Photo Printer Recommendations

[Werewolf]

Need some recommendations on a Photo Printer.  Price less than $500 or so and can print 16X20's (might cost too much for that size - do they they even make paper in that size for photo printers).

Would be nice if it could double as a regular printer too. I have no brand preference - just looking for a good quality printer.

You guys turned me on to the Nikon D70s which is turning out to be a great camera (well - for everything but landscapes - which is what I do most).

So hit me with your best shots...

As an aside - there is some vignetting in the 18-70mm lens in high light conditions at max f-stop. I read a couple of reviews and I'm thinking that it is normal - if so then Nikon quality has gone to *expletive deleted*it in the last 30 years because the Nikor lenses I use on my F2 don't do that! Is the vignetting normal?

[Sylvilagus Aquaticus]

I've been very pleased with Canon printers. I specifically chose one that uses individual ink tanks and has a dedicated black tank for normal document printing.
Specifically I have an 860i. I like it so much I bought one for my brother.

Regards,
Rabbit.

[mtnbkr]

My dad's canon does well, but I can't remember the model number.  It's about a year old and mid priced, if that helps.  For that matter, my 6yo HP 932C does a decent job if I use good paper and ink.  

The best I've ever seen under $500 was Olympus' Dye Sublimation photo printer.  

Chris

[Harold Tuttle]

a 11x17 paper path is not that common & a bigger path is the realm of the big boys
whatcha gonna print that huge?
Lightjet images at 16x20 are 60 bucks each

i just bought a Canon Pixma 6000d for 135 with a 30 dollar rebate
nice images up to 8.5x11, 6 colors

i've just used it for 4x6s so far

very nice image quality
a second set of inks and a stack of paper ran me 100 bucks

the biggest i have printed so far have been 12x 18 footers, but i used a service

[Vodka7]

Price to print at home is ridiculous.  Cheaper to get it done professionally.

[Silver Bullet]

You might find this discussion illuminating:

http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/10/10/0324200&tid=187&tid=98&tid=218

[Gewehr98]

I got rather tired feeding an inkjet photo printer, each time an ink cartridge ran dry.

Keep your eyes open.  Sometimes color laser printers pop up for sale, especially surplus clearing houses. I bought two of them for less than $100 each.

I've got two Tektronix color lasers that are really nice, purchased through an authorized GSA reseller.  I had to put a fuser cartridge in one, and a couple toner cartridges in another.  The color toner cartridges aren't that cheap, but they last for a very long time, about 6,000 pages for my Tektronix Phaser 780, and about 8,000 pages for my Textronix Phaser 560.  

Both Phasers are color-corrected, and compatible with TekColor, Adobe PostScript, Pantone, and ColorSync standards.  

The Phaser 780 can print 1200dpi color, and handle media up to Tabloid Plus, while the Phaser 560 is set up for standard Letter size media.

I've set up my Phaser 780 to operate under PhaserShare, as a web-accessible printer with its own IP address, so I can send print jobs to it at home while I'm online elsewhere.  

Here's what the big-assed Phaser 780 looks like, on top of the accessory media tray rack:



Here's what the smaller desktop-sized Phaser 560 looks like:

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

At the Ann Arbor art fair this summer, I asked all of the photographers which printers they use for digital work.  The answer was universally "Epson Ultrachrome".  The reason is that most museums now consider inkjet prints made on these printers to have sufficient quality and archival stability for their fine art collections.

I don't own a photo printer yet, but you can guess what kind I'll buy eventually.

[Monkeyleg]

The printer we use at the photo studio I work at is an Epson Stylus 2200. I don't know the cost, but it's terrific.