Photo Printer Test 2010

by John, allprinterreviews.com Expert Reviewer
(USA)

This Photo Printer Test 2010 gathered test data results among three top consumer choices in digital photo printer with direct printing capabilities but with different functions.

Let's see how a single-function photo printer and multifunction printer will match in producing laser quality digital photos at a reasonable price.

1. HP Photosmart D7560 Price : $119.00

Photo Printers Test 2010 focused on specific criteria as follows:

Print Speed- 33 pages per minute for B & W text prints and 31 pages per minute for color text prints while 4x6 photos will come out in about 18 seconds; larger sized photos will still take less than a minute.

Photo Quality- Colors are accurate and vibrant and color contrasts are smooth and had the appearance of perfect balance using HP photo paper. If used on plain paper, photos looked a bit grainy and had more emphasis on dark and yellow colors. Text documents looked crisp and very readable not only on white paper but even on CD/DVD labels, attributable to its impressively high resolution at 9600 x 2400 dpi in full-color.

LCD Display- 3.5 inch touch-screen display allows convenience in viewing, editing and printing photos PC-less with user-friendly menus and on-screen instructions displays. You can remove the red-eye effect and perform CD/DV labeling by following the menu on the touch screen system. Another plus factor is the LCD's adjustable viewing attribute since users can tilt the LCD screen to allow better viewing angle when editing.

Direct Printing Accessories- Memory Stick, CompactFlash, SD Card and XD Picture Card; Pictbridge all these make HP Photosmart D7560 energy-efficient as one criterion for its Energy Star label.

Ink Costs- This Photo Printer Test 2010 likewise shows that replacement cartridges for a $12 black ink and $10 each for color has an equivalent reasonable cost of 4.7 cents per page for black but a bit high-end for color at 22.4 cents, when tests were made on a 4-color page. We came up with better results in testing a $35 black cartridge wherein ink costs was at 4.4 cents per page while a $17 colored ink cartridge resulted to ink costs of 11.6 cents using the same four-color test page.

Additional Features:

Users can print labels using both photos and texts directly on CDs and DVDs.

Creative software to craft scrapbooking projects, greeting cards, labels, stickers, flyers, checklist and produce exactly the same images by printing directly from web pages.

The HP Photosmart D7560 photo printer machine is equipped with a main tray having a 125-sheet capacity for letter-size documents. There is the additional photo-paper tray that can load up to 20 sheets of 5x7 inch photo paper wherein users don't have to change paper if one needs to print photos in-between.

The disc caddy for printing CD/DVD labels is unobtrusively stored inside the front bay; there's an easy to detect lever to lower this special tray.

Photo Printer Test 2010 for HP Photosmart D7560, has arrived at an overall impression that this machine has all the attributes of a quality photo printer as single-function printer with large-volume capacity.


2. Epson WorkForce 600 All-In-One Printer $199.00

Photo Printer Test 2010 will now dwell on how an Epson multifunction will be able to hold its own:

Print Speed- For both color and black/white photos and texts Epson's speed performance is amazing at 38 ppm while laser quality black text was estimated at 27 ppm and 19 ppm for laser quality color text. Print speed for 4x6 photos is 16 seconds and larger sized 8. 5x 11 inches will take about 47 seconds.

Photo Quality- Epson prints vibrant photos on any type of paper. This is of course attributable to Epson's high quality and high technology DURABrite Ultra Ink. Colors are consistently bright even on plain paper and completely smudge, water and fade free since the ink is quick drying at a resolution of 5760 x 1440 optimized dpi.

LCD Display- The LCD display is smaller at 2.5 inch but can also be tilted to adjust the user's viewing angle. However, it only serves as a preview monitor. Scanning and fax messaging still have to go through the traditional PC processing before documents can be scanned or sent as fax message.

Direct Printing Accessories- It can also work with CompactFlash, memory stick, memory card SD, memory card xD and Pictbridge as media for direct printing. In fact, when it comes to connectivity, Epson Workforce 600, allows networking with other users with its wireless connectivity.

Ink Costs-Standard size ink cartridge for black ink is at $17 which is good for 230 pages and it presents the user an equivalent cost of 7.4 cents per page while the standard color ink cartridges cost $12.34 that yields 340 pages giving the user the cost of 4 cents per color. The high-yield cartridges came up with more reasonable cost of 3.4 cents per page for black.

Additional features:

There's the wireless connectivity mentioned earlier.

It can scan and fax as an all-in-one.

It has an auto-feeder with 30-sheet capacity. However, this means the auto-feeder has to be constantly replenished when in full use.

It can let you print your own stationery by allowing you to use some file photo as background. You can find an option in the front panel where the printer can be tasked to print a graph or notebook paper.

As a photo printer that has to deal with other functions like scanning and faxing, the qualities of the print results do not suffer. However, for its price and the great quality of its prints, it would be nicer if it can be used for creative projects than just producing quality photos.

3.Canon PIXMA MX300 OFFICE ALL-IN-ONE - $110.99

Photo Printer Test 2010 now moves on to Canon and see how it fares:

Print Speed- This Canon PIXMA MX300 prints black at 22 ppm and at 17 ppm color text prints which were disappointments. In as much as the 4x6 photos took too long at 46 seconds Photo Printer Reviews 2010 didn't bother with the larger sized 8.5 x 11 inches.

Photo Quality-If Canon's photo results were to be judged on its own, the quality will receive considerable praises for its clear and smoothness of color transition. However, Canon's photo results came out looking average when Photo Printer Tests 2010 compared the photos produced by HP and Epson side by side. Actually Canon PIXMA MX300 only has 4800x 1200 dpi when it comes to resolution.

LCD Display- Canon PIXMA MX300 has an LCD screen but it's the main agenda on the front control panel hence, it's not adjustable to allow for better viewing of the photos to be printed. What was provided instead as a provision for ease is the Easy-Scroll system. In addition, Canon makers deemed that the Auto-Image fix will suffice to ensure that photos are clear and vivid; users need not concern themselves about adjustments since the machine will automatically edit the photo prints for them. However, the LCD screen is not even backlit which makes even normal angle viewing difficult in low lights.

Direct Printing Accessories- the only medium it allows for direct printing capability is the Pictbridge; the machine has no slots provided to allow printing direct with the use of memory cards.

Ink Costs- The low capacity cartridges cost $16 for black and $20 for color wherein cost of ink per page is at 3 cents for black and 10 cents for full color use.

Additional features:

The scan, copy and fax abilities are very efficient with the use of the MP Navigator EX software, allowing the user to easily navigate scanning operations from changing scanning resolutions, editing and saving scanned documents or even attaching the scanned document to your email. You can also send fax messages in a blast and store fax messages received in its memory if you feel you don't really need a printed copy at the moment. Not only can you copy documents but you can enlarge and reduce, or copy the image borderless with its frame-erase capability, copy sticker media and copy documents 2-in-one or 4-in-one selections.

Input tray can load up to 100 sheets but it is not supported by an automatic document feeder to provide smoother operation of its all-in-one functions.

There are no creative concepts available if you're looking for other features where you can use the machine's photo printing laser quality capabilities.

Photo Printer Test 2010 Summary:

The results of this Photo Printer Test 2010 show that a photo printer can still come up with lab quality photos at a fairly fast speed and at the same time perform regular all-in-one functions with wireless net working capability like Epson Workforce 600 AIO. Users will find Epson Workforce as a compatible home office companion at a fair price of $199.

Now if you're the type of user whose main concern is to have photo prints in excellent laser quality produced at a blazing speed using a convenient touch-screen methods and practically PC less and in large volume capacity, the HP Photosmart D7560 single-function priced at $119.00 would be the right kind of printer for you.

Others may have the mind to decide on the Canon PIXMA which has the lowest cost at $110.99 which is actually ideal for those who have a balanced need for everything including ease of use in navigating without being too picky about details since most of the work is being done by the machine for the user.

Photo Printer Test 2010 shows each printer has its strong and weak points and the user can choose by weighing which strong feature will best serve his need when it comes to choosing a photo printer.

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