What is a good printer for A99 photos?

I had a question: What is a good inkjet printer for A99 photos? ie which inkjet printer has the best "Bang for the Buck" ? I have not seen this thread lately in this forum.

GaryG

A question worth discussing is: "What is the best printer for _me_?"

And the only way to make the discussion worthwhile is to list your needs:

- size of prints?

- viewing distance?

- papers you intend to use?

- how much printing?

- matte? glossish? grayscale?

- any anomalous factors (printing or display environments, noise concerns, software compatibility, etc.)

- some idea of your budget for this purchase would also be helpful.

I'm happy to recommend, in general, the Epson 3880, which is the smallest and least-expensive of their "Pro" printers. I've had mine for 2-3 years. If it were to stop working, I would immediately purchase another. If my income stream ever turns into a river, I will almost surely buy an Epson 9900.

I don't know of any camera other than ones limited to grayscale images that would have any bearing on the printer you select.

If you don't have a hardware-based color calibrator, you should include buying one in your printing budget.

Gary make sure you check out the printer and printing forum on Dpreview,also! Lots of good info there.

BigGG said:

I had a question: What is a good inkjet printer for A99 photos? ie which inkjet printer has the best "Bang for the Buck" ? I have not seen this thread lately in this forum.

GaryG

Click to expand...

I print with an old HP B9180.. Has been a love / annoyance relationship..

Get an Epson.. when it dies that is what I will replace it with.

http://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/jsp/ProductCategory.do?oid=-17652

HP makes the better office printers like my All-in-one scanner fax etc. IMHO

But they dipped their toe into quality small pro photo printers and jumped right out..

I have no opinion of Canon except that there seem to be some good deals at times people who get them are happy.

As said there is really not anything camera specific so I would read some of the other "what printer to buy" threads in the DPR printer forum,

Gary, as mentioned, check out the printer forum here on dpreview. I did that after I saw this deal on the Canon Pixma Pro-100. It was included in a bundle and I figured it was just a cheapee, but boy was I wrong. This is a high quality photo printer. Its a wide format printer of 13 x 19 too, but of course can print smaller images.

Here is the best part, and its a real/true deal and is still available till the end of June from B&H photo, where I bought mine and free shipping too. It has a $300 rebate, so you end up paying just $100 for it after the rebate. and Canon turns out to be good and prompt with the rebate (something I normally hate and was concerned with) the rebate is in the form of an AmEx card, but you can spend that many places. We just used it to buy our groceries at the local super market and it didn't take long to spend the $300 rebate.

The printer forum has multiple threads on this printer and some great expertise too. Another important aspect is that there is a kit refill that reproduces the colors accurately that the "experts" on the forum recommend, so it reduces ink costs to where its not a real issue, otherwise ink can be costly. This is a big and heavy printer, no lightweight here. Also it can print DVD's that have ink jet printable surfaces, another bonus for me. This printer is not designed for text really, but a photo printer. The deal from B&H includes 50 sheets of Canon 13 x 19 paper. Our local store want almost $100 just for the paper. the fact that the paper is a separate product included by B&H is how they get the rebate up to $300 versus $200, nice of them to throw it in for free.

Do take a look. I know you said you only want to print 8 x10 but this printer can not only do that well, but gives you the option to go bigger, as that nice A99 camera you have, you can certainly take advantage of that perhaps.

I would estimate that I have owned at least 30 color printers, 29 of them HP. Once I bought the Canon, I would never go back. I print book front and rear covers on mine along with large images. I can let the printer sit for a couple months, fire it up and get a perfect print every time. You'll never do that with an HP. Go Canon.

Ive been printing my own for many many years...

there is no such thing as a Sony A99 printer, or one designed around an A99.

When consitering a printer there are many things to consider.

The printers engine is a big issue, but then so are the quality of the paper and the ink.

How small the droplet is in each head. When it comes to quality prints ( speed is not a consideration.) So don't buy into the notion that printing a full page can be achieved in under a 20 seconds.

Also if you are pprinting a lot of photos, you may want to consider a third party ink supplier which can deliver OEM quality ink at a reduced price.. eg. OEM ink catritdge could be 19 dollars or one cartridge. And if the printer you use only takes propriitary ink you will have to pay 19 a cartiridge compared to 7 dollars for a third party oem quailiy ISO 9000 / 9001 complaint quality inki supplier.

The last thing you want is a printer with high ( 6 to 8 individual cartridges ) ink color cartirdges. You do not want a cartridge that has three colors in one cartridge, you want individual cartigeges and the more colors the better.

Most Photo quality printers have 6 to eight colors..

Lastly, there are archival printers who's inks are guaranteed not to fade for 100 years. Of course the paper also has to archival quality.

I've been using Epson printer for 20 years, you can buy OEM quality inks from third party suppliers.

I have all chrome inks, my large format photo printer used 8 inks. So rather than telling you what I have specifically, do some research into printers with high color content cartridges. high number of colors.

Good luck, and do the research before making the decision.

Bill

I have owned a few different photo printers and have finally settled on a printer I like... Costco! I have owned 3 Canons and one Epson. I have had clogging issues with all of them! If you print a few times a week or sell your work I can see how owning a printer would be worth it. If you are just printing a few "one offs" every month or so I would recommend a good printing service (I have had good luck with Costco). Trust me... it will be much cheaper in the short run and the long run! Ink + paper costs of printing your own are usually higher than using a printer service. Once you factor in the ink wasted on clearing nozzles and blotched prints a printing service is usually quite a bit cheaper!

Aftermarket inks tend to have more clogging issues than OEM inks. If you do a lot of printing on a regular basis I can see how you might get away with using aftermarket inks. If you only print occasionally I would recommend sticking to OEM inks... they have enough clogging issues by them selves without using after market inks.

The worst abuse of an inkjet photo printer is not using it! With no use the ink drys and those microscopic tubes and ink paths start to clog. If you must buy a printer look for one with a not too expensive user replaceable print head! Most print heads cost more than the initial printer price.

Of the printers I have owned the Canons were the least troublesome and HP's were by far the worst to deal with!

I pretty much agree with Evil except on the inks. I use Canon printers, paper and inks. Sure it costs more but I have found the OEM inks last and last and last instead of fading like the 3rd party inks did that I tested.

Ive never had an issue with ISO certified third party inks, in the last five or six years. I own 4 printers ( my wife and I ) my wife does scrap booking and has a portable epson photo mate, and an Epson all in one photo quality printer scanner, copier. I have, an Epson Photo printer and an Epson Large format printer. Years ago 10/15 years ago, inkjet printers were not designed as well as they are today. I have not had a clogging problem in at least 5 or 6 years , because printing technology has changed. The nozzle heads are now highly polished to avoid any clogging caused by lack of use. HP is a great printer manufacturer but you are locked into their ink, making printing cost of photos more expensive. With the cost of high quality paper and proprietary ink, it cost more to print them at home then it does to have a service do it. The only advantage is its fun, and convenient. I've used Epson printers for 20 years and I could use any brand, built I have no reason to switch.
Here is something else you might find interesting.

My wife's 3 in one was older technology and had an older style head design, and she needed a new set of inks. So I went to Epson's website ( this was 4 years ago ) I went to their refurbished section and found a printer for her at half the cost with New inks. ( A little more (50 dollars ) than the cost of buying New proprietary inks ) These refurbished units have the same guarantee as a new one, come with brand new inks, and they are as good as a new one. they replace anything including the complete outside casing. They hand tune the existing engine and replace anything that is an issue including using upgraded parts in the head. You can save as much as 100 dollars buying a refurbed unit.

BTW I have ( over the years ) found that my printers like Canon high end paper, and Epson's Professional Luster Photo quality paper and archival paper. I use Epson's Photo Mat paper as well.

Lastly, most printers do a good job, because printer technology has changed so much over the last 5 or six years.

You want your prints to jump off the paper? Use a printer that offers eight inks in their design, one with two different shades of black and a cartridge that fills in the pixels that other printers use the paper ( white ) emulsion of the paper for anything white. This filler cartridge fills in every pixel on the paper, leaving the surface perfectly filled.

Just my 20 years of printer experience.

Bill

Travelino said:

Gary, as mentioned, check out the printer forum here on dpreview. I did that after I saw this deal on the Canon Pixma Pro-100. It was included in a bundle and I figured it was just a cheapee, but boy was I wrong. This is a high quality photo printer. Its a wide format printer of 13 x 19 too, but of course can print smaller images.

Click to expand...

Thanks all for the useful information. I ordered a Pixma Pro-100 from BH for $399 with a $300 dollar rebate which means I get a good 13" wide printer for $99... A great deal.

GaryG

P.S. This is one of the photos I want to print.




Raffles Beijing Hotel, Chang'an Avenue on National Day 2013, Sony A99 _ Sigma 35mm F/1.4 ART

Canon is a great printer but to replace a set of cartridges will cost you 130.00 dollars. Canon uses only proprietary inks and it can be very expensive. Unfortunately ,You can not buy third part inks for that printer.

Those same 8 inks in a non proprietary manufacturer will cost you less than 50 dollars, and guaranteed to be the same quality and volume or better than OEM or your money back.

That's why I posted what I did.

Bill

I've been very happy with my Epson R2000 wide format printer. High capacity cartridges last quite a while, archival pigment ink, wide color gamut, dedicated matte black ink that doesn't require swapping, dedicate red and orange inks really help with skin tones and hard to print colors.

I use mainly Red River paper with it using either their profiles or my custom made profiles or will print using Epson paper with the Epson supplied profiles.

This is a printer I highly recommend.

[No message]

Gary, I think you will be pleased as I have with my Pro-100 Its such a great deal at that price. If you haven't done so, please take a look for threads under the printer forum on this site. There is some great expertise and lots of info, including refill kits you can get and save a bundle. Also lots of info there on color correction, so you print what you see from your monitor. I've spent a bunch of time on that forum reading and asking questions.

B&H is also great and responsive. What I would suggest, is testing the printer for a while before cutting out the upc code and mailing in the rebate. I waited almost a month just in case it died and I had to send it back to B&H. You will find the carton this printer comes in to be very thick cardboard and you need to cut out the upc code with all the cardboard intact, but they are very good at speedy processing the rebate from my experience and others I've read about, maybe 2 to 3 weeks total time at most, but like everything you can't count on that, because they do say allow more weeks.

i Use these two Canon printers.

http://www.dpreview.com/products/canon/printers/canon_pixmapro1

http://www.dpreview.com/products/canon/printers/canon_pixmapro10

printing Media, i prefer several Ilford printing papers, cheaper then Canon and imho the structure of the paper gives the results i prefer.

http://www.ilford.com/

Epson is also great, but i never used it ( only seen results by friend ) maybe next time i buy a printer i go the Epson road.

--
*All my Post Processing is done with Capture NX2*
Flickr Photo's
Galleries on DPR

This is a great forum whose members freely give their information.

GaryG

Ahoy!

Inkjet will cost thousands in ink alone. Consider this . . how much would it cost for a litre of fuel if you paid inkjet ink price by volume? Well, probably the same as the USA national debt, that's how much and the printer will be knackered in a matter of months. I haven't started on photo quality paper that will costs the same as the UK national debt. I think you can see where this is going. Unless you can afford the toner, correct paper type and a pro-grade laser printer, then don't even bother.

It's very much a false economy and you'll be best advised to have images printed by online firms such as RedBubble, Photobox, Bonus Print, Snapfish or the numerous other online printing companies for standard or enlarged prints, though there are very affordable options for laminated and canvas prints.