New printer : Canon or Epson ?

[Sarasocke]

I will probably be having to buy a new printer. I have a Canon Pixma iP4500 at the moment, but it has started printing dark blue instead of deep black. The prints look a real mess and I just cannot find a way to put it right.
Deep cleaning etc has not had any effect. I have used umpteen different kinds of paper, but have always used the original inks.

Anyway, I'm looking into buying a new printer. I use it mainly for photos and the ocasional letter, and I need a DVD printer. I don't need a scanner or fax.

I liked the Canon's system of two separate paper feeds, but have heard that Epson is also very good .....

What's your experience ?

[cosmicma]

with the explosion of online and in shop photo printing services the question is do i need a printer at all ??

6x4 prints can be had for as little as 5p a photo and 7x5 for not much more and this is the case more or less right up to 12x16 ( a3+ ) in my view it's hard to justify the cost of a printer now a days considering it's so cheap to get them professionaly printed
an example a friend of mine wanted just over 200 6x4s printed so of he went to his local boots store dropped them off and 24hrs later picked them up at the cost of 5p a print
i couldn't buy decent photo paper for the same cost never mind the inks ( 100 sheets 2 6x4 photo's per sheet )

the only thing the average deskjet printer is now is convenient it's certanly not cost effective

[matt wilson]

I get very good results from an IP 4600.It has all you need .Also worth knowing I found staples the office store doing inks at good value .

One thing I would try before scrapping current printer is re installing the drivers just in case that's a problem rather a hardware issue .All downloadable from Canon too as I found out when pc crashed .

[Cutter]

Originally Posted by cosmicma

with the explosion of online and in shop photo printing services the question is do i need a printer at all ??

6x4 prints can be had for as little as 5p a photo and 7x5 for not much more and this is the case more or less right up to 12x16 ( a3+ ) in my view it's hard to justify the cost of a printer now a days considering it's so cheap to get them professionaly printed
an example a friend of mine wanted just over 200 6x4s printed so of he went to his local boots store dropped them off and 24hrs later picked them up at the cost of 5p a print
i couldn't buy decent photo paper for the same cost never mind the inks ( 100 sheets 2 6x4 photo's per sheet )

the only thing the average deskjet printer is now is convenient it's certanly not cost effective

Could you give me a link to a reasonabley priced photo printing service, it sounds like I might try the no printer for a while at those prices.

[cosmicma]

no problem

http://photo.jessops.com/photo-printing.html

with the jessops service you can pick up instore so no shipping costs

personaly i prefer boots in store photo printing it's the same price for 24hr print service and the quality is better in my opinion

the 5p per print is for 200 or more prints in one order a tenner for 200 photographs is cheap bearing in mind these are not inkjet prints

if you want to try your hand at a few free prints to see what the quality is like have a look here
http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/dea...e-photo-prints

hope this is of some use...

[Cutter]

Originally Posted by cosmicma

no problem

http://photo.jessops.com/photo-printing.html

with the jessops service you can pick up instore so no shipping costs

personaly i prefer boots in store photo printing it's the same price for 24hr print service and the quality is better in my opinion

the 5p per print is for 200 or more prints in one order a tenner for 200 photographs is cheap bearing in mind these are not inkjet prints

if you want to try your hand at a few free prints to see what the quality is like have a look here
http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/dea...e-photo-prints

hope this is of some use...

Thanks again cosmica

[matt wilson]

just remebered .Canon are doing that from their website so you can compare printers .

[cosmicma]

Originally Posted by matt wilson

just remebered .Canon are doing that from their website so you can compare printers .

i sent for a print from canon some time back to see what their latest version of the 9000 series printers were like compared to the s9000 i have allready
to be honest it wasn't very informative i think it's a 6x4 print they send back i was hoping for an a3 so i could make a better comparison
it's free so not all bad

[duncan22]

If you have been happy with the Canon ip4500 no reason why you can't get another one.
Go on e-bay and type in canon outlet, this should take you to a page where refurbished Canon products are sold.
I purchased a ip4500 a few weeks ago for around £60 plus postage. This includes 1 year warranty plus a New Print Head and Original Canon cartridges. You could pay £40 for a new print head & £40 for new cartridges !
In all honesty if I have a lot of printing to do I take them to Asda as it's a lot cheaper ! The printer is used for A4 prints (plus printing on CDs/DVDs) and in my opinion are equal or better than using external sources but equally I accept they work out more expensive.

[duxter121]

DS colour labs in manchester, well wilmslow road in didsbury it is, are very good prints, i use them but be sure to size all your prints 1st for top quality prints that are delivered within 2-3 days after order has been sent, you have to calibrate your software by downloading theirs, just so everything tallys up, its free also.
just google DS colour labs manchester & thats where you will find the link