Photo Printers

Good day all!

I am new to the forum, and I am not a photographer. I am hoping to get a little help from those that are familiar with printers and high quality printing at home. I make wine and I am looking to print my own labels, but I am very confused by the printer options.

I am looking at all in one photo printers so I am not limited by formats, most labels are PDF. My first choice would be the Epson ET-8500 $800, but for the amount I am going to print a year (70 pages?) I don't think the eco tank price tag is going to save me much over a cheaper printer where cartridges are the big cost. My uncertainty is with the number of colours. The lower end ones don't all have 6 colours, and some that do have light cyan and magenta where higher end ones have picture black, grey, or red. Does it make that much of a difference in quality? With wine labels rich colours will be important. Deep blacks and solid contrast is a big concern.

There is another solid option Canon Pixma G620, $400. And then there are the real budget options like the HP Envy 7255e for $200 and 6 months of ink. If anyone can offer any insight on print quality, what really makes a difference and where my money is best spent, I would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks!

For your volume you're probably better off outsourcing. I would look for a small retail printer near you, or even a Staples, and see what they can do for you.

Get yourself a dye based printer. I’ve had one for 14 years and at times printed very infrequently. I’ve never had a serious issue.

Printing your own work is very enjoyable, I highly recommend it.

I’m not sure whether the G620 uses dye based inks or not.

Thanks for the replies. I have been outsourcing, but its a pain. I am 30 minutes from a small town. It can take days to drop it off and get back into town. Staples said they couldn't do it, and the only other option is a mess. This is the main reason I want to be able to do it myself.

It's more fun if I print them, too. I will search for die based printers and see where that leads.

The Pixma is dye based and seems like a good mid cost option. It is a tank model which is nice.

4800 x 1200 dpi
6 color cyan, magenta, yellow, black, grey, red

I don't know a thing about print resolution as it had never mattered. There are options with higher resolution, will I be likely to notice with labels?

Other than that it all seems to be pretty standard printer stuff.

I think it’s a fairly good option for you. It’s 325 at BH Photo right now.

https://www.bhphotovid​eo.com/c/product/16360​71-REG

I appreciate your input. I think I will give it a shot.

I bought the G620 about six weeks ago and, so far, I really like the photo print quality that I am getting from it. I will note that Canon doesn't provide profiles for their paper for this model. I did a little research and found that Red River Papers does provide profiles for their paper, so I bought a sample pack and installed the profiles. Makes a big difference.

Tim