Canon Pixma iP4000 InkJet Photo Printer
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- Black Print Speed: 25 ppm
- Color Print Speed: 17 ppm
- Output Type: Color Printer
- Technology (Detailed): Thermal Inkjet
- Printer Type: Digital Photo Printer
- Max Resolution (BW): 600 x 600 dpi
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Printing photos has never been easier!
Pros
Good quality printing and super-fast
Cons
Slow start-up and uses too much black ink on photos
Recommended it?
Yes
The Bottom Line:
Great all-purpose printer!
I bought this printer primarily for photo printing and I'm quite satisfied. I love the convenience of printing photos at home that are almost as good as what I get from a photo store. And I can print 1 or 50... it's quick and easy with the included software, which also lets me crop and lightly edit the photos on the spot! Friends love that I can give them instant photos, and I've even used it for passport photo printing.
Overview:
The Pixma iP4000 is fairly quiet and prints very quickly -- although automatic testing and printer head cleaning maneuvers that take place every time you turn the printer on can be slow. I also like having two paper trays: I use the covered tray on the bottom for regular paper, and the fold-up top feeder for photo paper, envelopes and other specialty paper. (toggling between the two is easy with a dedicated, well-marked button) There are only two other buttons on the unit, so operation is somewhat simple.
The printer itself is rather plain and low-tech looking. The top feeder folds down and the paper output tray folds up into the printer unit, so when everything is folded up, the printer is an unobtrusive, albeit somewhat large, rectangular box, with about 3 inches of the bottom covered paper tray sticking out. Not exactly stylish, but not ugly either, and it keeps the dust out, which, judging by the dust currently on my printer, is probably a good thing!
Photos:
The photos print quickly and are quite good. The printer has no trouble printing full bleed photos (edge to edge, with no margin) If you look closely, some photos are slightly grainy, but this often depends on the photo colors and paper. I find that Canon photo paper works well; HP paper seemed to be grainier and you have to tear off one of the edges.
Ink:
I'm pleasantly impressed with the ink tank longevity. I would estimate I can print about 125 4x6 photos before having to change tanks. It uses 5 ink tanks: yellow, cyan, magenta, "photo" black and "text" black, so you can replace the appropriate tank when it runs low. My only complaint is that the print manager pop-up window does not show you the actual ink level; the tanks are displayed as full until they're almost empty, at which point they appear almost empty and a "replace ink" message appears. It's smart to always have replacement ink on hand since the warning comes rather late. (You can also open the printer panel and pull out a cartridge to check on ink level but I never think to do that)
BUT... I've noticed that in photos that have a section of solid black (ie, black background, people wearing black clothing), the black turns to a gold-ish hue of black and/or fades when I print on photo paper. (I use Canon ink) I can minimize this problem somewhat by changing the setting on my computer under printing preferences so that black prints at slightly less than full intensity.
Plain paper printing:
Again, I'm very satisfied. I generally run this on "draft" mode to conserve ink. Printing is super-fast (well, except for the start-up routine when powering up) and I've never had issues with paper jams... unlike the HP inkjet I use at work. The iP4000 can do double-sided prints, but I've never tried it (instead, I'll print one page from the top tray and manually flip the paper)
Technical comments:
PictBridge compatible. Prints up to 4,800 x 1,200 dpi color resolution, 600 x 600 dpi black. USB and parallel interfaces. Ink is included in the box, but cables are not. Runs with Mac or PCs.
Overview:
The Pixma iP4000 is fairly quiet and prints very quickly -- although automatic testing and printer head cleaning maneuvers that take place every time you turn the printer on can be slow. I also like having two paper trays: I use the covered tray on the bottom for regular paper, and the fold-up top feeder for photo paper, envelopes and other specialty paper. (toggling between the two is easy with a dedicated, well-marked button) There are only two other buttons on the unit, so operation is somewhat simple.
The printer itself is rather plain and low-tech looking. The top feeder folds down and the paper output tray folds up into the printer unit, so when everything is folded up, the printer is an unobtrusive, albeit somewhat large, rectangular box, with about 3 inches of the bottom covered paper tray sticking out. Not exactly stylish, but not ugly either, and it keeps the dust out, which, judging by the dust currently on my printer, is probably a good thing!
Photos:
The photos print quickly and are quite good. The printer has no trouble printing full bleed photos (edge to edge, with no margin) If you look closely, some photos are slightly grainy, but this often depends on the photo colors and paper. I find that Canon photo paper works well; HP paper seemed to be grainier and you have to tear off one of the edges.
Ink:
I'm pleasantly impressed with the ink tank longevity. I would estimate I can print about 125 4x6 photos before having to change tanks. It uses 5 ink tanks: yellow, cyan, magenta, "photo" black and "text" black, so you can replace the appropriate tank when it runs low. My only complaint is that the print manager pop-up window does not show you the actual ink level; the tanks are displayed as full until they're almost empty, at which point they appear almost empty and a "replace ink" message appears. It's smart to always have replacement ink on hand since the warning comes rather late. (You can also open the printer panel and pull out a cartridge to check on ink level but I never think to do that)
BUT... I've noticed that in photos that have a section of solid black (ie, black background, people wearing black clothing), the black turns to a gold-ish hue of black and/or fades when I print on photo paper. (I use Canon ink) I can minimize this problem somewhat by changing the setting on my computer under printing preferences so that black prints at slightly less than full intensity.
Plain paper printing:
Again, I'm very satisfied. I generally run this on "draft" mode to conserve ink. Printing is super-fast (well, except for the start-up routine when powering up) and I've never had issues with paper jams... unlike the HP inkjet I use at work. The iP4000 can do double-sided prints, but I've never tried it (instead, I'll print one page from the top tray and manually flip the paper)
Technical comments:
PictBridge compatible. Prints up to 4,800 x 1,200 dpi color resolution, 600 x 600 dpi black. USB and parallel interfaces. Ink is included in the box, but cables are not. Runs with Mac or PCs.
