Proof that film photography is on the verge of extinction
Written: Feb 14 '06 (Updated Feb 14 '06)
Product Rating:
Ease of Use:
Paper Handling:
Pros: Phenomenal color prints, VERY fast print speed, works well with 3rd party inks
Cons: Black and white prints are not so spectacular, does not accept roll paper
The Bottom Line: If you're shopping for a large-format printer, give this one a try. It's been on the market for a few years, but it's still right up there at the top.
rfman's Full Review: Canon i9900 InkJet Photo Printer
The world of photography may be going digital, but I still love to see actual prints. A photograph means little to me unless it’s on paper. Not those little postcard-sized prints that the local supermarket spews out; I’m talking about nice large prints that can be framed and appreciated.
For the past few years, I had been using online photo-finishing services to make 11”x14” and 11”x17” prints of my best photos, and while the results were great, I wished I could have the control over the print’s colors that I had when printing 8”x10” size on my trusty Epson 875 photo printer. And so in time I decided that I would buy a wide-format printer, and so I went shopping.
Considering I wanted this printer solely for photographic use, the logical place to shop was at my local photo equipment store. After printing a sample photo that I brought on the Canon i9900 and the Epson R1800, I decided to purchase the i9900. HP also makes a wide-format photo printer, but I did not consider it, because it does not use individual ink tanks, which is nonsense on a photo printer (For example, I go through 3 Photo Magenta ink tanks for every single regular Magenta one, imagine the waste if they were not separate).
On glossy paper, the i9900 and the R1800 produced equally amazing results. I could not say that one was better than the other in terms of output quality. The i9900 was clearly the faster printer of the two, and ink costs were slightly lower than that of the Epson. The Canon uses dye-based inks, which are compatible with virtually any paper on the market, whereas the Epson uses pigment inks that have been known to have problems on certain paper types. For example, my preferred photo paper, Ilford Galerie Classic Pearl, is not compatible with the Epson pigment inks.
There is no perfect printing technology out there though, and where the Canon process must bow down to Epson’s is in terms of print longevity. The prints from the Canon i9900, on Canon photo paper, are rated to have a lifetime of 25 years when displayed under glass. The Epson pigment ink printers are rater at over 75 years. Pigment inks will always outperform dye inks in this way, but for me, the 25-year lifespan of the Canon prints was sufficient (25 years is about the same lifespan as a traditionally processed “wet chemistry” print has), so I saved 100$ and bought the Canon over the Epson. To this date, it has given me no reason to think I have made the wrong choice.
General Impressions
If you’re buying a wide format printer for the first time, be prepared to clean off a good part of your desk space to accommodate one. This printer is big. With the paper input and output trays both fully extended, this printer takes up more space than my 21” CRT monitor does. It’s better off placed on a shelf or credenza than on a computer desk.
Out of the box, the i9900 is as easy to set up as any printer. It differs from conventional printers only by the amount of connectivity options that it offers, featuring separate USB 1.1 and 2.0 ports as well as FireWire. The USB 1.1 port is useless, as sending a photo to the printer via USB 1.1 takes forever. Windows users will want to use USB 2.0, while the FireWire connectivity option will please Mac owners. It’s even possible to use both options to have the printer connected to two machines without needing a switch.
The print head is replaceable and is packaged separately from the printer for shipping, and installation is very straightforward with the supplied instructions. With the print head installed, the 8 ink tanks can be fitted into place and the printer is ready to go.
Driver installation is straight-forward, and unlike the driver packages of some competitors (cough… HP… cough), it doesn’t install a bunch of useless resource-hungry programs without asking you. The first thing to be done is to perform a print head alignment, no different than with any other inkjet printer. Actually, it’s even easier, since part of the process is automated. After that, you’re on your way to the best prints you’ve ever made at home.
The prints the i9900 really are nothing short of amazing. In my opinion, I’m getting better results from my i9900 than from any typical 1-hour photo finishing service. In under 45 seconds, this printer will create a 4x6 that I’d put up against any professionally-finished photograph, any time. I say it’s better because I have complete control of the color tone of the picture, which I do not get with absolute certainty from photo finishing labs.
The same holds true for larger size pictures up to 13”x19”, as long as the original file has sufficient resolution. With my 8.0 and 7.1 megapixel Olympus cameras (E-500 and SP-310, respectively), I have no problems creating exquisite 13”x19” prints, and I’ve even made a few from my old 5.1 megapixel camera, although that’s as low as I’d go, and I’d probably limit it to 11”x14” for 5MP files. Both digital and long-time film photographers are amazed by the quality of the large-format prints that the i9900 produces in seconds. I’ve made prints for myself and friends, and I’ve sold some as well, and have gotten nothing but great comments on the quality of the prints.
I should add that the quality of the prints is also directly related to the paper used. I’m rather certain that anybody buying an i9900 will use it exclusively for photos, so we’re really only talking about photo paper here. No matter the quality of the printer, it would be foolish to expect good results on plain paper, it just won’t happen.
The Canon paper delivers great results, as expected. The Canon Matte Photo paper produces great results for scenes where a glossy finish is not desired, and is reasonably priced. I’ve used it in both 8.5”x11” and 13”x19” format and have gotten great results. The Canon Glossy papers all produce excellent results, but my senses cannot tell the difference in print quality between the regular Glossy Paper, the Glossy Paper Plus and the Glossy Paper Pro. I’d say stick with the lower grade paper; it works very well with the i9900. For my best quality prints, I use Ilford Galerie papers, which rival the best studio paper and works outstandingly well with the i9900. It’s quite expensive, so I tend to use it only for prints that I give away as gifts or sell, but it’s great that the i9900 works well with it (which isn’t the case for Epson pigment-ink printers). Finally, I must slip in a little word about what I consider the best deal in all-around photo paper. Costco sells some excellent photo paper under their house brand, Kirkland signature. It’s only available in glossy, but at 24$CAN for 125 8.5”x11” sheets or 19$CAN for 300 4”x6” sheets, it’s the best deal under the sun. The consensus among users is that this paper is actually manufactured by Ilford (the paper is made in Switzerland), and the prints I get on this paper are as good as on Canon paper, at a fraction of the price.
The other variable in the print quality equation are inks. Let’s start off by establishing the fact that no matter which model is chosen, ink costs are the main expense of running or high-quality photo printer. The i9900 requires 8 different ink colors to operate, all in separate ink tanks. The Ink tanks themselves do no contain the print head or nozzles or any electronics at all actually. Ink levels are measured optically from outside the ink tank. The Canon inks deliver great results as expected, but the costs for the ink tanks, while in line with competitors’ prices, are rather high considering it’s just a plastic reservoir with a small quantity of ink in it. The good news here is that it’s very easy for 3rd parties to make compatible ink tanks, and that 3rd party inks can be used with great results at a fraction of the price. I did notice a slight color shift with the 3rd party inks, but that was quickly fixed by making a custom color profile for the printer with the new ink set. And I now pay about 10$ for a set of cartridges rather than 80 $ for canon original inks. I should also mention that the printer also uses up the different ink colors quite unevenly. You can expect to go through 3 or 4 PhotoMagenta ink tanks before you need to replace the Green ink tank, so it’s often better to stock up on the colors that are used quickly (PhotoMagenta, PhotoCyan and Yellow are the most-used for me). So my final word on ink is that the Canon inks deliver great results, but don’t be afraid to try 3rd party inks, they work quite well in the i9900 too.
That being said, the i9900 is not without its flaws however. It has a few limitations that don’t bother me, but they may be significant for some other users, so I want to mention them to keep the review as objective as possible.
One of the first things that I’ve noticed is that the i9900’s spectacular performance with color prints does not carry over that well in black & white. With only one black ink (many Epsons have a black and a grey, and the wise-format HP has 3 monochrome inks), gradations are slightly grainy even with a very high quality original file. So if your printing is mostly Black & White, the i9900 is probably not the way to go.
The second drawback is that the i9900 doesn’t work with very thick media. I like to print our photos and images on greeting card envelopes sometimes, and the i9900 is unable to do it with the thick linen paper ones. It smears ink all over the envelope and generally makes a mess of things. I had to revert to my old Epson (which has an adjustment to set the paper thickness) to print on thick envelopes.
Finally, the i9900 only accepts sheet paper, not roll paper, so the biggest prints it can do is 13”x19”. For large panoramic printing, the Epson models are still the way to go.
Outstanding features
Simply put, the color print quality of the i9900 is nothing short of phenomenal. It’s also the fastest printer in its class by a landslide. And the painless handling of 3rd party ink tanks is a nice plus.
Problem points
As mentioned previously, the monochrome print quality of the i9900 is somewhat lackluster. The printer is really designed for color prints with the addition of dedicated red and green inks, and the compromise resulted in rather ordinary black & white prints.
The limited media handling capabilities might be a problem to some, as it does not accept roll paper of very thick media. It works fine with the heaviest of photo papers however, and that’s sufficient for my needs.
Value
In terms of actual purchase price, the i9900 is significantly less expensive than its competitors from Epson and HP. Ink costs are about the same for genuine ink cartridges from all brands. Computing price per print can be a very complex undertaking, and I’m not going to try to do it in this review. Broadly speaking however, with paper and ink costs accounted for, it’s probably not economically sound to use this printer to print out a bunch of 4x6 pictures when professional photo finishing labs will do it for under 15 cents a print these days.
It’s with the larger prints that the i9900 becomes a very attractive proposition. For example, even with the best photo paper, the cost to print an 8”x10” print is about 1.50$ (0.75$ for the paper, and I estimate 0.75$ for ink from the volume of prints I can do on a set of cartridges). With 3rd party inks, the costs drops to below a dollar. Most labs charge around 4$ for an 8”x10”. The savings add up even more for 11”x17” and 13”x19” prints (about 3.50$ versus 15 $ for this particular size). So if you make a lot of large prints, the i9900 is definitely worth the price.
Who should buy this printer
The i9900 will suit a variety of needs, from the advanced hobbyist photographer to low-volume professionals. If you create a significant number of large-size prints, the i9900 should absolutely be on the list of printers to consider.
Who should avoid this printer
I couldn’t imagine being disappointed by an i9900, but if you’re not going to be printing anything bigger than 8.5”x11” size, the iP8500 would be much better suited to your needs at almost half the price. It has the same print head and ink system and is otherwise identical to the i9900 but does not accept large-format paper.
While this should be obvious, this printer is not designed to be a general-purpose printer. It’s not made to print out letters and e-mails, and will not product its best results on plain paper. It’s more economical to have a small laser printer (which cost little more than 100$ now) for general printing and keep the i9900 strictly for photos.
Conclusion
The i9900 does not disappoint. In the end, it’s the quality of the prints that matters, and the i9900 still impresses me six months and many hundreds of prints after I first bought it. Some might quibble about its few deficiencies, but short of spending close to 1000$ for a photo printer, the i9900 is a clear winner.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 475 Operating System: Windows and Macintosh
Up to 4,800 x 2,400 dpi resolution 4-by-6-inch photos in as little as 38 seconds 13-by-19-inch posters in as little as 3 minutes 8-color ChromaPLUS in...More at Amazon Marketplace
Epinions.com periodically updates pricing and product information from third-party sources, so some information may be slightly out-of-date. You should confirm all information before relying on it.
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.