Photo Printers

The Canon Selphy CP790 Compact Photo Printer is a portable, mushroom-shaped powerhouse making it interesting for review. It is a very practical solution to the problem of carrying around all the bits and pieces needed to get this dye-sublimation printer working.

Features:

Canon Selphy CP790 has a unique Storage Basket which can easily hold the paper and ink cassettes, cable, AC adapter and battery pack that comes as an option. In addition, its special locking mechanism helps hold everything together when you carry the printing party with you anywhere you go. Even though the printer itself is much like Canon’s other small dye-sub machines, this machine has an oval, lime green top, into the top of which are set a 76 mm LCD display for previewing our images, ink and paper in one cassette and a series of five push buttons. In the centre of these is a four-way selection cross with, embedded in the middle, one of Canon’s Easy-Scroll Wheel for browsing quickly through menus.

Each of the sides of Selphy CP790 mushroom’s ’stem’ includes a door or sockets. On the left we would find sockets for the small, white power block, which delivers low-voltage DC to power the whole machine, a USB socket for connection to a PC or Mac and a PictBridge socket for printing directly from the camera. On the right side we have a cover for the film cartridge. SELPHY printers work by transferring solid ink from a very thin film ribbon onto the glossy photo paper, using a thermal print head. The cartridge supplied with CP790 is enough for just five photos, but consumables are available in 36-print and 108-print packs, which include both paper and cassettes. In the front we would see sockets for SD, MemoryStick and CompactFlash cards. There is an infrared sensor too, and a Bluetooth adapter is available as an option. Also at the front is a pull-down flap so we can plug in a paper cassette when printing. Two paper cassettes are supplied with the printer, one for 15 x 10 cm postcards and the other for business card-sized prints. A socket for the printer paper to feed out between each printing pass is present at the rear end.

All the parts fit in an oval, green bucket and the printer clips into its top. This is a very convenient way of transporting the machine. The bucket comes complete with a handle; though no spade and the whole system loses a little in portability, as we have to pay extra for the optional battery. CP790 comes with an applet called SELPHY Photo Print and a print driver and is compatible with both Windows and OS X.

Performance:

When we print, the paper is fed into the SELPHY CP790 and out the back of the machine. Later, it feeds through four times, being rewound between each feed, and layers of yellow, magenta and cyan dye-sub ink are laid down, followed by a final, clear, covering layer to protect the print. Despite this complicated process a four-pass 15 x 10cm print would take 58 seconds to complete from a PC, exactly a minute from an SD card and 54seconds from a PictBridge camera. All three times are quick when compared with many inkjet printers, including the small-format Photosmarts from HP.

Dye-sublimation technology employed in this Selphy CP790 printer makes use of heat to transfer ink to the paper, reproducing around 16.8 million colours for incredible pictures in both colour as well as  black and white. A clear protective coating is included that prevents against damage from light, water and gases so that your cherished photos last a lifetime. The CP790 comes with integrated Creative Options like Frames, Photo Diary Print, Calendars and much more to provide our photos a great personal touch we want when sharing those precious moments. It can also print borderless images in Postcard and Credit Card sizes or Black & White photographs. The Portrait Image Optimize feature helps you automatically deliver backlight correction for the photo prints, face detection and noise reduction while printing.

Print quality of these prints in this Canon Selphy CP790 Portable Photo Printer is pretty close to traditional silver halide photographs. There is very little of the dottiness of inkjet prints, as the ink in dye-sub printers is very briefly vapourised, or sublimated, to transfer it from the film in the cartridge to the print and the inks mix, giving what is often referred to as continuous tone print, without ink dots. Photo test prints look good, with smooth transitions between colours and sharp detail in foregrounds. By default, colours are rather dark, but flesh tones are natural enough. Overall, these images are easily as good as the best to come out of equivalently-priced inkjet printers and far better than some traditional photos.

Canon has taken its eye off the ball when it comes to pricing the consumables for the SELPHY CP790. The rival companies, such as HP and Kodak, are offering colour prints for cheaper price. But, it is worth paying a bit more for the convenience of printing wherever and whenever we wish.

Warranty:

The Canon Selphy CP790 Compact Photo Printer is available with a standard warranty of one year.

Verdict:

Stylish and compact, simple and smart, the SELPHY CP790 is a great little printer in lot of ways. Although CP790’s ‘toadstool in a bucket’ design might be a bit gimmicky, there is no denying it is a convenient way of carrying printer, cassettes, power supply and spare consumables. It is very easy to use and is versatile, printing from USB, PictBridge, memory cards, optionally Bluetooth and even infrared. Prints quickly and can produce lab-quality photos. With its range of creative functions and convenient features, it is also ideal for families for cherishing memories. Unfortunately, its expensive running cost lets it down.

Check other Canon Photo Printers, Compact Photo Printer Reviews in this website.

Canon Selphy CP790 Photo Inkjet Printer - Technical Specification Table

Manufacturer	Canon
Model Name	SELPHY CP790
Technology	Thermal dye sublimation
Type	Compact photo - dye sublimation - colour
Form Factor	Portable
Dimensions (W x D x H)	247x 178 x 86 mm
Weight	1.1 Kg
Max Resolution (colour)	300 x 300 dpi (Dots per inch)
Sheet feed capacity	20 photo blanks
Features	3.0" LCD Display, My Colours, Portrait Image Optimize, Red-Eye Correction, Storage Basket, Easy-Scroll Wheel, Power Save, Voice Guidance through PC
Connections	1 x USB - 4 pin USB B 1 x infrared – IrDA 1 x direct print port - 4 pin USB A
Interface	USB, Infrared, direct print USB
Connectivity Technology	Wireless, wired
Connection Type	USB 2.0
Print Speed	Up to 0.8 min/page - 4 in x 6 in
Supported Flash Memory Cards	Memory Stick, Memory Stick PRO, Microdrive, MultiMediaCard, SD Memory Card, Memory Stick Duo, xD-Picture Card, Memory Stick PRO Duo, miniSD, CompactFlash Card, MultiMediaCardmobile, MultiMediaCardplus, MultiMediaCardmicro, SDHC Memory Card, miniSDHC, Memory Stick Micro (M2)
Media Type	Photo paper
Media Support	Postcard Size (100mm x 148mm) Credit Card Size (54mm x 86mm) Wide Size (100mm x 200mm); Credit Card Stickers Mini Size – 8 stickers per card Credit Card Size Stickers
Fade Resistance	Up to 100 years in album
Ink tank types	Three colour with clear ribbon
Power Device	Power adapter - external
Direct Printing Specifications	PictBridge, Canon Direct Print
Power Supply	60W
Noise Level	62dBA
Certified for Windows Vista	Certified for Windows Vista software and devices have undergone compatibility tests for ease-of-use, better performance and enhanced security.
Options	Bluetooth adapter, battery, different paper cassettes
Printing Software	Canon Selphy photo print and driver
Accessories	BU-30 Bluetooth Unit NB-CP2L Battery Pack CA-CP200 Compact Power Adapter PCL-CP300 L Size Paper Cassette PCC-CP300 Card Size Paper Cassette PCW-CP100 Wide Size Paper Cassette
Compatible OS	Microsoft Windows XP, Microsoft Windows Vista, Apple MacOS X 10.4 - 10.5
Warranty	1 Year

Canon printers have been giving Epson and HP printers a pretty good run for their money over the last few years. Pixma is the latest attempt by Canon to corner the market. Canon has gone for a practical design for its iX5000 printer.

Design Features:

Canon Pixma iX5000 Photo Inkjet Printer is square-cut with a traditional paper throughput from rear to front. It makes use of a four-stage telescopic output tray specially intended for this purpose. This Photo Inkjet printer has two buttons control for power besides a paper feed. There is a PictBridge socket at the front and you will find a USB 2.0 port at the rear ends. The set-up and installation of Pixma iX5000 is quite standard and take about half an hour for both hardware and software. Connection is by way of a standard USB 2.0 cable, which we need to buy separately.

Output tray:

The Canon iX5000 inkjet printer does not look particularly exciting, but it is neat and seems to be tough and durable. Its paper input tray is well organized and can hold up to 150 sheets of plain paper, but there is no option to use roll paper in this printer. The output tray of iX5000 feels similarly robust and supports A3 paper to prevent curling. With the exception of the print bed and mechanics, the parts and casing of this printer are all plastic. The sharply angled tray means the footprint is just a touch smaller than competitive A3 models.

Physical Dimensions:

Dimensions and weight are low enough for one person to install the printer and carry on their own. As with the case of Canon models, the print heads and inks have to be fitted separately, using a simple snap-in process. It is at this point that the main cost-cutting angle of this printer is revealed, when you realise the straightforward use of colour.

Faster data transfer:

With a well-built design and bigger operational buttons the Pixma iX5000 offers a great sense of reliability and ease of use. The Auto Feeder comes with the ability to hold up to 150 sheets, accounting for ease of use and comfort. The printer has a USB2.0 Hi-Speed interface for a much faster data transfer and it is compatible with both Windows as well as Mac OS X. Canon’s Pixma iX5000 inkjet printer prints on paper up to A3+ (329 × 483mm). Therefore, it is a good compromise between an A4 printer and expensive large-format device.

Cartridges:

As with many other Canon Pixma printers, setting up the Canon iX5000 involves fitting its print head before slotting in the ink cartridges. It uses PGI-5BK pigment black ink and the     CLI-8 cyan, magenta and yellow cartridges which are used in many current A4 Pixma devices. These three cartridges would last for an average of 93 A4 photos; however, an A3+ page has two and a half times the area.  The black is a double size cartridge, whereas others offer a standard, relatively tiny, reservoir.

Canon FINE technology:

Canon employs FINE technology with 2pl ink droplets in Pixma iX5000 Photo Inkjet Printer which delivers a 4800 x 1200 dpi (Dots per inch) print resolution. The new technology means that the output is equivalent to competing six-ink models. But the inks are dye-based rather than pigment-based, which means the available gamut is very different and longevity is also an issue. The Single Ink Print system which is transparent has been employed in the printer that makes sure it delivers a cost-effective operation and reduces ink wastage. The iX5000 costs less than photo-orientated A3+ inkjets such as Epson’s Stylus Photo R1800 or Canon’s i9950.

Optimisation & Enhancement features:

The ChromaLife100 label assures that fading is minimal over a century under ideal conditions. But when exposed to air, this figure goes down to a decade or so. As most people do not keep their prints in a darkened room in a vacuum, the latter figure is more likely to reflect the real-world longevity. The supplied software holds the usual range of easy-quick photo utilities. More interesting in the printer is the main driver, which includes a couple of optimisation and enhancement features that try to add more punch and colour to prints. There is also a noise reduction tool, which attempts to remove graininess and other artifacts from our images.

Speed Performance:

This advanced iX5000 A3+ printer offers a remarkable A4 printing speed of 17ppm in colour and in mono format of up to 25ppm delivering professional productivity. It prints on a wide range of photograph sizes that range up to A3+. You can also take full advantage of its quick result for all the tasks. With the Canon Pixma iX5000, we can receive an A3+ size photo laboratory quality printing in or about 166 sec in regular mode.

Excellent Print quality:

In spite of the printer’s four-colour print system, the print quality for photos is generally quite good and colours appear natural and well-balanced. There is a lot of fine detail available in both bright as well as shadowed areas of an image. It can handle the graduated tints exceptionally well and solid colours are highly consistent, although sometimes not as clear as the originals. Though there is the possibility of a slight feathering into plain paper, black text is fairly free from jaggies. All your favourite photos can be viewed in a large and beautiful format. Also, one can enjoy rapid borderless photograph that prints on a range of various sizes.

Prints sharp texts:

The Canon Pixma iX5000 Colour Inkjet Printer enables us to print sharp texts and exciting colour graphics. If you require professional, superb quality photo prints, the stand alone printer can deliver crisp and sharp black text of striking and rich colour graphics. This feature is perfect for reports, documents, web pages, spreadsheets and photographs too. It can print photos straight from virtually all PictBridge that is compatible with camcorders and digital cameras. It can perform well without a PC as well. Excellent results can be observed in a short moment after the photographs are taken.

Warranty:

Pixma iX5000 Photo Inkjet Printer comes with the standard warranty and support of one year.

Verdict:

Canon Pixma iX5000 Photo Inkjet Printer is the ideal choice for users who are basking for professional, high quality prints. Though it is a bit heavy, this printer delivers sharp and crisp black text of rich and vibrant colour graphics. Moreover, it is easy to use and a reasonably priced wide-format A3 printer from the Canon.

Check other Canon Photo Printer Models, Reviews, Specs in this website.

Canon Pixma iX5000 Inkjet Printer - Technical Specification Table

Manufacturer	Canon
Model Name	Canon Pixma iX5000 Photo Inkjet Printer
Technology	4 single ink, FINE print head, 2 pl Micro-Nozzles
Type	Colour photo inkjet printer
Dimensions (W x D x H)	601 x 317.6 x 193.2 mm
Weight	9.3 Kg
Speed	Photo Lab Quality Speed: borderless 10 x 15cm in Approx. 51 seconds (standard); A3+ in approx. 166 seconds (standard) Mono Print Speed: Up to 25ppm (max.) & 12.2ppm (standard) Colour Print Speed: Text & Graphics at up to 17ppm (Max.) & 9.5ppm (standard)
Maximum Resolution (B&W)	Up to 4800 x 1200 dpi
Maximum Resolution (Colour)	Up to 4800 x 1200 dpi
Media Type	Plain Paper, Envelopes, Photo Paper Pro (PR-101) Photo Paper Plus Double Sided (PP-101D) Photo Paper Plus Glossy (PP-101) Matte Photo Paper (MP-101) High Resolution Paper (HR-101N) Photo Paper Plus Semi-gloss (SG-101) Glossy Photo Paper ‘Everyday Use’ (GP-501) Transparency (CF-102) T-shirt Transfer (TR-301) Glossy Photo Paper (GP-401) Photo Stickers (PS-101) Super White Paper (SW-201)
Max media capacity	150 Sheets
Interface	Hi-Speed USB 2.0 port Printing from PictBridge-compliant Direct Print Port: Camera direct photo Digital cameras & camcorders
Maximum number of ink colours	4 colours
Cartridges	Single Ink technology - 4 separate ink tanks (PGI-5BK, CLI-8C, CLI-8M, CLI-8Y)
Compatible OS	Windows XP Mac OS X v10.2.8 or later Windows Me or Windows 98 Windows 2000
Software Included	Windows: Easy-WebPrint, Easy-PhotoPrint, PhotoRecord & Easy-PrintToolBox Mac: Easy-PhotoPrint
Driver Features	Windows: Photo Optimizer PRO, Image Optimizer, Photo Noise Reduction, Vivid Photo Mac: Vivid Photo, Photo Noise Reduction
Temperature Range	5° - 35° C
Noise	Approx. 37dB (A) (best quality mode)
Power Source	100 - 240V AC
Power Consumption	Approx. 17W (printing) Approx. 0.8W (standby)
Microsoft Certification	Certified for Windows Vista
Energy Star Compliant	Yes
Warranty	1 Year

Generally, HP manufactures printers for the consumer and professional Inkjet markets, but until recently, with not too much scope for the semi-professional or sole-trader professional. HP was keen to fill the gap and came up with Photosmart Pro B9180, another example of its scalable print technology in which it relies heavily for future developments. Let us wait no further in reviewing the HP Photosmart B9180 Multifunction Inkjet Printer in detail.

Design features:

The HP Photosmart B9180 Multifunction Inkjet Printer is quite big in size, but has a solid, professional feel. There is a general thought that large areas of plastic in a A3+ printer is pretty flimsy, but not the case with this Inkjet Photo printer. The printer has a boxy functional design having a curved front edge. This means that we have to open it up only when using larger sizes. The printer has a brushed metal panel that nicely folds down to expose a secondary, straight-through paper path. The paper from the main tray does the normal 180-degree turn before it is printed. However, in the top tray, it travels unfettered from front to back. This suggests that the printer could print on card up to 1.5mm thick.

A two lines by 16-character LCD display never fails to show status messages and instructions. There is also a row of 5 buttons underneath that helps you to navigate its menu system. You can find a USB 2.0 and Ethernet sockets at the rear end and the printer is of course network enabled right out of the box.

Installation:

We felt a bit difficult to install the consumables. The HP Pro B9180 requires separate ink cartridges and print heads which you have to install and prime in a set order. First, open the cartridge cover at the left-hand end of the printer and plug it in each of the 8 cartridges. They feature keyed mouldings which allow fitting only in its respective slot. This is followed by the priming of the printer achieved by pumping ink from the print cartridges to the point where the heads are available. When prompted by the LCD display, open the top cover and fit each of the two-colour heads, after you remove the stoppers on the ends of the tubes from the cartridges first. You also need to wipe each print head using a ‘super cotton bud’ that is spirit-soaked and provided with each head in order to get the ink flowing.  Now, you can load the’ calibration pack’ with actually ten sheets of A4 Advanced Photo Paper. Next, allow the paper to perform its own calibration for which you have to wait for about 30 minutes or so. This also involves several test prints and the print quality gets better progressively as a result.

Full calibration process:

A bit of research on the process of Full calibration will tell you that it is a one time process, although ‘closed-loop’ calibration occurs whenever a new, unrecognized media is employed in the printer. While you are waiting for this, the software can be installed that includes a comprehensive driver, a Photoshop plug-in & HP’s Photosmart Premier Application, a simple photo editor which is sufficient to do basic edits and to crop, resize and select images for printing.

Maintenance Software suite:

HP has integrated the HP Photosmart Pro B9180 hardware with a gamut of printing and maintenance software suite and tools. Right at the top of the chart is a plug-in that helps you to print directly from within the Adobe Photoshop offering a real-time preview of the image. This also allows us to choose the colour profile, print size, paper type, borderless options and much more from just within a single window. We always feel that this is the way any form of photo printing should be and is really a joy to use. Besides, HP has included an application, HP Printer Utility serving as the dashboard for interacting with the photo printer. The program incorporates realistic indicators of remaining ink capacity and other useful help screens. There are also facilities that you can make use of for cleaning the printheads that you do not require any more in addition to printing test pages and applying the closed-loop calibration tests.

HP Printer Utility:

The main advantage of the HP Printer Utility is that you can install customer paper profiles straight into the HP Photosmart Pro B9180’s driver. While there is nothing new in using custom colour profile for a particular paper type, HP makes the job much easier for you allowing you add your new profile directly to the paper-type menu.

HP Photosmart Edit:

Additionally, the Photosmart B9180 Inkjet Photo printer also has an application for printing photos namely the HP Photosmart Edit. But given the HP Photosmart Pro B9180’s target audience, we feel most people will be using Photoshop or a similar program to print. A nice feature of HP Photosmart Edit is that it can easily convert colour images to grey scale. It also offers a set of black-and-white transformations akin to conventional camera filters. Photoshop’s Channel Mixer features much more sophisticated set of tools for the same process, but Photosmart Edit without doubt will provide good results.

Performance:

The B9180 is brilliant as it can not only auto-sense the paper type it utilizes, making use of bar codes on the back of HP sheets and its very own densitometer to calibrate for other types, but also sense paper sizes. Also, we found that the printer does not print an image that is fairly big for the loaded paper input which is good under any standards. But one should note that it even tells you if the paper is bigger than is actually required for a given image. This feature helps in avoiding the wastage of costly photo papers.

Excellent print quality:

The pages printed with the printer are of excellent quality. It makes use of pigmented inks all through to provide stunning resistance to fading accredited by the Wilhelm testing laboratory to last for over 200 years. In addition to the regular cyan, yellow and magenta, you will find two blanks – photo black for photo images and matt for text print and other additional colours including light cyan, light grey and light magenta. Colours that you see in the prints are lively, but well controlled; therefore the images do not appear lively when they are not indented to. Colour including reds, blues and greens are quite well rendered, appearing true and natural.  With fine, intricate lineage and sharp edges, the detail is fine. The colour gradation is smooth without obvious bands in the prints. The colour print on plain paper is also highly managed with neat, stipple-free frills and clear, crisp and precise plain text. Black print is not as dense as we may expect. The black and the white images appear a bit darker than the original print.

Print speed:

The print speed is fine for this type of printer and apparently better than the cheapest HP Photosmart 8750. Normally, it would take 1 minute and 18 seconds for printing a five-page text document which is comparatively good for a printer built for photo printing. If it is a 5 page text and graphics print that has to be printed, it will takes only 21 seconds longer. However when you consider the A3+ size print, coming in at 2 minutes and 12seconds, one has to admit that speed has not been sacrificed on the alter of print quality.

Sound levels:

Because it is an inkjet, one would like the sound levels to be as less noisy as possible and in most places; the sound levels were quite below what we could measure. In general you will find some pumping cycles and clicks while the Hewlett Packard printer is re-circulating and maintaining its inks, but these should not be annoying anyways.

Instruction Manuals:

HP provides an easy to use, instructive manual that helps you to get the most out of the printer including discussing profiles, print types and instructions to use the print driver’s integrated colour features as opposed to utilizing Photoshop’s colour features. For someone who is new to pigment-ink printers or looking to augment his or her Photoshop printing knowledge would find the manual highly practical in every way.

Warranty:

The HP Photosmart B9180 Multifunction Inkjet Printer is covered under a standard one-year limited hardware warranty.

Verdict:

The HP’s latest pigment-based Vivera Ink printing technology deployed in this printer receives a fair amount of beating. The vivacity of colour prints is excellent, stained only by insignificant darkening of black and white and this may need some form of compensation. The printer is a unique one, in that it is a product so well thought out and so immaculately built-in with Mac as well as Windows PC. As parting words, this high-end photo inkjet printer brings the feature set and printing quality of high-priced printers to the desktop of any ardent graphic artist or digital photographer.

Check Latest HP Photo Printers Reviews, 2010 Photo Printer Best Buys in our website.

HP Photosmart B9180 Inkjet Printer - Technical Specification Table

Manufacturer	HP
Model Name	Photosmart B9180
Printer Type	Thermal Ink Jet
Dimensions (W x D x H)	673 x 429 x 241 mm
Weight	17.1 kg
Printing Speed (A4, Draft Quality, Black)	Up to 28 ppm
Printing Speed (A4, Draft Quality, Colour)	Up to 26 ppm
Printing Speed (Draft Quality, Colour Photo) on Photograph Paper	As rapid as 10 seconds
Printing Speed Footnote	Depends on print mode, type and rough figures. Precise speed will differ according to the document, system configuration and software program complexity.
Printing Quality (Best Quality, Black)	Up to 1200 x 1200 input dpi & 4800 x 1200 optimized dpi while you print from a PC in only gray in max.dpi-mode
Duty Cycle	Up to 1000 pages per month
Printing Quality (Best Quality, Colour)	Up to 1200 input dpi & 4800 x 1200 optimized dpi while you print from a PC
Display Type	LCD (Two-line text) plus backlight
Print Head Nozzles	24 kHz Max. firing frequency 1056 per nozzles colour
No. of print cartridges	Four dual colour print heads & Hewlett Packard Vivera Eight individual high capacity inks
Memory	64 MB
Media Sizes	A4 (210 mm x 297 mm) A3 (297 mm x 420 mm) C6 (114 mm x 162 mm), 100 mm x 150 mm (inclusive or exclusive of cut-off/tear-off tab) B5 (176 mm x 250 mm) DL (220 mm x 110 mm)
Borderless printing	Available (up to 330 mm x 1117 mm)
Custom Media Sizes	Main Tray: 89 mm x 127 mm to 330 mm x 482 mm Specialty Tray:100 mm x 150 mm to 330 mm x 1117 mm (Only Single sheet)
Media Types supported	Cards (Greeting, Index), Labels, Paper [Photo, Plain, Coated, Inkjet, DFA (Digital Fine Art Media)]
Standard connectivity	Ethernet 802.3 10/100 Base-TX High Speed USB-compatible plus USB 2.0 specifications
Humidity Range Operating	20 to 80% RH
Operating Temperature Range	5 to 40º C
Energy Star certified	No
Acoustic Power Emissions	5.7 B(A) (printing at 2.2 ppm)
OS required	Windows® 2000 XP Professional XP Home Windows Vista™ Certified x64 Edition (supports only USB direct connect) Mac OS X version v10.2.8 (only web download) Version v 10.3, Version v 10.4 & higher
Included Software	HP Photosmart Premier Software
Warranty	1 Year

Epson is a Japanese company which focuses on total digital imaging solutions. It has been producing a wide range of input and output imaging devices like inkjet printers, dot matrix printers, lasers, scanners, and LCD projectors. Epson Stylus Photo P50 photo printer is such a small, compact and attractive product from Epson with various eye catching features.

Features:

Stylus Photo P50 is very compact and has just three buttons in the front with no LCD screen making it relatively clutter-free. Blending in with the rest of Epson’s new inkjet range, the top of the Stylus Photo P50 comes in gloss black colour with a texture of minute dots. Surprisingly, Epson Stylus Photo P50 6 colour photo printer has no memory slots and also has no wired or wireless network module, hence the connections has to PC or Mac must be made via USB. It is very shameful that there are not memory card slot, which are available in most of the standard printers and all-in-one printers these days. Printing from cards would still be hampered due to lack of display. To print from cards via computer, other manufacturers have tied their printers in with PC or Mac based software.
This printer is controlled by three push-buttons at the top left of the front panel, one for power, one for cartridge changes and the third for paper feed and to cancel the job. The first two buttons have embedded LEDs to indicate the status. At the rear end it has a single socket for USB connection, which is the only way to feed data into this printer.

The output tray is of flap type which folds in the front and input tray is also similar which sits on the top of the top of the printer. This whole product looks ungainly when both these flaps are opened, but it can be stored easily when not in use. Epson offers an attractive feature of printing labels onto compatible discs with this printer. A separate CD/DVD tray is located at the front of the printer for this purpose.

The Stylus Photo P50 Inkjet Printer also uses a piezo-electric print head with plug-in ink cartridges as usual in Epson printers. The Stylus Photo P50 employs Epson’s Claria dye-based inks, which the company claims results in longer-lasting prints. Six inks in total are available in this photo printer, each housed in its own cartridge with light cyan and light magenta added to the standard CMYK four colours. Interestingly, these two light cartridges, although specified as ‘additional colours’, are actually heavily used when printing photos. All the six inks are also available as a bundle which can save a bit of cash. Epson provides a bundle of software to select with the printer including its Easy Photo Print application. The driver lets us to keep an eye on the ink levels and apply features such as red-eye reduction.

Epson provides various software, which are bundled with the machine and includes the company’s useful web print utility, which ensures that everything from a viewed web page is printed by compressing the width of the print image. When compared to the previous Epson printers, the installation applet is better designed as it no longer requires accepting the license agreements for each sub-element of the suite.

Performance:

The Stylus Photo P50 is pretty fast when printing in draft mode. It was able to print text with an impressive print speed of 25ppm. In draft mode though the printer is incredibly loud, it sucks a sheet of paper in with a thunderous clunk sound each time.

As this printer is designed for high-quality photo prints, it is unlikely to be used to print text documents. Using the highest quality setting, an A4 photo print would take over 5 minutes to appear. With the quality loss, we can obtain faster photo prints in 30 seconds using the standard settings. The quality of the prints obtained using the highest quality setting is awesome. The colours are rich and detail is well defined when Epson’s Premium Glossy Photo Paper is used. A sample of the same is also included. It would print around 5ppm when it comes to a normal text document which is a realistic normal mode speed. This is attained due to the efficiency of Epson’s driver, which takes very little time for processing before starting to print. Textures are smooth and colours are natural. Maximum resolution obtained is 5760 x 1440 dpi. Colour graphics are also smooth and dither-free thought the black text over graphic fills is bit rough and round the edge which is not surprising as this is applicable when printed on plain white paper too.

Warranty:

Epson offers a back to dealer type standard warranty for one year for Stylus Photo P50 photo printer.

Verdict:

The Epson Stylus Photo P50 A4 Printer is a decent photo printer which is able to produce vivid prints with impressive quality.  The six colour print, a good photo print speed and extra feature to print on CDs and DVDs are the leading characteristics of this photo printer. It also has certain limitations as the time taken to print the highest quality photo prints is bit high, high running costs, absence of status display and the lack of a built-in card reader. It would have been great if wireless technology like Bluetooth was included in this photo printer.

Check other Colour Photo Printers, Latest Epson Photo Printer Reviews in this website.

Epson Stylus Photo P50 - Technical Specification Table

Manufacturer	Epson
Model Name	Stylus Photo P50
Printer Type	Colour Inkjet
Dimensions (W x D x H)	450×289x187mm
Weight	5.5Kg
Black print speed	37ppm
Colour print speed	38ppm
Maximum Page Size	A4
Sheet Feed Capacity	120×80g/sm
Maximum paper weight	255 g/sm
Print Head Resolution	5760dpi
Carriage Resolution	1440dpi
Number of Ink Colours	6
Ink System	Epson Claria Photographic Ink
Minimum drop size	1.5pl
Connection type	USB 2.0
Extra Features	Direct CD/DVD print
Printing Software	Epson print CD, Web-to-Page, Easy photo print, Driver
Noise Level	63dBA
Warranty	1 Year