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Tom's Hardware Benchmarks Inkjet Printer Paper
An anonymous reader writes "We all know that the specs of your inkjet printer, driver settings, and ink cartridges can make a big difference in the quality of your prints. But the cheapest and simplest aspect of printing can also have a big impact on the final quality: the paper. This short article is an interesting read, the author actually found ways to 'benchmark' inkjet printer paper."
A benchmark is a fancy word to describe a process where a set of items are evaluated objectively based on pre-defined parameters and following a standardized set of procedures. To put it shortly, benchmarking is a process to determine the best option.
Knowing this, why is it so odd that someone found a way to test paper and determine what's best for a given application? Does timothy actually believe that only computer parts can be evaluated by potential buyers?
Slashdot, fix your code or at least hire someone who is competent at it to do it for you.
I'm really glad they did this. I've been getting terrible frame rates from my usual printer paper.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
People that need color printing for only an occasional document find benefit in inkject, especially if they print off an random photo here and there. But for B&W use only obviously laser is the way to go. Still some people just don't print much and need color only every now and then. The thought of having 2 separate printers for those people doesn't make sense, nor does buying an expensive color laser.
People are still taken in by this scheme?
I believe the Discworld character Samuel Vimes had something to say regarding this "scheme." Being poor, he had to buy cheap shoes that wore out quickly and ended up costing him more over the long run, but he simply could not afford the more economical option because of the higher up-front costs. So yes, people are still being 'taken in' by this scheme because, being poor, they don't have any other real options. Luckily, every poor person is to blame for their own poverty and so we can continue to look down are noses at those inferior folks whose lack of options are their own damn faults.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
All I really want to know is if it can print Crysis 2?!?!
yeah what a fraudulant scheme... i mean, who would want to print photographs on a inkjet when you got dot matrix and laser, right?
No one. It makes poor quality prints and costs more than having good quality ones made. Go look what your local place that prints photos costs, it is amazingly cheap.
Inkjets went out with the Turbo switch on the IBM PC-RT.
If you want clean results, get a shark with a fricken' laser-printer on its head.
Did not look at it, but rest assured it is GOATSE.
Same link.
Can you not afford normal entertainment?
I'd rather not run the risk of being arrested.
I am missing the joke here; IBM PC-RT never had a turbo button. But six quadzillion x86 PC clones (and their 286/386/486 children) all had it, and I loved it (if only for the silliness that it was.)
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
The biggest expense is the most avoidable. The ink. Don't buy an overpriced spray-and-pray blotter printer. Get a real laser printer. I bought mine at a University Surplus auction for $10. Toner for it was expensive, I paid $90 for a cartridge. But that's enough toner to print on several cases of paper.
The ink sellers will love it if you keep on using their expensive ink in your spray-printer, though.
Perhaps you should stop taking pictures of illegal acts.
Who would want to print photographs on an inkjet when the drugstore less than a mile away can print it on real photographic paper? And for less money, once you factor in all the partial ink cartridges you will be throwing away if you're actually serious about printing photographs on an inkspray printer.
Then get the color printed some place else. The drug store will do proper photo prints for $0.10/each. On real photo paper with real photo printing. Not some cheap inkjet smudgy mess.
If you print on photo paper with non-generic ink, you can hardly tell the difference. You will NEVER get a laser printer to print a photo that looks that good.
Sure, I care about contrast and such when printing on regular paper so that I can see the lines and words and simple pictures or diagrams that I'm printing. But I don't and never will care about anything beyond mediocre color accuracy if I'm printing on plain paper. Even if the color is 100% accurate, anything beyond text and line art, it will still look like complete crap...it's regular paper!
If I want a pretty prints that I give even the slightest care about, I'll use photo paper (matte or gloss).
There's a copy shop downstairs. No matter how "cheap" you could print with your inkjet, they're cheaper.
So unless you're printing pictures that you don't want anyone to see, this is the obvious better choice.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
It's time to upgrade from your ASR-33, grandpa.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
who would want to print photographs on a inkjet when the print shop downstairs prints in better quality and at roughly the same cost/picture.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
If you can hit it its hardware
if you can't its software
if its software going to a device then its firmware
so the manual for your new program is hardware
the DVD/CD/FD your program is on is hardware
your download folder is full of software
Any person using FTFY or editing my postings agrees to a US$50.00 charge
You may be positioning it across the grain rather than with it. Holding it up against a bright light should show that. Also, try using a green marker to trace a rectangle around the edges.
Then I would refrain from printing those pictures either and keep them stored encrypted on a hard drive that you can easily bang against the next wall if the police kicks down your door.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Ah, I was just waiting for this comment. I have news for you: the "local placethat print photos" is just amazingly cheap. It's not always great.
Photo printing, done right, gives perfect results. 1) An incredible gamut (more than you can get out of your inkjet); 2) extremely long life photos 3) paper that won't turn yellow or degrade.
But in local, cheap photo shops, this is not the case.
1) The gamut comes because of the printing system. A properly calibrated minilab (that means once a week at least, though it can go for months with no calibration and still do acceptable output) has no issues *printing* the correct gamut. The problem is the chemicals needed to develop the paper. Remember, it's regular, chemical-based printing. After a certain amount of square meters developed, the chemicals *need* to be changed. Cheap photo shops get away with adding some chemicals (Replenisher) to the solution that extends its life a little - which is fine and acceptable. It's made by the manufacturer and under certain conditions it will work just as good. But often, these guys at photo labs keep adding the chemicals until all you have is a useless liquid that won't develop anything and we're back to 1980s colors, and only then, they will change the developer. Respectable shops can change the developer and other chemicals as needed - but they charge more than the 1-hour lab at the mall.
2) the long life of the photo comes from proper developing. Because of the destructive process used to develop photos ("ink" is removed from the paper, not added to it, like in the Kodachrome process, which lasts forever), if not done properly, the chemical reaction keeps going for years after the photo is developed (that's why photos fade). There are two steps: stopping and washing, that need to be properly done, in order to actually stop the reaction. If you remove the photo from the stopping bath (or if it's cold, old, contaminated, etc), or don't properly wash the print, the chemicals will continue affecting your print for years.
3) photo paper is not regular "wood fibre" paper, which would disintegrate in all the liquids it needs to be processed in. It's either resin-coated or polyester. Polyester won't turn yellow, and it's not food for bugs, among other benefits.
So, try to develop your photos at a respectable lab.
And for that one-off print you want to give grandma of the kids playing with her that day, the inkjet on photo paper (especially a 6-color epson - even better if 9-color) is much more practical than driving to the lab and having just 1 print developed.
Searches for "IBM PC-RT turbo button" on Google are already turning up this thread.
Answer: Google is lurking on /.
Also, if the RT has no turbo button, what's it doing with a speed indicator?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/31231773@N02/4468867321/in/set-72157623718669848
You laugh, but in some countries (apparently, the UK), trying to print a photo of your 2-year-old playing in the bathtub can get you arrested.
Maybe he's a hipster and is posting goatse ironically.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Cause of this: http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2188752&cid=36257328
betcha didn't know that.
I would laugh but I still remember receiving telexes on the ASR-33.
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
My kids like to print out color stuff from the web. They don't care if it's photorealistic. For that matter I rarely print stuff at home (or at work) and I don't need it to look awesome either. So yeah, there's still a good reason for some people to have an inkjet printer.
Terrorist, bomb, al Qaeda, nuclear, yellowcake, kill, assassinate. Carnivore is dead... long live Echelon.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2188752&cid=36257328
Also, inkjet is always more expensive than the print shop downstairs, even after you print enough photos (a few hundred) to pay for the printer - unless you use a CISS but it's hard to find quality inks. Right now I use a german brand (OCP) in generic chinese paper (60cm wide roll) and I'm simply amazed at the results. But it takes just too much work:
1. Check if your printer driver lets you print in color managed (ICC) mode. Choose Adobe RGB, and disable any post processing at driver level
2. Make sure your monitor is calibrated, or at least, it's configured for 6500K white. The sRGB function should work relatively good.
3. take photo in adobe RGB, if you have a pro camera; or convert to it from sRGB, if you have a consumer camera.
4. Make sure the gamma setting on the printer is right
5. make sure you're setting the right paper kind in your printer "Ultra High Quality Super Gloss Eternal Archival Pixie Dust Photo Paper", or some other silly name.
6. Print, and see if you got it right.
7. Repeat 6 when you figure out which of the other 6 steps you screwed up.
8. Repeat everything again when you notice you forgot to enable "borderless printing"
Good luck if using alternate brands of paper and ink. You can have them profiled for a few bucks, if your printer driver lets you load ink and paper profiles, and save a lot. But for the odd print, stick with original ink and the manufacturer's paper.
of course, i didnt rtfa.
but.. i think this "Tom" was beaten out by Wilhelm long ago!
http://www.wilhelm-research.com/
Wilhelm Imaging Research, Inc. conducts research on the stability and preservation of traditional and digital color photographs and motion pictures.
Wilhelm was a founding member of the Photographic Materials Group of the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works, is a member of the Electronic Materials Group of AIC, and was a founding member of American National Standards Institute/ISO subcommittee IT9-3 (now called ISO WG-5 Task Group 3), which is responsible for developing standardized accelerated test methods for the stability of color photographs and digital print materials
yeah!!! but uhh, maybe this geek website is doing better?
I have never posted a link to that image. unlike you Anonymous Coward. Mod me funny to avoid karma boost.
I switched to laser because the cost was far less then what an Inkjet ran us in ink. As an example, I've got an HP1600Color Laser that cost $400 when new, and I'm still operating on the original toner cartridges after 4 years. If I'd been using an Inkjet, I'd have replaced the cartridges every month simply from lack of use causing them to dry out at an avg cost of $40 per cart. That's 48 months worth for 300 or 1900+ for and inkjet.
Mod me up/Mod me down: I wont frown as I've no crown
I have a Brother MFC-6490CW inkjet printer. At the time I bought it, it was on sale and Amazon.com shipped it to my front door for $190, total.
I chose this particular printer largely because of a novelty: It is a multi-function machine that can both scan and print at sizes up to 11x17" (aka Tabloid or Ledger, the ISO equivalent being A3). You won't find any laser printers that can do that for less than a couple thousand dollars.
My printing needs are best described as "light." I realized that 90 percent of what I print out I print for my own use. I carry it around for however long I need it, probably a few days, and then it ends up in the recycle bin. I never print photos on photo paper, because as many people have pointed out, that's a waste of ink (and hence money). I do often print things with photographs in them, though (Web pages, etc.) so I like those printouts to be in color. I also like my text to be in color -- it makes it easier to see things like hyperlinks, highlights, annotations, etc. But I really don't care if any of it is "presentation quality," because I'm likely to be the only one who sees it.
The printer came with a set of high-capacity ink cartridges. That set lasted me, I would guess, about a year and a half. Since then I've bought off-brand, generic cartridges, and I've been mostly happy with them. The genuine Brother black ink is more water-resistant than the generic ink, but for my purposes, it mostly serves.
I don't remember what I paid for them, but checking Amazon right now, I can order a set of four high-capacity black cartridges, plus two sets of all three colors, for $10.48. They get cheaper if you buy them in bulk.
So all in all, I'd say I don't feel ripped off. I get to scan big things from time to time and print them out on big paper in color from time to time, and the rest of the time I have an adequate ink jet office machine that costs me less per year than I'd usually spend on lunch.
Breakfast served all day!
That's no speed indicator. That's a POST code display, so if power up self test chokes somewhere, you can tell which test choked.
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
Exactly right. Very few people ever mention the fact that you have to replace those inkjet cartridges every month whether you use them or not. The technology is utterly stupid, except for a few exceptional cases (like doing extremely high-volume printing with one of those continuous-flow ink systems).
You know there's something wrong when there's a store on every block that does inkjet cartridge refilling.
My wife is an ex-legal secretary, and has a bad habit of printing all kinds of stuff that doesn't need to be. But with my HP LaserJet 2300 and remanufactured cartridges available on Ebay for $25 each and printing 5-6000 pages, it still takes 9-12 months for me to need to replace the cartridge. $30/year for toner is pretty easy to swallow, but if we were using an inkjet, I'd be replacing carts every week or so for that same cost, adding up to a lot of money (most inkjet carts are lucky to print 500 pages).
As for color lasers, you can get low-end ones for around $200 now, maybe less. They seem to suck, however, because the cartridges are tiny, and the black one is just as small as the color ones, but they're still a much better deal than an inkjet. In fact, for the price, it'd make sense to have a color laser just for color printing, and a dedicated B&W printer for regular printing, since lasers don't have to worry about ink drying out from disuse.
In fact, for the price, it'd make sense to have a color laser just for color printing, and a dedicated B&W printer for regular printing, since lasers don't have to worry about ink drying out from disuse.
That's what we are doing in our network.... the colour laser is much higher end than the basic entry level, because it actually does get used to publish a quarterly newsletter for about 1500 members of a local charity (and for the cost of one of the quarterly prints we were able to buy the printer and all the toner for the print, and each subsequent print we have saved $600 over the print shop cost), but other than that, all the printing gets done on a b&w laser except the rare occasions that I want to print something in colour... which is exceedingly rare. :)
Haven't used an inkjet in almost a decade. Went without colour printing for years because of exactly the reason the GP said, but when colour became an option, I did exactly what you suggest. :)
I actually found it cheaper to run a colour laser printer. $350 3 years ago and it still has 80% toner. It's a network printer and installs quicker on OSX/Linux than Windows.
In contrast, my $80 Inkjet printer was costing me over $100 every time I went to use it because thinks had dried out from lack of use. A colour laser can be sitting there for months turned off and after a page or two to knock the dust and toner that's settled out, it's printing as good as the day you turned it off.
Inkjets are a scam, they were touted as being a cheap way of printing. Yes, they seemed to be at first, when your ink carts were only $10. Now they are $50 for blacks usually, $60 for a colour set (that's here in Australia). In contrast, when I do eventually need toner (I can't see it happening before the printer dies as it's a home printer), it's going to cost $110 per colour (CMYK). I probably won't buy new toner, I'll probably end up getting a newer, cheaper model and having mine recycled.
There's no reason to waste your time with an inkjet printer at all, unless you're just buying it for the scanner or faxing facilities, even then you can get a decent scanner cheap enough.
the colour laser is much higher end than the basic entry level, because it actually does get used to publish a quarterly newsletter for about 1500 members of a local charity (and for the cost of one of the quarterly prints we were able to buy the printer and all the toner for the print, and each subsequent print we have saved $600 over the print shop cost)
Yes, in general it seems that the higher-end and more expensive your laser printer, the lower (sometimes dramatically) your consumables cost is. The $200 color laser is good if you rarely print anything at all, as a set of replacement carts is probably > $100 and run out after 1-2000 pages, but if you're doing much printing at all, it's worth it to spend more on your printer. Besides, unlike those infernal inkjets, you don't have to worry about the ink drying out, so even if you get some giant office printer with 5000-sheet bins, you won't lose anything by it sitting there except power consumption (the big printers seem to have higher standby power consumption).
Banging them against a wall is just not sufficient.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Basically their data supports the Dynex paper as the best multipurpose paper, and given their focus on "value" in conclusion it's also the cheapest.
It was best in color gamut, but not text reproduction or bleed through.
I don't like accusing sites of being underhanded because I don't believe in unnecessary cynicism, but given the content of the article and the outright odd nature of suddenly reviewing printer paper, this thing reeks of payola from HP.
Toms is going to decide on someone, since these are all relatively good brands of paper. That someone will probably will be more likely to quote their review if it sounds spammy, and that will send more people back to their site.
I've worked on photocopiers, printers & wide format units for over 30 years. I carry a paper sample card with me that shows the color red, in different shades. Some glossy, some matte finish, some bright, some dark. When I get an end user that says "the colors don't look right", after I determine there isn't anything wrong with the machine, the driver, or how it is set up, I check their paper. Usually they will "cheap out" on inexpensive big box paper, and less than 92 bright. I whip out my sample card that shows all the colors through the front and ask them which one is red. They most likely pick one of the middle red colors, which is a bright glossy red. I then open it up, and show them that the red color they see in different brightness levels or hues, is the EXACT SAME SHADE of red, but printed on different paper stocks. Most of the time they get it, and once I show them how to set different driver profiles for each type of paper, I never hear about it again.
There are so many errors in your post I hardly know where to begin
No photo process of any type that relies on broadband white light passing through or reflecting off the produced image can be "perfect": this is just the spectral limit of chemical compounds. Replenishers don't extend solution capacity a little. When used at manufacturer's recommendations, they extend it many times. Kodachrome is not forever, it is one of the worst processes for resistance to fading from exposure to light. The image in Kodachrome is formed by three developers each of which forms a particular color when acting on exposed silver halide. Other silver based color processes form an image using a color-coupling developer which reacts with exposed silver in each layer, forming colored dyes with the chemicals embedded in each particular layer. Truly archival color images require different processes, such as gum-bichromate or the azo dyes of the ilfochrome (cybachrome) process. The causes of image degradation vary by process, but it is true that generally speaking chemical purity (and freshness) and good washing are necessary. Some photo paper is still wood based, but modern photo paper is easier to use and easier to get long-lived results. Some inkjet printers use pigments instead of dyes, and (generally speaking) pigments provide much better longevity than dyes.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
Because they don't. Prints from the print shop look like crap, and they charge out the wazoo for anything bigger than 4" x 6". Prints on the Canon Pro 9000 are great if expensive. Prints from mpix are also great and similarly priced, but the turnaround time is much greater.
Who cares how they found a way!
I've already cracked my printer open and began rewinding the motors with more copper.
When I'm done it's going to have exhaust valves that release pressure like a turbo charged car.
Sure it might spray a fine cloud of ink each type I print, but at least it will be faster.
"You should always go to other people's funerals; otherwise, they won't come to yours." -- Yogi Berra
I did this long ago, shortly after the HP500 came out and noticed that results were pretty varied in my office. We went to a large office supply store and bought a ream of every type of paper they had. Went back to the office and ran some comparison tests. We found that the difference in paper was significant and the most expensive paper was not the best. And the recycled paper was worse than the cheaper non-recycled paper. We also found that the side that we printed on made a big difference, one side was definitely producing better results than the other. We ended up picking the best paper and telling the office manager to only buy that type for the inkjets. Put up signs to show which side of the paper to load pointing down in the tray. And used all of the reject reams in the copier and the laser jets.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
I don't give a crap if it's photorealistic either. I give a crap when it works out to something like, what, $1.75-$3.50 a sheet? You get maybe 200 sheets of paper out of an inkjet cartridge, and they're usually $35 at the cheapest.
Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
As a working professional photographer I can easily vouch for the quality of high end inkjet printers such as the Canon Pixma line. The real key to success in using one of these printers is going to the effort of color calibrating your computer monitor.
Buy this video: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/videos/camera-print.shtml
I am in no way associated with the owner of the above site. Trust me it will be money well spent to get you on your way with successfully printing your images in a predictable/repeatable manner!
Remember folks - not all injet printers are created equally! The crappy ones really are crappy and a waste of money. The high end inkjet printers for photographers produce stunning results and will outlast previous wet darkroom prints.
Sig?! Sig?! We don't need no stinking sig!!
Also, your printer may work better if you plug the right kind of clock into the outlet next to it. Between that and the green rectangle trick, my printouts are so realistic they give me a giant Mpingo woodie every time I look at them.
You can buy a $5 Mini LED flashlight from the EFF that makes the yellow dots much more visible. I like to keep it around for when people accuse me of being too paranoid when I'm ranting about privacy and such. Grab the nearest color printout, shine the blue light on it, and show there are hidden yellow dots that can be used to track you; that's a good way to make people really nervous as they consider what else I'm saying is true. More fashionable than tin foil, too.
I don't think you can buy a laser printer that's as good as inkjet printers at printing colour photos... and is cheap enough to buy for sporadic home use.
I'd be happy if you tell me I'm wrong. Have I've just been sucked in by marketing?
Good to see that someone has made a benchmark test like this. It'd be interesting to see the results of testing the differences between printers too.
I have two printers. One is an A4 Epson Stylus Photo R220. I recommend epson because the ink is cheaper than HP's (Epson's print head is in the printer, not in the cartridge). The "Photo" in this case means two things: it's got 6 colors (CMYK + Light cyan + Light magenta. For some reason, light cyan goes away twice as fast as the other colors), and most important: the driver lets you use color profiles. This is a big thing - it's like owning a camera with M (full manual) mode vs a cheap "AUTO" camera. You need this for a fully color-managed workflow. Well, except the monitor, which, unless you get an HP DreamColor, won't be able to go beyond sRGB.
My other printer is an A3+ HP K8600. This one is a "Business Inkjet" printer. It's great for printing text (HP inkjets are much better than Epson in this regard, and it hasn't changed since the Stylus 440/DeskJet 692C from the mid-90s), but it SUCKS for photos. This is not a photo printer. It can print photos but the colors don't come out right, it's grainy (the Epson Photos have more DPI), but most important: it doesn't support color management. All is printed as HP "RealLife Enhancement". You don't want this for photos. Also, the HP DOESN'T use the black ink on photo paper. It's a thing of dye-vs-pigment ink (I don't know which is which, and I don't care). The thing is, HP business black ink doesn't stick to photo paper. I tried - it dries and it's just black dust. Epson black sticks to photo paper just as well as the other colors. HP makes black by squeezing half your C, M and Y carts in every print. The resulting black is terrible - greenish brown.
I mentioned "photo" and "business" printers. Epson has another line (maybe HP does too, I haven't checked), I think they call it "Artisan". 9 cartridges (includes grey and another black and yet another black for matte finish). These are A3 and larger, and damn expensive. They're expensive to maintain too, and you only get the intended colors if you're using Epson ink and Epson paper.
If you're just trying to have "fun", I'd recommend that you get the one of the Epson "Photo". Don't go with the Artisan just yet. Or maybe not. If you got a Canon 1D or Nikon D3, go for the Artisan (hell, if you have a $7K camera just for fun, you're loaded, go continuous tone!). If you have a Nikon D3/5/7000 or Canon Rebel, go for the Photo printer. Get the Artisan when someone is actually paying for your photos and you do your own exposition.
Or better yet: don't spend your money on a printer at all. Get GEAR. You will be needing, in this order:
a 35mm f/1.8 or less lens. Learn composition and take pics with low light.
a 50-200mm, or 70-300, to go out taking photos of birds and stuff
a tripod, when you realize that, unlike the 35mm it's fucking hard to hold a 300mm steady by hand
a flash, with remote trigger, when you want to give your photos a "pro" look (only when you get this one you will understand why they call it "photoGRAPHY")
a flash stand and umbrella, when you get tired of bouncing at the ceiling
another flash, stand, and umbrella
a few more small flashes. yes. you will be going crazy with flashes. see strobist.blogspot.com
a macro lens, or extension tubes, diopters, bellows, and other macro gear
a soft box (this one you can DIY)
a ring flash
maybe by now it will make sense to invest in a printer. but there's so much more you can get like:
background stands
gaffer tape - lots of it
paper backgrounds
fabric backgrounds
more lenses!
studio flashes (yes, more flashes)
more and bigger umbrellas
soft boxes
another camera
Don't worry about the WAF (Wife Acceptance Factor). This is where the 35mm f/1.8 comes into play: get some pics of your kid at head level (you will need to crawl if you have a toddler. Protip: you will get much more interesting shots at waist, knee or even floor level, than eye level), set your camera to Aperture Priority and go all the way down to 1.4, "Vivid" color and white balance to a higher point to get a warmer image. Snap. You
No shit. my oldest got an inkjet thrown in with his new laptop he got for college, and being the "hates to waste things" type tried to actually use it. Blew through a good $70 in a month. I calmly went out and found him a nice B&W laser on the net WITH a 5000 sheet toner PLUS a 15,000 and a 13,000 toner carts thrown in. Final cost? a hair over $100. The laser cost slightly more than he blew through in a month trying to feed the inkjet and after 6 months of printing constantly for class he has yet to go through the 5K, much less even open the 13k and 15k carts.
When you look at even the color laser printers the prices are low enough the insane inkjet cart prices just don't make sense. I have a brand new inkjet given to me by a customer who didn't know better and got a laser after I pointed out the price difference, and as soon as the black ink cart runs out it'll be headed to the dump or to my engineering buddy who likes to strip stuff for parts like gears. If you are printing so little you think an inkjet would work I can promise you you'd get better results simply having your printing done at Walgreen's or Wally World, for everyone else B&Ws start at like $40 refurb and you can often find color lasers like this wireless model for $150. Inkjets are like floppies, once upon a time they made sense and now they are just pointless designed for the dump ripoffs. The only time I recommend an inkjet anymore is when someone needs a cheap scanner/fax I tell them to get an all in one and simply use the ink up and then keep the scanner/fax. IMHO that is pretty much the only time having an inkjet makes any sense anymore, as the all in ones are cheaper than buying two devices.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Impact Printers Inkjet printers are developed after, the use of non-combat work. The advantages of the more prominent small size, simple operation, printing, low noise, can be played using special paper and photo pictures and more comparable. After several years of tempering, the ink-jet printer technology has made great development.
This problem has been solved long ago: get a color calibrator and generate profiles for each of you printer + ink set + paper combination. Then you'll get reliable prints. Now let's get onto the real problem: why did my printer stop working with Ubuntu 11.04 ?
Non-Linux Penguins ?
Uh... I cannot second that. The people who happen to have a print shop right in my apartment building (ground floors here usually house some kind of office, which happens to be a print shop for me) are quite good at their job, they make you feel like they enjoy working on your pictures and the quality is by some margin superior to anything I or any layman could produce. And comparing their cost to photo printers (trust me, I did), I ended up with the realization that it's cheaper, simply because if they fuck up and produce a failure, it's their money, not mine.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I actually found it cheaper to run a colour laser printer. $350 3 years ago and it still has 80% toner. It's a network printer and installs quicker on OSX/Linux than Windows.
Be careful of some particularly cheap colour laser printers if you are likely to print a lot though - the price per page (what-ever page you are talking about: b/w business text, colour charts or full-page photos, ...) is steadily rising at that part of the market especially when it come time to replace the drum(s) and such, and some of the inkjet tricks have crept in (the first set of carts that come with the machine being half full or less, for instance). Also I've seen really cheap models that produce noticable intermittent banding in some colour output.
My colour laser (which replaced a B/W laser and InkJet pairing just over three years ago) works out noticeably more expensive per page in consumables than the ones at work, but they cost five times a much to buy initially. It is still considerably cheaper than running an inkjet, for any amount of output, but the way the market is going some manufacturers might find a way to "fix" that on their cheap models - some are already noticeably worse than mine. Essentially avoid anything explicitly sold as a "home" printer and you'll get much better value in the long run (and unlike many inkjets that break down completely fairly quickly, "long term" tends to be a valid period to consider for laser/LED machines). Mine is targeted at "small workgroup/office" and didn't cost much more then the "home" models on the market at the time. The chunky toys like we have at the office are what you want if you have extensive printing needs (but for home users the initial expense will probably far outweigh the reduced running costs).
Though even if the real cheapies do start to approach parity with the dreaded inkjet market on consumables (which they might in a couple of years, unless inkjet ink costs are rising by the same factors of course: it is a while since I've priced up anything in that market), the other advantages would still exist: good quality output without paying 15+pence per page for high quality coated paper, usable duplex without even more expensive paper, fast operation with more-or-less honest speed claims in marketing (my laser claims 16ppm for b/w output, over a long run I clocked it at more like 13ppm, mainly as it pauses for a short while every now and then, my last inkjet claimed 20ppm and couldn't even feed blank papar through that fast and even "fast/draft" output was more like 4ppm), being able top leave it idle for a few weeks without having to waste 20% of each cart running the head clean operation, and so forth.
There's no reason to waste your time with an inkjet printer at all, unless you're just buying it for the scanner or faxing facilities, even then you can get a decent scanner cheap enough.
There are a few good inexpensive (again: check for reviews first and generally go for "inexpensive" over "dirt cheap") all-in-one scanner/printer/copier/fax machines that use toner-plus-laser/LED printing rather than spitting ink. Though I still tend to recommend separate units unless the user is going to make much use of the "operate as a fax/copier without needing the computer powered on" option - you tend to get a better scanner and a better printer for not much more money that way and if one breaks down you don't need to replace both.
Sadly yes, that's happened.
There are also perfectly legal photographs that would never lead to arrest that you may nonetheless not want printing in public,
My color printer at home will, since it is properly calibrated and all my photos are RAW images, print images at significantly higher quality than the photo shop doing "real photo printing" - that is unless I engage one of the high-end shops that properly calibrate their printers. I am not quite certain when you last used an inkjet printer, but it's almost a decade since they printed "cheap smudgy mess".
Don't forget, the photo printer at your local store is calibrated to the lowest common denominator. Badly lit shots stored as highly compressed JPEG junk. I don't know of any serious photographer today that doesn't print his own stuff unless he needs to do mass-printings. The majority of them use ink-jet today. Sure, they do not use the $249 Epson from Amazon, but even that one is probably better than the average photo store on typical prints (if operated by someone who knows what they are doing)
Many I know use the Pixma Pro series. Slightly more than the run-off-the-mill Epson/Canon but not excessively so. And, as I said, with higher quality than Wall Mart.
BZZTZ. Wrong. If you invest a modest amount of money in an ink-jet today it will print at a better quality than your local place. For me, as an enthusiast, at significantly better quality. The local shop has a printer that is calibrated for badly lit, highly compressed JPEGs, and good photos come out looking like sh*t. That is, of course, unless you go to a shop where the guy running it knows what he is doing. Not going to happen at WalMart.
I would say "amen" to all of the above and recommend making sure you get a printer so that your wife can hang some of the images on the wall. That makes a huge difference. Make sure she gets them framed properly. Also, if you get a printer capable of larger prints, that is better.
As to the list - if the $1500 for the 35mm 1.4 prime is a little on the high side, you can get very, very good results with a 50mm 1.4 too, at about 1/3 of the price. You just have to move a little further away. Heck, if you are a Canon person, even the $100 50mm 1.8 is going to blow you away if you are used to the kit lens. Shooting with primes also makes you a better photographer, since you learn that you have to move your body to shoot. Moving your body seems to engage the brain a little more :-)
If you only print a few pages a month use a print shop (but you might want a cheap inkjet on hand for emergency use, proofs, and the note for the delivery van).
If you only print BW letter or A4 get a good second hand office laser.
If you print a lot of small colour items, get a decent A4 inkjet that you can fit with a CIS system. Brother DCP195c with refillable tanks is worth looking at.
If like me you print a lot of A3 colour on heavy ( > 200 gsm) card for framing or to make greeting cards, tourist items, menus etc. then invest in a good solid A3+ printer with CIS. I use a Brother 6690 printer on a wireless LAN,. Tanks hold about 150 ml and can be topped up while printing. Ink costs about £2 per 100ml bottle for good quality ink, I use about £20 ink for about 6000 prints. I prefer a mat finish so I don't use photo paper, but I buy good coated paper and willingly pay for it. The fact that this printer includes an A3 scanner with auto feeder, and USB stick - SD card reader all available on the LAN, and that it works from windoze and linux hosts, played a part in my selection of this printer, but my primary reason was that a good simple CIS system was available and it has two supply trays, both capable of A3.
nec sorte nec fato
Yes, forgot to mention that. For some reason, the 50mm 1.4 is much cheaper than the 35mm. It's just that 50mm is a bit long for indoors. But you're right, a newbie shouldn't be shelling out $1500 for a lens.
No idea about Tamrons, Sigmas or anything. I only have the nikon cheap lenses (the 18-55 kit and a 55-200 that's $150 or so). Maybe there is a cheaper 50mm 1.4. I wouldn't go too crazy for quality as a normal prime lens is almost foolproof. Unless someone put plastic elements in it, any brand should work excellent. Don't worry about multicoat, nano coating, extra-low dispersion glass, fluoride, etc. Just get the cheapest 35 or 50 1.4 (which is compatible with your camera's AF). A used one should work great.
For occasional printing, you are far better buying a color laser. Inkjets will dry out if they aren't used often enough, and toner never dries out.
I picked up a Brother color laser printer with wireless and wired network for $300 around the Christmas deals, so they really aren't that expensive anymore. Laser printers can also be refilled without the manufacturer giving you shit...
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
This isn't new, but I'm glad they've done this. People do this all day long where I work. They "benchmarked" all of our paper, inks, etc. to industry standards. After all, we run a professional high volume printing shop as part of what we do. This just brought some of the tools we use down to the consumer level and wrote it up for the casual user to understand and limited the paper significantly. The actual range of paper is nearly as great as the range of colors available, not to mention other printable surfaces.
I think this article is a great read. Most home users have no idea how much paper matters. There is a reason why prices vary so much at your local store. Good paper costs good money. Forget pictures, think of your resume. If you want to make an impression, don't go with cheap copier paper unless you also show up to your interview wearing a wrinkled tshirt and sweatpants. AFAIK, the greatest artists didn't paint on toilet paper either.
I8-D
If you're doing fine art inkjet prints on the higher end printers, you likely aren't using the papers referenced in the article :) There are, however, several good sites that collect hard data on the various paper options out there:
Neil
Owner, Dane Creek Printing
I switched to laser because the cost was far less then what an Inkjet ran us in ink.
And I always thought that was the absolute rule too, so when I researched my most recent printer purchase I was surprised how much price-per-page varied within the two categories--some inkjet printers are reported as quite cheap to run, and some lasers quite expensive--and the printer I ended up with was an inkjet for which consumer reports claimed around $.02/page for black-and-white text (if I remember correctly--I tried to check that just now on their website and found they'd switched to using a monthly cost based on average home use).
I had a chance for a week to work with a color scientist there. We used to create an ICC profiles for the printer by printing out a color pattern without using any color profiles or modifications to the output, then capture that color information using a spectrometer.
I found that I could create some pretty amazing prints when the printer was properly calibrated to the paper (even really cheap printers - sub $100 models) you were using, but that it took a $12,000 piece of hardware to do it (I which I could remember the name/brand of the machine that did this - something German as I recall, but it basically had a robot arm that would analyze each swatch of the test pattern we printed earlier).
Amen!
I have a Brother HL-2227DW, monochrome laser, built-in wireless, wired ethernet and DUPLEX printing that cost me $120. The "starter" toner cartridge that came with it lasted me a year.
If I need a color print, I take a USB with the file to Kinkos or the local UPS Store.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
I call bullshit. I have long preferred laser but my 3 year old $200 Canon Pixma MP530 not only does duplexing and has ADF for scanning but the ink tanks are refillable. I put new tanks in it maybe once every 3-4 months, at a total cost of $45 for all 5 tanks. A colour laser that did duplexing would have cost me a good deal more than $400 today, let alone 3 years ago, and I'd still have to buy a scanner with ADF for what, $50 used off of ebay.
You can tell by my use (new tanks 3-4 times a year) that I don't print a whole lot, yet the heads have never needed cleaning. I just wish it did hole punching and binding. :-)
Maybe that is generally true, but there are plenty of exceptions. My old Samsung CLP-300 for example works out to less than a cent per page. The black toner is about half a cent per page.
http://www.123inkjets.com/Samsung/Compatible/Laser-Toner/Black/CLP-K300A/1230-Product.html
Don't expect even an expensive business printer to be any cheaper than that...
What you get from a high end business class printer isn't cheaper consumables, it's hassle free operation. They'll crank out thousands of pages before there is a jam, and then, they might still auto recover from it. Meanwhile, for the home user, an occasional mis feed isn't a big deal.
Business class printers also blow past home printers in speed and duty cycle, but that's almost incidental. And these days, a low end laser is probably faster than you could want, unless you're literally keeping multiple laser printers fully utilized around the clock.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant