Canon Pixma iP4000 Photo Printer

Rating:
Summary: Outstanding Printer!!!!
Review: I have been using the Lexmark Z series printer for far tooo long now!! I used to spend almost $40.00 on the cartridges and have a MAJOR mess to deal with when I tried to fill it. And the printer was very noisy and limited.
I had read all the reviews on the Canon iP4000, and found the best price right hear on Amazon.com! I have been printing photos galore! Printing on quality plain paper is almost as good. The printer is almost silent! It does an excellant job!! I couldn't be happier!
The negative reviews are from people who can't follow the set-up instructions.

Rating:
Summary: Simply awesome.
Review: (...)

This is my first photo-enabled printer and I must say I'm impressed with it. I was expecting good quality but nothing close to a regular film print. This printer instead delivered a close match (certainly not the same) which left me positively surprised.
I decided to buy this printer because I wanted to print some of my photos, maybe not the best ones (for which I would only get them from a studio), but those who I liked and wanted around the house.
The article on "Tom's Hardware" was a decisive factor in choosing this printer over the IP5000 or the Epson. Especially the very low cost per picture.

Rating:
Summary: Great buy!
Review: Great buy! Easy setup. I was printing photos in minutes. Print quality is excellent. Software includes "Easy-WebPrint" which automatically sizes web pages to fit width-wise on paper...no more cropping of the right quarter or fifth of the webpage being printed. Paper can be fed from the tray on top or the cassette. Also has a USB port on the front for ease of plugging in additional USB devices.

Rating:
Summary: Satisfied Customer
Review: I am very pleased with this printer. It was a breeze to install and prints clean, crisp copies. The noise level is low and it's much quieter than my previous printer. Amazon delivery was also very prompt. I'm grateful for the Amazon reviews which prompted me to purchase this top notch printer, as it's well worth the money.

Rating:
Summary: Gorgeous prints.
Review: I bought this last night after reading reviews. Though I've printed only about five pictures, I've done the same one on all, comparing on a few papers (one of which was printed from a store kiosk).

These 4X6 that I used look incredible on the canon Photo Pro Paper (you get 5 with the printer, but they cost around $30 retail for 75 sheets). I've also tried some cheap low-gloss kodak stuff (print job looked like hell), and HP's top of the line paper (about half the price of canon's best). The HP prints looked good, but not quite as good as on the canon paper.

Like I said, I also compared this with a kiosk print from a drugstore, and this printer does a better job. To my great surprise, when you print this on the good photo pro paper and look at it from all angles it looks simply like a normal 35mm print; what I mean is, if you print on lower quality paper (or use a drug store print) and then look at it on angles it looks almost as if the picture is layered: as colors change across the picture you see nasty ridges. However, no such ridges _at all_ with this IP4000 and the photo pro paper.

So, this review is as much for the good paper as the printer, but to make a very long story short, this printer has finally given me confidence in the quality of home-created digital photographs.

Awesome printer! I don't know if it's much better than the $50-cheaper IP3000, but I'm very pleased that for $150 I've now got an incredible printer :)

For my rambling you can rate this review negatively if you like!

Rating:
Summary: Paper recommendations for ip4000
Review: I found nothing to dislike about this printer except for performance on plain paper, expecially in Standard Quality. I have tried different papers (Hammermill, HP, Office Depot, Kodak) on this printer and finally found somewhat a match for it for both text and graphics. Here it is:

Plain: Kodak Bright White Inkjet Paper (110+ brightness, 24 lb. 90 g/m2, $6.00 at Office Depot). Works with either Standard or High quality plain paper setting.

Plain (second choice): Office Depot Color Inkjet paper.

(HP Bright White is terrible for this printer in Standard mode. It produces smears for blue. Hammermill is not much better.)

High Quality: Epson Matte Paper - Heavyweight. This paper is excellent for color photos when you set the driver to use Matte Paper Photo or High Resolution paper.

Hope that helped.

Rating:
Summary: Very good printer at an affordable price
Review: I purchased this printer in exchange for another photo printer received as a gift. Given the chance I would make the same choice again.

When researching printers I decided on a choice between the iP4000 and the iP5000. The sales person at my local store tried to steer me towards the Lexmark printers but they were no match for the speed and quality of the Canon series. She actually told me that it was a good thing to have all three colors in the same tank like the Lexmark so when I run out of yellow, as I always do, I would have to throw away the half used cyan and magenta as well. It was then that I noticed her name badge read "Lexmark Specialist" and I inferred some hope for a commission was inducing her to make such ridiculous statements.

The sample photoraphic prints available in the store were typically of scenes that displayed the printer's color depth capabilities; in this case a mountain biker was rendered very realistically. However what convinced me to choose the iP4000 was that to the naked eye the gradient of the sky in the background was almost perfectly smooth, lacking the diffusion or cross hatching patterns that appear on most other printers. Most other sample pictures don't include areas of solid color for this reason. The iP5000 was even better but I couldn't justify it for an extra $70.

With a second black ink tank the iP4000 works well as a document printer with rich black text without sacrificing the black print quality in photos. This feature alone led me to choose the iP4000 over the less expensive iP3000. The print head in the iP4000 is replaceable when it needs replacing, unlike some other printers that make you purchase a new print head with each ink cartridge replacement (which while ensuring consistent quality, makes for expensive consumables). The printer also supports PictBridge that enables direct camera to printer connection for those who prefer to leave their computer out of it.

The printer ships with five sheets of 4x6 Photo Paper Pro, their top of the line photo paper. I purchased a pack of their Photo Paper Plus and found no difference in the quality of the print discernable to the naked eye. Using the less expensive paper means photos that cost on order of $.24 - $.29 each, on par with my local photo printing services. I've also purchased the store brand photo paper in hope of reducing the price per print to less than $.20 each assuming the quality is just as good.

I've combed over the printer for weaknesses but have found very few. I suspect the front output tray may become increasingly flimsy with repeated opening and closing but only time will tell if I am justifiably concerned. The dual paper paths allow me to store 4x6 photo paper away from dust and children's fingerprints, however expanding the bottom tray is awkward to change from 4x6 to 8x10 paper. After a few dozen 4x6 and 8x10 photo prints, the ink tanks still appear full and either the meter is inaccurate or this printer is very efficient with ink.

As someone with habitual buyer's regret, I'm having a hard time finding something to regret. Perhaps I should have purchased the PIXMA iP8500 for the 8-color printing or the iP5000 for the 9600x2400dpi resolution and 1pL droplet size but if my mother can't tell whether the picture of the kids is from film or digital then that's good enough for me. For the price this printer can't be beat though I'm not certain how Canon is making any money on these. They don't have a proprietary ink tank system or smart chips that lock you into their consumables. Perhaps they are betting their superior quality will keep you buying Canon.

While some complain of a lack of whizbang features I actually welcome a printer that does one thing and does it very well: printing. So far I have not been disappointed with this feature. If only I could find a cell phone that makes and receives calls as well...

Rating:
Summary: Great photo printer for cheap....
Review: Mine cost about $100 after coupons and discounts at OD. I got this as a replacement for my Canon S900 which clogged up, and it costs less to just go ahead and buy a new printer than try to fix the old one. I got it primarily for photo printing. And it does a great job at that using Canon photo paper. Fine detail, great contrast and flesh tone rendition, hard to tell from the camera shop. Amazing for a $100 printer with only 3 colors and 2 blacks. My wife is very critical of photos and she even likes these! As far as text, this is not so good but it is not as important for me. The big pluses: very fast, quiet, duplex printing, 2 trays, very frugal with the inks, and excellent photos. Not much to complain about, hope it lasts longer than the 2 years the S900 did....

Rating:
Summary: Lab quality prints, great price all around
Review: Quite simply, I wanted a printer that gave me 1) lab-quality prints in 2) any size up to 8 1/2 x 11 that was 3) quick & easy to use, with or without a PC. (My wife is PC-adverse and wants pictures on-demand.) The Canon PIXMA ip4000 delivers.

I looked very closely at the HP Photosmart 8450, Epson PictureMate and Stylus RX500, even the entry-level HiTi. It seemed I would either be paying $250 or more to do sizes over 4x6, or just doing 4x6 to get great quality at reasonable price. Fortunately, I was able to find a printer that could deliver across the board. I had narrowed things down and was leaning towards the $200+ HP until I started looking at the per-picture printing costs, and the PIXMA then became a no-brainer.

I am not a professional photographer, but I am framing and displaying pictures printed from the PIXMA around the house. I have not been disappointed.

Rating:
Summary: Great Photo Printer, once the print driver is tweaked.
Review: This printer prints super fast and quiet also. The multi-color cartiridge with empty sensor allows you to only change the color that is empty. Text pages punch out quick and sharp. Out of the box, don't expect photos to print all that well without tweaking the print driver to optimize for photos. They turned out pretty pixelated. You will have to read about all the setting in the manual in order to understand what all the settings are for. Took me about 8 different settings and prints to get the results I was looking for in photos. Once that was done, the photo prints were excellent!! From the lab-like quality and that was with kodak paper which everyone seems to have problems with that brand jamming. Would have given 5 stars if it weren't for the intensive driver work required for good photos, which may be a little overwhelming for the average user looking for a photo printer. The bottom line is Excellent Prints, make sure you read the manual.