The old days of sending your film out to be developed and waiting days to see what they looked like are quickly fading into the past as today's photo printers make everything so much easier and quicker. Now all you have to do is just snap your photos, hook up your camera to the photo printer and in seconds your beautiful prints are pouring out before your very eyes. It's really that simple!
Of course, you can also upload your photos to your computer and edit them before printing too. With all of the photo editing software that is available for use today, there is no reason that your photos can't look like like they came straight from a photo lab as they come out of your printer. But which photo printer should you buy?
The term photo printer is often used for just the small specialized snapshot printers that only produce 4 X 6 photos and no enlargements, but these days even their larger brethren are being called photo printers since that is the main use that many folks are putting them to at home. Here are a few digital photo printer reviews to help you find a high quality printer for your needs:
If a snapshot printer happens to be all that you really need, a good unit to look into is the Epson PictureMate Deluxe Viewer Edition that comes with a 2.4 inch LCD preview screen and is really economical to operate, producing great 4 X 6 photos that only costs on average a little over 20 cents each.
If a larger inkjet photo printer is needed, the Canon Pixma iP4000 is almost universally agreed to be one of the best in it's category. It uses four separate ink cartridges for improved image results and a special black ink that makes photos just pop off the page with contrast. It is also a great multi-function printer, but it makes an excellent photo printer as well.
For those who want even more professional results, and capability to print enlargements on up to 13 X 19 inches, the Canon i9900 would be a great selection. It uses 8 ink cartridges with 2 picoliter droplets to produce outstanding photo results, and can even print a 13 X 19 borderless print in under three minutes, making it blazing fast too.
Any of these digital photo printers would make a great choice, but we tried to select a printer for each level of photography from that of just wanting to print snapshots alone, to those who are more serious about their photography, and then even to the most demanding of serious photographers. All of these three printers have received very high marks from online independent and consumer reviews, so a selection of any one of them should be a very wise choice.
Digital Photo Printer Reviews
Epson Picturemate Deluxe offers fast and easy photo printing, editing and printing at home or office. You can print your photos on glossy 4x6 paper. With this photo printer, it is a quick process to make a direct printing from any PictBridge compatible digital camera and memory cards, and you don't need a PC. You can view your images in clear details on its photo viewer. Epson Picturemate Deluxe lacks an adapter for mini SD cards.
This is truly a very good medium level photo printer. Here are some of the important specifications and features (and my comments) of Epson Picturemate Deluxe:
* There are a lot of image options, including mini-wallets, fun Disney borders, and Borderless
* Premium 2.4-inch photo viewer for selecting and editing photos makes the selecting and printing of the photo pretty good
* Direct photo printing from popular digital camera memory cards without a PC with memory slots of all sizes
* It uses the Advanced Micro-Piezo ink jet print technology that is optimized for photo printing
* Up to 5,760 x 1,440 color dpi resolution which is more than any normal home user would probably need
* Printer supports CompactFlash Type I and II, Secure Digital (SD), MMC, Memory Stick (including PRO, Duo, MagicGate), SmartMedia, Microdrive xD-Picture Card
* ContrastPLUS 5-color ink system; built-in two-sided printing (again great for a home printer, you probably will not use it a lot but still is good to have)
Here what comes in the regular box: Epson PictureMate Deluxe printer, power cable, starter PictureMate photo printer ink cartridge, 20 sheets of PictureMate Photo Paper, CD-ROM, user guides; Epson Software Film Factory (PC and Macintosh compatible, P.I.M. and Exif Print-enabled0029
The street price of this printer ranges between $175 and $250 but this is only a part of the story as we all know. It is the supplies that will make the bulk of the cost of ownership.
With Epson PictureMate deluxe, printer supplies cost seems to be reasonable with OEM cartridge being about $35. There are also quality compatible cartridges that you can use for about only $12 or so.
Now lets calculate the true cost of ownership (per month) of this printer. This is how we calculate cost of ownership of a printer: ?number of prints per month? times ?cost of the printer cartridge? divided by ?the yield of the printer cartridge?.
For example, lets assume that you will print 20 photos per month using this printers ink cartridge set that yields about 20 photos and a set of cartridges cost $35 for the genuine Epson brand ink cartridges. The monthly "cost of ownership" is then
(20 photos) x ($35) / 20 pages = $35 / month. A little pricey, but if you were using the Epson compatible replacement cartridges (good quality ones exist and comparable to OEMs unless you are in professional photography printing of course), the cost of ownership would be a much more reasonable of about $12 / month with the same formula.
Both Jim Johnson & Christy Berger are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.
Jim Johnson has sinced written about articles on various topics from Information Technology, Dental Practice and Abdominal. You can find photo printer reviews by visiting our Digital Photography website at http://www.photographyconsumerguide.com/photo-printers.html.. Jim Johnson's top article generates over 301000 views. to your Favourites.
