Now, let’s get back from the world of innovation technologies to printer maker releases.

The Compact

The Stylish

The Sexy

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“The soil” of Canon is extremely fertile this month. Believe it or not, but here come three more multifunctions from that manufacturer - Pixma MX300, MX310, and MX700. As you may gather it from the word ‘multifunction’, these devices perform functions of printing, copying, scanning, and faxing.

Apart from the functions mentioned above, Canon Pixma MX700 features networking, two-sided printing, and an auto document feeder. The device prints and copies 30 pages per minute (ppm) for black text and 19 ppm for color documents. The printer employs 4 separate color cartridges (pigment black, cyan, magenta, and yellow) that are capable of producing 2-picoliter-sized droplets at up to 4800 x 1200 dpi in color and 600 x 600 dpi in black.

The printer also features a 1.8-inch LCD screen to helps navigate the menu, and supports PictBridge connection as well as memory cards. The MX700’s scanner has a CIS sensor to achieve 2400 x 4800 dpi; copy zoom ranges from 25 to 400 percent. For easier copying, scanning, and faxing Canon Pixma MX700 employs a 30-page auto document feeder.

Canon Pixma MX310 has the same basic design of MX700. Both the MX310 and the MX300 use one black and one combined color ink cartridge to print 4800 x 1200 dpi in color and 600 x 600 dpi in black. Both MX310 and the MX300 can print as fast as up to 22 ppm black and 17 ppm color. The printers are compatible with a PictBridge connection for direct printing from cameras, but don’t support memory card slots.

All in all, this month Canon has released 12 inkjet printers – 6 all-in-ones, 2 compact photo printers and 4 “men of mould” – regular color inkjet printers. Frankly speaking, I can’t imagine there is necessity for that many devices, however, there is surely someone at Canon who can. Wilson Rotham of Gizmodo.com is confused, too; in his acticle “Canon Launches 12 Printers, Only Needed To Launch 4” he tells why 4 printers would be enough and calls to put an end to this “product spam.”

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Printer makers just can’t stop pleasing their customers with new releases. Epson USA introduced three new Hi-Definition printers. Epson Stylus Photo R280 is a single-function photo printer capable of printing on wide media (up to 8.5″ x 44″) and CDs and DVDs. It features very fast speed – up to 38 ppm in black and 37 ppm in color at maximum resolution of 5760 x 1440 dpi.

Epson’s Stylus Photo RX595 and Stylus Photo RX680 are multifunctional printers that can copy and scan. Both printers have a built-in 2.5” LCD preview screen and support direct print from memory cards and PictBridge-enabled cameras. Stylus Photo RX595 perform as fast as R280, while RX680 is faster – it prints 40 ppm in black and white (color printing rate is that same). The printers also support maximum resolution of 5760 x 1440 dpi.

Printing speed put aside, the new devices seem pretty ordinary, so where “Hi-Definition” come from? The trick is in use of Advanced MicroPiezo printhead that produce ink droplets as tiny as 1.5 picoliter. Yet the printers utilize 6 individual color cartridges filled with Claria Hi-Definition Ink, a proprietary in by Epson to print smudge, scratch, water and fade resistant photos. The manufacturer promises that pictures printed with Claria inks will last as long as 200 years.

From Canon’s side, there is a trio of new printers, too – Pixma MP520, MP610, and MP970. All three all-in-one printers feature PictBridge and memory card direct print, reduced warm-up time and improved Easy Scroll-Wheel interface; they also support. Easy Scroll-Wheel now not only gives information on specific functions, but also takes the user to the specific function selected. All three models feature Auto Image Fix, a tool to adjust image quality.

Canon Pixma MP970, being the top-of the-line model, has a large, 3.5-inch LCD screen, uses seven individual cartridges and features a CCD in its scanner. Printing rate is 30 ppm for black, 22 ppm for color documents at 9600-dpi maximum resolution using 1 picoliter droplets. MP970 is network-ready device with a film adapter for both slides and negatives.

Pixma MP610 support the same speed of 30 ppm for black, 22 ppm for color documents at 9600-dpi maximum resolution with 1 picoliter droplet size. However, it uses only five individual cartridges (without photo cyan and photo magenta). The printer has a smaller, 2.5-inch LCD screen, and a CIS sensor in its scanner.

Canon Pixma M520 is low-end model with only 2-inch LCD screen. It utilizes four color cartridges to print Black text at 30 ppm and color text at 19 ppm. Supported resolution is 4800 dpi with 2 picoliter droplets.

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We are back in town! Two weeks of complete isolation from computer world have left me feeling hungry for news. Let’s see what has been going on in printing industry.

Canon announced two new models: imageCLASS MF4270 and PIXMA mini320. Canon imageCLASS MF4270 is a network-ready multifunction laser printer with a built-in duplex unit, designed for small and home offices. Apart from regular printing, the duplex print applies to incoming faxes and copying documents.

Canon imageCLASS MF4270 can print and copy at speed of up to 21 pages-per-minute (ppm) at up to 1200 x 600 dpi resolution. Fax unit feature 8 one-touch speed dial numbers, 100 coded speed dial numbers and 256-page memory capacity. The printer uses Canon Single Cartridge System, which means toner and drum are combined together in one unit.

Canon PIXMA mini320 is another compact photo printer “to bring to life those images captured at important moments”. According to Canon, this is the first compact photo printer in the brand’s model range to print images up to 5×7 inches. PIXMA mini320 feature 2.5” color LCD screen with wide viewing angles, and the Easy-Scroll Wheel interface. The printer uses Canon’s ChromaLife100 system that provides 100-year-lifespan of pictures printed with genuine inks.

Hewlett Packard respondes with introduction on a new multifunction inkjet printer. HP Photosmart C5283 All-in-One combines printer, scanner and copier in one unit, so it can scan, copy and print black-and-white and color images. Bundled HP software allows printing web pages without cut-off edges. Photosmart C5283 support print directly onto CDs/DVDs, and from most common flash cards. The printer is fueled with 6 color HP Vivera Inks in separate cartridges.

HP keeps on exploiting the idea of the Web being a storage for documents for printing. Now is the time for mobile phones to come into play. Having been developing for several months, one of HP laboratories gave birth to a new service named Cloudprint. This software makes it possible to share, store and print documents using a mobile phone.

Here is how it works. Users first “print” their documents to a HP server connected to the Internet. The system assigns them a code, and transmits that code via SMS back to user. Later, using the SMS, it is possible to retrieve the documents by entering the user’s phone number and the code on the Cloudprint Web site. The documents can then be retrieved in PDF format, ready to be printed at a nearby printer. The service will include a directory service that will show the location of publicly available printers on Google Maps.

Next is Epson reporting. The Japanese company launched three new printers ranging in features and prices. The first one is Epson CX9400Fax, a multifunctional printer that also copies, scans and faxes. The device features built-in 33.6 Kbps fax modem and 30-page document feeder. The Epson CX8400 can print borderless 4×6 images in 26 seconds and monochrome documents at the speed of 32 ppm. The basic model, CX7400, produces black text pages at 28 ppm and 4×6 borderless color prints in 27 seconds.

And now Epson presents something really interesting – world’s fastest laser-quality printer! Epson C120 is the fastest laser-quality document ink jet printer around. It can print as fast as 37 ppm for black and 20 ppm for color, obviously, in fastest (draft) mode. Epson claims that this performance makes the C120 leader among ink jet printers under $160 in terms of black and white printing, while offering about twice the speed of printers in the sub-$100 segment.

Priced for only $90, Epson C120 may seem a cheap purchase. However, beware of ink costs. Black ink cartridges for the C120 are currently selling for about $20, while a color cartridge is about $38. Black and color cartridges are rated to print 250 and 350 pages accordingly, and you can count on spending at least $200 on ink for every 1000 pages. These are the cost comparable to owning an economical color laser printer, so think it over before buying the printer.

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if you place Canon SELPHY CP-740 on it and you can do it fast. The new compact photo printer makes a 4×6-inche picture that Canon claims to last al least 100 years within just a minute! The printer supports direct printing from digital cameras as well as most popular flash card slots. Besides, the printer features 2-inch color LCD display and built-in red-eye correction software.

“This printer is ideal for anyone who hopes to produce long-lasting memories with no hassle. Especially with the popularity of scrapbooks, crafting, and even personalized postcards printed while on vacation, the SELPHY CP740 Compact Photo Printer can make great quality prints and postcards,” said Yuichi Ishizuka, senior vice president and general manager, Consumer Imaging Group, Canon U.S.A.

The printer is expected to be available this fall for estimated selling price of $99.99.

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This post may be interesting to you if you own a Canon or Epson inkjet printer and still can’t decide whether to use genuine of compatible inks to print your photos. This post will, probably, make you feel disappointed if own a Canon or Epson inkjet printer and chose compatible inks to capture the moments of your life into paper with compatible inks. This post will make you feel proud of using genuine inks for your Canon or Epson printer.

Let’s get to the point. Allion Test Labs, Inc. a Taiwan-based company that verifies product quality and interoperability of PCs and PC peripherals, has tested color fading of inkjet-printed photos using OEM inks and third-party manufacturer’s inks. Allion was hired to do the test as independent tester and didn’t reveal the relations between test results and the ink manufacturers names. It’s only known that the evaluation was done using two printers: one by Seiko Epson Corp, the other by Canon Inc.

The color fading test was made of three parts:

• how well a photo framed under glass resists to an in-door light
• how fast a photo degrades in the dark (to simulate album conservation)
• how well a photo resistance to gas

In the accelerated gas resistance test a mixture of gases is used to simulate aging of a photo, so that one year of real life can be tested in 72 hours (if you are interested in the actual gas formulations, visit the original news page).

The punchline of the evaluation is this: no remarkable color fading was discovered in print using original printer manufacturers’ genuine ink and paper after an acceleration test that results in aging equivalent to five years. On the opposite, color visibly started to fade in photos printed with refill ink and genuine paper, even in tests resulting in aging equivalent to one year. See that for yourself on the figure below for one brand (the original inscriptions were in Japanese):

As we see, picture printed with geniune inks even in five years is not as faded as the one printed with third-party inks. Almost the same figure for the other:

Once again, it’s clear that original inks are more fade-resistant than compatible ones.

So, folks, if you are keen on printing out Japanese girls on your Canon or Epson inkjet and want them to last the longest, you’d better stick with geniune inks Otherwise, watch for photos fade out over time.

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Canon Pixma MP530 is another ‘omnipotent’ device combining functions of printer, copier, scanner and fax. Just like most printers of this class, Pixma MP530 is designed to satisfy the need of home users or small office.

However, there are, or I’d rather say, there are not, a couple of things that an office user might find useful. Media card slots and a color LCD are missing from this model, but that may not be a problem if you used PC before printing photos.

Canon Pixma MP530 faxing abilities include 40 programmable speed-dial numbers, 33.6 kbps of faxing speed and 150-page memory. The paper capacities are modest, but enough for target users: cassette and paper feeder for 150 sheets each and a 30 sheets automatic document feeder.

The printer employs five cartridges system - 3 cartridges for main color and two cartridges for dye-based and pigment-based black inks. Canon Pixma MP530 supports maximum resolution of 9600dpi x 2400dpi and can print as fast as 29 monochrome and 19 color pages per minute.

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