advise on printers

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loneranger

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I am looking for advise on photo printers. I need to cut some of my photo printing costs, currently I am just using a pro photo lab that give me C type prints on my scans, but it is becoming way too expensive. What would you guys recommend for a printer that can give me 8x10 and occasionally 11x14 prints, for presentation and portfolio, and perhaps occasionally for gallery.. Not too expensive a printer of course, but something that can give me quality COLOR prints , thanks for your help.
 
HP 8750 does great. Superb b&w. They make a slightly lower priced wide carriage as well (forget the number, but my friend is using one). Any maker lowend wide carriage printer will be good as well, but only the HP will do the b&w's so well (Epson pigments are nice, but much more pricey). HP dye based on HP paper is still the most archieval I believe. The only down-side is that you have to use HP paper, which is very nice, but kind of expensive.
 
Hp 8850 great deal on this new printer.Produces pro quality prints.Will do 11x14 too.$299
 
Given your mentioned desire for 11x14" prints, this means a 13" carriage (13x19") printer. Since you also haven't mentioned black-and-white printing at all, the choice of printers is relatively wide.

Both Epson and HP make a few printers in the $400-600 range that can do the job. I've been rather partial to HP the last few years. This HP printer has been well-received, with just a few less features than this one (but both are on sale at the moment).

On the Epson side, this model is the only one that holds my interest. The 2880, on the other hand, now appears to offer smaller ink carts than its predecessor (2800), and I have the sinking feeling that those smaller carts aren't any cheaper than the 2800's. The HPs I've linked to, on the other hand, have huge ink carts; so big, in fact, that they are separated from the print heads via hoses, just like the big-bruiser jobs both companies make. Something to think about.

Another thing to think about, which was one reason I switched from Epson to HP: Epson's heads are permanently mounted in the printer, which means that if a print-head-related problem should crop up, you have to ship the entire printer off to an Epson service center. HP's print heads are user-replaceable, which for me is a big deal. If a head goes bad, simply replace it with a new one. The printers monitor head condition and can give you a heads-up in case there's a problem. In addition, each of these HPs has a closed-loop calibration system, just as on the big boys, which makes proper color calibration easier.

That's my take on it. There'll be a lot more from others that's worth reading.


- Barrett
 
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Thanks everyone, the HP 8850 sounds great and pretty cheap, from what I have gathered online, Epson has some reliability issues so I've decided to stay away from that, can anyone recommend canon, I'd rather spend less than $500, I do mainly color with rare BW, and I do like at least the option of making archival prints. How does canon compare with HP in terms of ink cost, archival quality, etc.
thanks
 
HP 8750 costs ~$299 and the prints are more archival than most pigment inks (check out Wilhelm). Until you do side by side comparisons, don't just think that pigment systems are "better," dye is almost always way more vivid, richer and higher dmax than pigments. I wasn't wowed by the Canon prints. I haven't seen the 8850 output yet, but HP's first pigment printer was nowhere near as good as Epson's pigment offerings. If you aren't interested in b&w, the Epson dye based printers are cheap and good too (if you don't like HP for some reason). Dye based systems look more like traditional photographs, pigments look like something else on fineart papers... like printmaking something... depends on what you are after. I like my photographs to look like photographs.
 
groan! been there, done that... 4 years of hell. HP dyes or Epson gray pigments... they just work.

>>If its pure B&W check out the various Piezo printing bulk ink options.
 
Thanks mh2000, I like your comments. I definitely want my prints to have the C print look, I cannot stand that superreal digital look, I guess the dye versus pigment is a controversial subject, I naturally assumed pigment was better but I guess I was wrong.
 
(To second mh2000's remarks...)

In the name of full disclosure, my main printer for the last few years has been an HP 8750, and, save for the fact that HP just recently discontinued it, I can't say enough great stuff about it. The dye-based inks are essentially free of the artifacts that still plague most pigment-ink-based printers (namely metamerism, bronzing, and gloss differential), while still offering pretty much the same archival stability. My current show was printed on the 8750, and I've gotten quite a few positive comments on the quality of the prints in the last month. And that's just for the color output; IMO, the 8750's black-and-white output, especially on glossy and satin paper, is in another league altogether.

You can likely find new-in-the-box 8750 from the usual suspects (eBay, Amazon, etc.). I'm tempted to buy a second one to mothball as a spare. That's how much I like it.


- Barrett
 
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I'm sure the B8550 is just as good.

I'm preparing for a little show coming up and the prints are coming out great... HP & b&w is just a joy!

🙂
 
I own the HP9180. It drive me nuts, can't get the colors to print correctly, I get banding and sometimes stains. I guess it can be all solved but have no patience for this. A printer should print without too much tweaking and not the hours I have spent on it.
 
Yep, nearly forgot: Canon has certainly gotten up to speed in terms of printing in recent years, and like HP, the heads are user-replaceable.


- Barrett
 
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