Color Inkjets Evolving But Still Have Room to Develop
My last color printer, a long-since discontinued model, was so loathsome a beast that it nearly made me swear off inkjets forever.
Its prints were decent for an economy printer of the day, and it was a bargain at the time for $300. Or so I thought. That machine seemed to drink $30 ink cartridges like Los Angeles draws down water on a hot summer day. And it was loud, slow, needlessly complex and unreliable--age-old problems for color printers.
So I’m delighted to report that today’s offerings at half that price--Canon’s BJC-6000, Epson’s Stylus Color 860, and Hewlett-Packard’s 842C--are faster and better in just about every way. (You can get a serviceable printer these days for as little as $50, but the reduced aggravation is well worth a $100 premium.) They all create stunning photo-quality prints that rival the products of standard photo processors.
Unfortunately, they’re also finicky, loaded with hidden costs and still take too much effort to master.
Color-printer makers--competing with an arms race of features--have created a cost/complexity ratio that is out of whack with the expectations inherent in a $149 device. For that price, I want appliance-like simplicity rather than a multitude of jargon-ridden software controls for photos, graphical images and text, and various paper types (Epson sent four varieties billed as perfect for photos).
Bear in mind, also, that color printers offer the classic razor/blade dichotomy--vendors earn their real profits selling ink and paper specially tuned for their products.
A complete set of cartridges for any of the three units tested will set you back $50 to $61. Those cartridges last a long time if you print mostly text with lots of white space on standard paper. But if you’re a digital photographer, watch out: A sheet of top-quality glossy stock runs from 65 cents from Epson to a whopping $1.80 from Canon.
Speaking of hidden costs, none of the units comes with the required cable to connect to your computer, so tack on an extra $10 to $69, depending on type and length.
Considering that only a couple of years ago low-cost color printers used to be painfully slow, these machines are a major step up. For light-duty home and small-business printers, they spit out text, Web pages and simple newsletters with impressive speed, particularly in draft mode--up to several pages a minute.
The differences between them--and the abilities of your computer--play out when printing complex images. When it came to complex graphics and photos, printing slowed to a crawl--up to 13 minutes for a full-page photo that took up about 1.1 megabytes of disk space. Part of the delay was image processing, which is the PC’s job, not the printer’s. Today’s low-end 500-megahertz PCs would do much better than the aging PC I used.
Here are the results of my tests, from best to worst.
Canon BJC-6000
The Canon BJC-6000 provoked some strong and far-from-nostalgic memories of my old printer.
Although setup went smoothly, the Canon proved maddeningly, well, clunky. Its print carriage goes through a series of loud setup routines before and after a print run, turning the printer into an obnoxious kibitzer every time you fire it up. And it looks dinosaur-like beside the svelte HP offering.
That was not the only irritation. The print head required a realignment procedure after printing only a few pages. And the printer refused to accept the special photo color cartridges after I had used them once then swapped them out for the regular color cartridges. No matter; the cartridges made no discernible difference on photographic colors or clarity.
However, Canon made up in quality and economy what it ignored in fit and finish.
It was easily best for text--dark and clean with virtually no splatter even on very large or very small type sizes. Its illustrations were clear and vibrant, and its photo test just a hair below the HP unit, falling behind with slightly muddy details.
Canon also gives you a break on its ink cartridges; black sells for only $14, compared with $29 or $30 with the other printers. The cost of its three-color cartridges--$12 apiece or $36 for all three--is ostensibly higher than the $30 or $32 charged by the other companies, which package all three colors in a single unit.
But colors are consumed according to the types of images printed, and never in precisely equal quantities. With the other companies, you must replace the entire cartridge when a single color runs out. Canon’s separate color cartridges allow you to completely use all the colors, saving considerable cost of ink in the long run.
HP 842C
I initially fell in love with the HP 842C. It runs as quiet as a whisper, and its compact size gives it a desktop footprint about one-third smaller than its competitors--a key advantage in cramped work spaces. It also created the best photo reproductions, with sensational skin tones and clear details, and did so far faster than the Canon or Epson.
Unfortunately, my affection faded fast when the 842C fell flat in every other important category.
Its text files were less bold and clear, and contained more splatter than the other two units. It also was the worst performer in the illustration category, suffering from blurred edges between sections, particularly on curves and sharp angles, and minor banding.
The Canon and Epson units’ glossy prints mimic chemical-process photo prints when it comes to spills--a splash of water can be quickly swabbed with minimal damage. But HP’s ink is dangerously water soluble. A moistened finger tip is enough to smear the image.
In the “it’s not a bug, it’s a feature” department, the 842C’s paper tray uses plastic guides to separate a newly printed page from the stack momentarily--apparently to aid in ink drying--but the guides makes a clackety-clack sound on every page, spoiling an otherwise meditative decibel level.
Finally, HP offers a substandard 90-day warranty, compared with a full year for the others.
Epson Stylus Color 860
The Epson Stylus Color 860 started by delivering a computer user’s nightmare: software installation problems. It took more than an hour, most of that time with an Epson technician, to properly install the driver (software that controls the printer, acting as an intermediary between your application and the computer’s operating system). A few days later the Stylus developed conflicts with other drivers on my PC, resulting in an additional 30-minute session with the technician.
Once problem-free, the printer demonstrated some thoughtful features. The ink cartridges install in a click, and clear function lights and buttons on the printer make ink and paper status visible at a glance. A see-through cover lets you view print jobs as they progress.
The output was decidedly mixed, however.
Text was dark and clear--though with a bit more splatter than the Canon machine. Graphics, however, were among the best in the group, free of faint distortion seen in the other printers.
However, the Epson fell down on digital photos, in this case, of a group of people outdoors under a blue sky. A red cast gave everyone a severe sunburn, distorted clothing colors and hazed over some details. Even using the driver controls to sharply reduce the amount of magenta did not remove the cast from the image.
Overall, the mediocre result didn’t seem worth the setup hassles.
Because I need a color printer, when I began this review I had intended to buy the best unit--clearly the Canon. But as I sit listening to its deafening clicks and whirs, I can already feel the buyer’s remorse setting in.
What I really want is the HP 842C’s design finesse with the Canon’s consistent print quality. Perhaps I’ll wait for the next generation; maybe then if I fall in love, it’ll last beyond a testing honeymoon.
*
Times staff writer Charles Piller can be reached at charles.piller@latimes.com.
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Color Printers
Serviceable color inkjets can be had for as little as $50. But for versatility, value and overall quality, these are the best that the three top printer makers offer for less than $150. All handle a range of paper and envelope sizes, and can print photo-quality images.Source: The manufacturers
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Color Printers
* Canon BJC-6000
$149
Annoyingly loud, but best text and graphics.
* HP 842C
$149
Quiet and fast, top photo output, substandard text and graphics.
* Epson Stylus Color 860
$149
Stylish design, mediocre photos.
For more information, please see C6.
