Canon i9900

Pros: Small footprint. Incredible seamless gradations.

Cons: Loud. Feels a little like a toy printer.

Summary: What I wanted to know before I bought the printer – that I didn’t see reported here – was this: How does it print on 24 lb text stock? Can I use use this as a traditional printer as well as for photos?

The answer is this. As for paper handling, it’s about as good as most good low-cost, ink-jets on the market. And we had no complaints about the speed. But the print quality gets lost on a paper with some absorption. We tried printing on various mediums and compared the output to other ink-jets in our office. Although the final output was better on the i9900, the difference was not compelling. Most folks won’t see much difference on text paper. Not so for photo paper.

We needed the large format and output quality for press proofs. On photo paper, the output quality was breathtaking. I’ve never really bothered to print a photo on an office printer because we work with professional photo processors in New York, or mail to Kodak. This printer changed everything. If you’ve spent time in the dark room burning and dodging then this printer will still not be up to snuff. However if you are happy to send your photos off to Kodak (not Wal-Mart where they melt them to speed up the development so all latitude is destroyed and so that shots end up looking polarized) you can toss out your Kodak mailers now. Try a duotone. The gradation will blow you away.
Enjoy.