com/wp12001

Paul Stuckless said:

It sounds like the s520 will do the job from all of your reponses.
My next question is with the $33 for the 3 carts of ink, how many 8
x 10 can you do. I know the HP half full carts ($30) can only do 20
8 x 10's and the more expensive full carts can only do 40 8 x 10's.
If the Canon can do at least 40 for the $33 price, it might be
worth switching.

Again thank you for your responses.

Paul S.

Click to expand...

I have been averaging around 30 A4 and about 20 4x6 full colour prints from a set of colour carts, and around 1/3 black
This should amount to you getting around 40 give or take a couple!
It is only a rough gauge but should help you!

--
Cheers: Brettski...
http://www.figjamdesign.com/directory
(Panorama Express - Free Upload Showcase)

Paul Stuckless said:

It sounds like the s520 will do the job from all of your reponses.
My next question is with the $33 for the 3 carts of ink, how many 8
x 10 can you do. I know the HP half full carts ($30) can only do 20
8 x 10's and the more expensive full carts can only do 40 8 x 10's.
If the Canon can do at least 40 for the $33 price, it might be
worth switching.

Click to expand...

The carts for the new printers that HP has - which would be the only ones I would consider over the S520 - are brand new. I may be able to tell you how many 8x10 pics I can create in a few weeks, but that will be only if I take a lot of pics on my trip and want 8x10's of them all.

I also print in transparency mode which uses more ink than the other settings! I just seem to get a better result this way!!

--
Cheers: Brettski...
http://www.figjamdesign.com/directory
(Panorama Express - Free Upload Showcase)

Chas74624 said:

The carts for the new printers that HP has - which would be the
only ones I would consider over the S520 - are brand new. I may be
able to tell you how many 8x10 pics I can create in a few weeks,
but that will be only if I take a lot of pics on my trip and want
8x10's of them all.

Click to expand...

The only problem that I have with HP is the price of their carts. Here in Canada at least for the price of the ink carts, you could buy a new printer. For example the full cart #78 here costs $99 Canadian, and the black is $55 Canadian. For $150 you could buy a new printer. If the ink would last for 100 8 x 10's I wouldn't mind as much, but after spending $150, I only get 40 8 x 10's. That to me is unacceptable.

It may be that the new HP printers have a more acceptable ink supply. If that is true then I might look at it. I would be very interested in knowing how many 8 x 10's you can get for your new printer.

Thank you,

Paul S.

WP said:

With my S750 (Same Cartridges) I usually get 80-120 8x10's before
haveing to replace one of the cartridges. All depends on what you
are printing.
--
Have a great day
http://www.pbase.com/wp12001

Click to expand...

That sounds like a high number, which if correct could save me alot of money. What kind of pictures do you print?

Thank you,

Paul S.

Brett Warner said:

I also print in transparency mode which uses more ink than the
other settings! I just seem to get a better result this way!!

--
Cheers: Brettski...
http://www.figjamdesign.com/directory
(Panorama Express - Free Upload Showcase)

Click to expand...

Sounds interesting... Could I ask what you use transparencies for?

Thank you,

Paul S.

Mostly my kids, some landscapes. The ink usage will vary. Yellow seems to be the color used the most in the four color printers. I've used my S750 since March, and have replaced the black cartridge once, about a week ago, the yellow once (yellow was the first to go, I think after about 60-70 prints), and the Cyan and Magenta have just come up with the low ink warning. I have used 3 packs of 4x6 pro paper (20 sheets per pack) two of 8.5x11 pro paper (20 per pack), two 8.5x11 glossy paper (20 per pack) and about 50 hi-res paper prints, and 1 and 1/2 reams (about 750 sheets) of paper for miscellaneous web pages, draft copies, homework etc. Just as a comparison, since the low ink indicator has come on for the cyan and the magenta (the tank side empty), I have made seven 8.5x11 prints and five 4x6 prints waiting for the cartridge to run out.

All that printing has cost me so far about $25 in ink (the printer comes with a full set of cartridges). So I am extremely pleased at the ink usage. And the individual cartridges is such a cool idea. If I had to replace the whole set when one color runs out I would have only got about 60 prints.

--
Have a great day
http://www.pbase.com/wp12001

Paul Stuckless said:

That sounds like a high number, which if correct could save me alot
of money. What kind of pictures do you print?

Thank you,

Paul S.

Click to expand...

Paul Stuckless said:

The only problem that I have with HP is the price of their carts.
Here in Canada at least for the price of the ink carts, you could
buy a new printer. For example the full cart #78 here costs $99
Canadian, and the black is $55 Canadian. For $150 you could buy a
new printer. If the ink would last for 100 8 x 10's I wouldn't
mind as much, but after spending $150, I only get 40 8 x 10's.
That to me is unacceptable.

It may be that the new HP printers have a more acceptable ink
supply. If that is true then I might look at it. I would be very
interested in knowing how many 8 x 10's you can get for your new
printer.

Click to expand...

I will let you know... how much are the Canon carts? At least here in the states it is cheaper to buy the HP cart over the three Canon carts. So if ink usage is roughly even then the price will be about the same.

Chas74624 said:

I will let you know... how much are the Canon carts? At least here
in the states it is cheaper to buy the HP cart over the three Canon
carts. So if ink usage is roughly even then the price will be about
the same.

Click to expand...

I think the Canon carts hold more ink so can produce more pictures from said amount. I am still looking into the cost of ink so haven't found out any prices for sure. I'll let you know.

Paul S.

Paul Stuckless said:

I think the Canon carts hold more ink so can produce more pictures
from said amount. I am still looking into the cost of ink so
haven't found out any prices for sure. I'll let you know.

Click to expand...

I am not sure. I know that the HP Black holds 19ml and each of the new color carts hold 17ml. I could not find that info on the Canon carts.

Chas said:

Paul Stuckless said:

I think the Canon carts hold more ink so can produce more pictures
from said amount. I am still looking into the cost of ink so
haven't found out any prices for sure. I'll let you know.

Click to expand...

I am not sure. I know that the HP Black holds 19ml and each of the
new color carts hold 17ml. I could not find that info on the Canon
carts.

Click to expand...

The Canon carts are definately larger with Color since each holds 13ml - I went to the store. The black was the same as the HP - though the HP was more expensive it is a pigmented ink and not dye based.

Chas said:

Chas said:

Paul Stuckless said:

I think the Canon carts hold more ink so can produce more pictures
from said amount. I am still looking into the cost of ink so
haven't found out any prices for sure. I'll let you know.

Click to expand...

I am not sure. I know that the HP Black holds 19ml and each of the
new color carts hold 17ml. I could not find that info on the Canon
carts.

Click to expand...

The Canon carts are definately larger with Color since each holds
13ml - I went to the store. The black was the same as the HP -
though the HP was more expensive it is a pigmented ink and not dye
based.

Click to expand...

I also went to the store today and this is what I found out:

Canon s520
Colour ink - 13 ml per colour @ $20(CAN) each
Black ink - 27 ml @ $20(CAN) each
Total of 39 ml colour and 27 ml black @$80(CAN)

HP 5550
colour ink - 17 ml total ( 6 ml per colour) @ $45(CAN)
Black ink - 19 ml(?) @ $20(CAN)
Total 17 ml colour and 19 ml black $65(CAN)

HP 932C (waht I have now)
Colour #78 full size - 38 ml total ( 12ml per colour) @ $99(CAN)
Black ink - 27 ml(?) @ $45(CAN)
Total 38 ml colour and 27 ml balck $135(CAN)!!!!

Epson C80
Colour ink - 9 ml per colour @ $30(CAN) each
Black ink - 12 ml @ $20(CAN) each
Total of 27 ml colour and 12ml black @ $110(CAN)

Due to the superior quantities of ink vs. $, I think the Canon s520 wins hands down. ( Sorry for the Canadian $, take my numbers and multiply them by .63 to get approx. $US). I know the HP 932C at 38 ml colour will produce 40 8 x 10's So you can work out how many 8 x 10's the other printers will make with the amount of ml given.

Hope this helps, I know it has made up my mind...

Paul S.

It's great to have a photo printer for occasional use. For quantity printer, why would you not use a photo service? Even Wallmart does this off of a disk and if I'm not mistaken, it's .29 a print on photo quality paper. They do all the work. If you have a program like Adobe Elements or Adobe Photoshop, you can do all of you color corrections, cropping, etc. Wallmart in an hour can print out your stuff with remarkable accurate reproductions. By the time you factor in the cost of ink, paper, your time, your errors, etc. it is far more cost effective to do it this way. If you have a fast internet connection, you can upload this to a service and have it returned to you via mail. Just another view, but it works for me.

Paul Stuckless said:

Chas said:

Chas said:

Paul Stuckless said:

I think the Canon carts hold more ink so can produce more pictures
from said amount. I am still looking into the cost of ink so
haven't found out any prices for sure. I'll let you know.

Click to expand...

I am not sure. I know that the HP Black holds 19ml and each of the
new color carts hold 17ml. I could not find that info on the Canon
carts.

Click to expand...

The Canon carts are definately larger with Color since each holds
13ml - I went to the store. The black was the same as the HP -
though the HP was more expensive it is a pigmented ink and not dye
based.

Click to expand...

I also went to the store today and this is what I found out:

Canon s520
Colour ink - 13 ml per colour @ $20(CAN) each
Black ink - 27 ml @ $20(CAN) each
Total of 39 ml colour and 27 ml black @$80(CAN)

HP 5550
colour ink - 17 ml total ( 6 ml per colour) @ $45(CAN)
Black ink - 19 ml(?) @ $20(CAN)
Total 17 ml colour and 19 ml black $65(CAN)

HP 932C (waht I have now)
Colour #78 full size - 38 ml total ( 12ml per colour) @ $99(CAN)
Black ink - 27 ml(?) @ $45(CAN)
Total 38 ml colour and 27 ml balck $135(CAN)!!!!

Epson C80
Colour ink - 9 ml per colour @ $30(CAN) each
Black ink - 12 ml @ $20(CAN) each
Total of 27 ml colour and 12ml black @ $110(CAN)

Due to the superior quantities of ink vs. $, I think the Canon s520
wins hands down. ( Sorry for the Canadian $, take my numbers and
multiply them by .63 to get approx. $US). I know the HP 932C at 38
ml colour will produce 40 8 x 10's So you can work out how many 8
x 10's the other printers will make with the amount of ml given.

Hope this helps, I know it has made up my mind...

Paul S.

Click to expand...

--
The best to you!