Holy cow I love this new Canon i9900 printer! Anyone else?

[Adam Hicks]

I'm absoultely floored that home printers have come this far. I printed some letter size edge to edge and it just blew me a away. I'm still unsure of the color setting to use in Photoshop CS for the optimal color output though. Using the quick print program that came with the printer I've been able to get excellent color matched prints (to my eye anyways) without any modification. I could probably tweak that a bit more, so if anyone out there is using this printer and has any tips or tricks, please let me know!

Sorry this is a tad off topic guys... all of my prints are coming from my DRebel though :)

[Conk]

Sorry no tips yet as I just bought the i960. It also blew me away with the borderless 8.5x11 prints. I wanted the i9900 but couldn't bring myself to paying the extra $400.00 for 2 more cartriges and larger prints of 13x19.

[DocFrankenstein]

I am considering getting that printer. I would really appreciate a follow up as to the amount of ink it wastes and how much one print cost.

After you get some statistics of course.

How's the pixelation? Is it soft on 13-19? What glass are you using?

[Adam Hicks]

Well I bought the printer for $429 shipped no tax from NewEgg.com as far as price goes...

So far it hasn't used much ink at all. I've printed around 24 4x6 and 4 8x10 images and the ink wells still show full. I bought an extra set of the 6 main inks on eBay for $33. Real canon stuff. never use generic ink in a printer this nice! :)

[John_T]

Hi Adam, right, the printer is really great. I have the i9950.

The main tip I can give you when printing over PSCS is to choose Printer Color Management in the PS printer dialog, and then in the i9900 printer dialog choose your paper, Quality whatever you like, and Color on Auto.
I think the i9900 has a very good printer driver and it is very well set up for Canon papers. I would not recommend getting fancy with profiles unless you want to use non-Canon papers.

My prints of professional test targets have come out perfect, and so nearly match my monitor I couldn't hope for better. I did try seperately profiling Canon PPP to double check the printer driver's job, and the seperatley profiled print was not nearly as good.

[Adam Hicks]

Thanks John... I'm only using the Canon Photo Paper Pro (but I don't understand why they don't make it in 5x7, just the plus.) I noticed when using any other paper, even the Kodak Ultima, that the quality just isn't nearly as good as on the Canon paper, so I'm sold.

[btroeller]

I also printed some professional test targets and was blown away with
the 9900.
However, I sent some of my 10D files to the printer as 16 bit TIFF's
and noticed that they did'nt have the 'punch' the test targets had.
The targets were 8 bit JPEG's and so my questions are 1) are 16 bit files
not supported fully by the 9900's printer driver and 2) should I be sending JPEG's instead of TIFF's.
I am using PSCS with Printer Color Management selected.
Both the test target and my 10D files looked equally good on my monitor.
All settings and media were the same for both prints.
Thanks for your help.

[Adam Hicks]

I'd have to do some tests as far as TIFFs go. I've been printing either RAW (AdobeRGB) or full quality JPG and have seen colors that are darned near 3D they're so perfectly saturated and crisp. But instead of sending things out and hoping they came back as I expected, I just bought the printer so I could experiment.

I was torn between spending $700 or so on something like a 17-40L, and was close to doing it, but decided that a new lens wouldn't get me there shooting lots of shots and practicing like a new printer would. Now that I can print these things myself (and stare in amazement as they spit out in about a minute) I find that I'm more anxious to get out and try new things and take more pictures = have more fun with the investment I've already made. So I think it was a good decisision at this point in my hobby-life!

Take care, sorry I couldn't answer your question directly, but I'll be experimenting with different formats over the next week and I'll post some results from the printer as I do.

Adam

[btroeller]

Adam,
Thanks for the reply. I need to do some more experimenting also.
If I can achieve that '3D' effect with the test prints, I should be able
to get that with my own files.

[CyberDyneSystems]

Unfortunately I missed the timinng for the i9900... I put off getting a large printer for a loooong time and then bit the bullet and got the i9100.

I truly love that printer.. but I got it about two weeks before the i9900 hit the shleves.. which is better for the same price.. and in fact drove the remaining i9100s down to half price.

Oh well.. timing...

But Yes.. I love the prints the i9100 gives me!

[DReb-MO]

Hi Adam, right, the printer is really great. I have the i9950.

between thses two printers. The 9900 and the 9950? I understand the 9950 is the Euro version but I thought I read it also comes "more fully" equipped. Something about printing on CD's etc. Either way I picked up the i9900 10 days ago on eBay for $287 w/o the inks. It was a risk but it funcitons perfectly and best as I can tell from printing out the firmware info only had 11 standard pics printed. Photos are breathtaking from it. Bought some Canon Photo Paper Pro in the A3+ size and was blown away being to print something this large at this high quality at home.

[John_T]

Yes, the only difference between the i9900 and the i9950 is a facility for printing directly on printable blank CDs or DVDs. Apparently the US distributors did not want the CD facility to cut costs, both for their own profit and competitive pricing. Competitive with what, I can't make out...