Reader Reports: (most recent first)

(added 8/16/2004)
" Canon i900D:
These are my comments on this printer:
First off, let me just say thank goodness for your site. It has now saved my bacon on two occasions.

With respect to the Canon i900D, I purchased this printer in place of an Epson Stylus Photo 1200, which was a classic, but never worked well under OS X, yielding unpredictable color results. It was also quite noisy and it was getting harder and harder to find genuine ink-jet cartridges for it. But enough on the Stylus 1200, on to the i900D.

I'm still feeling my way around this printer, but the most important thing I must emphasize is that it does not use Colorsync Profiles under OS X. At first I was furious to learn this, since this was one of the main reasons I replaced the Stylus 1200. But my concerns were allayed after visiting your site and learning, quite correctly, that the i900D actually works just fine in Photoshop with Colorsync turned off. It produced results that matched my monitor exactly. Haven't tried it under OS 9 yet, but I understand that the Canon drivers can utilize Colorsync under that OS.

The printer is very quiet (it even has a quiet mode, but it's quiet when not using that) and prints far faster than the Epson Stylus 1200 did. MacAddict recently reviewed the i900D and gave it exceptionally high marks. Unfortunately, they misstated its abilities with respect to printing on CDs and DVDs, which it does not (this seems to be Epson's exclusive province for the time being).

At any rate, my preliminary experience is quite positive with this printer. I give it a thumbs up.
Ken"

I'm happy with my i900D although I wish it read Sony Memorystick Pro media (not an issue for me originally until I bought a Sony DSC-T1 camera, although I can use the T1's camera dock with the printer.)
I got my i900D for a really good price last year ($199 on a sale pricematch), but if I had to buy today I'd also give the Epson R300M (about $220 or so w/2.5in LCD option). It reads memorystick pro media and has a 1/2in larger LCD that's easier to read, plus you can read the ink levels on the LCD (a plus since using my Airport Ext. base to share the printer means the std printer utilities do not 'see' the printer.) The R300 doesn't have as small a droplet size as the i900D though (which as 2 picoliter size vs 3 for the R300M), although photo prints look excellent to my eyes on both printers. And the i900D has a user removeable/replaceable print head where the Epson does not. Epson also charges more for ink carts (and much more for the black R300 cart -even though it's not larger in capacity than the color tanks.) The i900D also can hold both 4x6 and 8.5x11 paper at the same time (flick of a knob changes source) where the R300 can only hold one or the other.
One note - although the R300 can print labels on printable CDs, the printed CDs are reportedly not waterproof. (saw a warning on that in a review of the printer.)

(added 11/26/2003)
" My Canon i950 has been very fine. Photo quality is stunning, and I like Canon's middle-ground approach of having a replaceable print head (unlike Epson) that is not part of every cartridge (unlike HP); this allows Canon to standardize on ink cartridges while upping the nozzle-count of their printers -- a smart move, and ultimately better for the consumer and the environment.

The only glitch has been trying thrid-party ink, which caused some apparent clogging. Now, back with Canon ink carts, the printer works superbly again.

The i960 (which replaced the i950) should be every bit as good (slightly faster, and it includes a 4x6 paper cartridge); for a general-purpose printer that also prints great photos, go for the i950/i960, which can use a larger black ink tank and prints faster in non-photo modes.
FYI, Staples is running a $30-off-$150 promo ... and they sell the i960 for $149.95. Add a bag of rubber bands or something to use the discount!
Tony "

(added 11/26/2003)
" Hello, Just opened the i960 I just got to replace my old workhorse, an Epson SC 760. It was a tough choice, since up till now I was convinced that Epson had the best quality. However, reviews for the i960 seemed too good to be true, but I've had some experience with the Canon CP100, which also produces fabulous prints (but the prints are much pricier). Of interest, it took me a while to find a place to get this one (many places out of stock), but Amazon had it for $187 with free shipping!

The instructions for the i960 were amongst the best I've seen. I tested the printer first with my Powershot S45, and it spit out a borderless print in less than a minute (WOW!). I then used the Easy Photoprint application under OS X.3 and printed another borderless 4x6 (even faster!). Then I used my old standby, GraphicConverter, to print a scanned image, and I've never seen a better, GRAINLESS print from any inkjet printer to date. It printed the 8x10 in about 1.5 minutes--I cannot tell you how much faster this is compared to the Epson at the highest quality setting. Two thumbs up!
Great site, by the way!
Ed C. "

" I use a Canon S820, which I've had for over a year now. Bought it on closeout for a net of $50, this is a really good printer. Drivers are built-in and the printer is recognized in OSX, but to get the edgeless photo printing I had to download drivers from Canon's site. I can't vouch too much for the text, since I have an old Laserwriter 16/600 on my home network and use that for text documents. What mixed documents I have printed on the Canon look quite good, and others have remarked how fast it is too.
All in all, I'd call this printer a winner.
JSH
TiBook "

(added 11/26/2003)
" Hi Mike, you asked
I have a 14 month old i850. Used for both photos and text printout. As with all consumer inkjets, either Apple or the printer manufacturers have been negligent in providing the same capabilities for printing that are available under OS9. If you ask the printer manufacturers they will blame Apple for not implementing commands under OSX that allow for adding features. Apple will point the finger back at them.

I doubt they have done much to the drivers for the entire line of i series printers since they were introduced over a year ago.

1. Can you print text pages backwards with your i900?

Never tried that, but I have no need to really.-Mike

There is a readme file with each of the 2 updated software drivers for the i850, which read the same as the initial download of the OSX drivers for the i850 which list half a dozen features that are on OS9 and not OSX.

2. Moreover have you tried getting the inklevels to display under OSX? Only available while a print job is running. Under OS9 you can view anytime.

I've done that fine. I can check ink levels and more at any time here using the "Bjprinterutilty" (I put that in my dock) Isn't that part of all of canon's printer installs? (maybe you missed it.) I'm new to canon printers but the utility Canon installs works fine - anytime.
Also the canon models use a light sensor to detect ink levels (with a trigger/alert at 20% left) - some printers actually 'count' droplets I'm told (far worse method).-Mike

3. Worst flaw I can see for Canon's to be taken seriously as a photo printer compared to Epson, is the lack of option to select a custom ICC printer profile. There is a "Colorsync" option available, it appears under Canon's print window options. Yet the pull down menu does not work. Under OS9 the Canon driver window options, let you select from a pull down menu any printer profile stored in the System/ColorSync Profiles folder.

That is not an issue for me personally but would be for someone in a professional environment running OS X.
Their default profiles for the paper types I use most (glossy) look stunning with the prints I've made from my digital cameras (both canon models)-Mike

After dozens of e-mails to Canon's professional division in Irvine, Calif. I was able to get no information from the socalled 'printer guru' at that office--- Kevin Ear. He e-mailed Japan and said he did not recieve any additional information from the engineers there(what exactly transpired in the communications I have no idea).

At a summer Photoshop Expo in Long Beach, Calif; I talked to a rep from GretagMacbeth, and he said he only does printing from his Tibook, and that OSX printing leaves much to be desired compared Windows where he has no problem networking a printer.
My i900 (and past epson models) share fine to other macs here via the USB port on the AE base station. (regarding the networking comment, but I'm not using PCs with that printer)-Mike
He was teaching a ColorSync usergroup seminar at Calumet, Holloywood for the large format Epson customers, because they had so many problems in understanding printing under OSX.

From day one OS X printing has been a sore spot - and often not brand specific. For instance HP printers use PhotoRet vs ColorSync I believe.-Mike

Bottom line is that if you want to use a custom printer profile, stick with Epson; or print with OS9 on a Canon. I have no idea what problems you may have trying to printout from Photoshop or other applications in Classic mode on a OSX boot only Mac computer.

I have none so far. And I don't use classic - printing from PShop and Preview are fine with the i900D as well as direct from my cameras. But my PB G4/800 and all my macs except the G5 can boot to OS 9 if need be.-Mike

In summary, if you want to use calibration equipment for a color workflow management system utilizing ColorSync with a Canon printer, you can only do so with OS9, it is not available under OSX.

I don't need that capability personally (nor do most non-pro users I suspect), but I read in a mac mag. review you can build custom colorsync profiles for the canon printers, although I don't remember the details.-Mike

I have included a Zip file of the OSX screenshots I sent to Kevin Ear to try and explain how Canon's drivers don't allow for custom profile selection, while my Espon scanner does. (Scanner or printer?) I have also attached 2 screenshot jpg's of OS9 for the Canon driver where I selected a downloaded Epson ICC profile for large format printers constructed by Apple guru, ColorSync/printer expert, Bill Atkinson.

4. There is one and only one limited way I know of to get around Canon's lack of support for custome ICC profiles. You can select from the Canon print window options, NO color correction/management. And then use an color management savy program like Photoshop to select a custom ICC printer profile. If you need to print a from a page layout program like iViewMedia Pro, you are out of luck under OSX with the Canon.

Photoshop is the only high end app for graphics that I personally use for printing. If I worked in the print biz I probably would have gotten an Epson 2200 but I didn't want to spend that much money (and it's missing some features my i900D has that I do use)
But here's a quote from a mac magazine review (macworld)
" Canon and Epson supply ColorSync profiles for each supported paper type, but the profiles we tested weren't particularly accurate -- we actually saw better color in the Canon's output when we didn't use ColorSync. "
That was from a review of the older Canon S830 model. My i900D prints using the default (by paper type) look excellent to my eyes. They look as good as most 35mm prints I've had.-Mike

5. Be aware that Canon dye based inks do not last like the pigmented inks on some Epsons.
The dyes in Canon's ink tanks are rated for about 25 years. How long they actually last I don't know but they likely will outlive me at this point in my life. Macworld noted in june 2002

"Following Epson's lead, Canon is using light-fast inks with these models and making the same claims of 25-year print life."

And the epson photo 960 (which I considered) also uses dye inks - although some other epson models like the high end 2200 printer use pigment based inks with up to (estimated) 80 year life on some papers. Some have said pigment inks do not look as good as dye - but the 2200 reviews I read all said the output was excellent. One reviewer said it matched his canon 9000 for image quality, which speaks well of the canon I guess.
As for as longevity of the canon inks - see page 3 of this study done by Wilhelm Imaging Research on inks for PC world magazine:
http://www.wilhelm-research.com/pdf/PCWorld_Cheap_Inks_2003_10.pdf
They list 27 years for the genuine Canon brand ink (but 92 for the Epson Pigment based ink)-Mike
If you do a serach of user comments on Version Tracker for the Epson 2200 OSX drivers, you will see there still exist problems which you don't have under Windows. (not sure what that has to do with this para on inks.)

6. The Digital Photography Review site has a printer and printing forum that is tedious to navigate through, but some independent professional profile and inkjet supply company people answer some of the questions. Here is the link. http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1003&message=5602744
(no real name used)"

I know photographers that use the canon printers (including Steve at Steve's digicam's site) - but they're often Windows users.
Again for my needs and $200 budget, the i900D is a perfect fit. I really don't need anything that the i900 doesn't already do (and very well)
I know you prefer epson printers and understand for you that's a better choice. But then I'm not a professional print person where some of the points you bring up could be an issue. For the money I spent, I'm very satisfied with the performance, features and value of the i900D. For professionals, the Epson 2200 would be a better choice.

(added 11/26/2003)
" Mike, for serious photographers who want their pictures to last over 10 years, there really is no competition- the Epson 2200 and it's smaller version is still the only high end archival printer. Borderless printing works great in iPhoto. The pictures from my Canon 10D printed to the epson 2200 are as good as taking your film for custom prints at a photolab.

You should see my prints on canon photo plus/glossy paper. Stunning... I see the same quality printing my rebel shots to canon pro paper. Even a film photographer friend was blown away that the samples I showed him were printed on an inkjet. with a 2 pico-liter droplet size (equal of any epson) - nobody I know can tell they were inkjet prints. For me the i900D was $199 well spent - I do not have the budget for a 2200 (and I wanted features on the i900D that's missing from the 2200 also).-Mike

Sure the various Canon printers can print just as beautifully, and even faster, but to me what good is a photo hanging on a wall when it fades in 5 years?

Maybe You're thinking of some older printers/inks. Granted the pigment inks like the 2200 last (an estimated) 80 years or so but the Canon dye inks are spec'd for 25 years (27years per a study I read) That's fine for me. Macworld noted in june 2002
"Following Epson's lead, Canon is using light-fast inks with these models and making the same claims of 25-year print life."

With large separate ink tanks it is also economical like your Canon i900d. With a black and a light black, my black and white prints are perfect and neutral under common lighting. There are a few features that are still not working under Panther, like the ability to switch the Matte black ink with the gloss black on the fly. Shame on Epson for not making OSX an equal priority.
Another point, the Epson 2200 sounds cooler than the Canon i900d. What's up with all the lower case letters? What was wrong with the i900a, b, and c, anyway? ;-)
bill c.
photo retoucher "

When I can buy a 2200 for $200 and it has all the other features my i900D has - I'll grab one. Seriously though, the 2200 is an incredible printer but for me it's more $$$ than I wanted to spend, and it does not have some features the i900D has that are important to me. And as a FYI - the i900D has a 2 pico-liter droplet size - as good as any Epson. Read steve's (digicam site) review of the 2200 where he compares print quality (color) to his older 9000 canon. From conclusions page of Epson 2200 review

"I really expected to be disappointed in the color and saturation. I'd read numerous forum messages where people thought the pigment-based printers just weren't up to challenge when compared to their dye-based cousins. Having never used a pigmented-ink printer myself I had no idea what was going to come out of it. I am happy to report that the very first print came out looking almost exactly the same as it did from my Canon S9000."

And the S9000 doesn't have as small a droplet size as the i900D. At under $200 - the i900D is a steal for users like me in my opinion. I did not want this to turn into a "my printer can beat up your printer" contest. The 2200 is an outstanding printer - but for me the i900D is a better value and fit (feature/cost wise) for my needs.

(added 11/26/2003)
" I recently bought a Canon i560 based mainly on Cnet's recommendation. For $129 with a $30 rebate I got a printer with four individual ink tanks (CMYK), edge-to-edge photo printing and Mac OS X native photo printing applications. The driver seems to work very nicely. The Easy Photo-Print and Easy Photo-Print Plus makes it easy to touch up, crop and print bordered or borderless (edge-to-edge) prints. The prints are virtually indistinguishable from the prints I got from Ofoto. It's impossible to say right now how well the prints will hold up over time, but they look great right out of the printer. To my knowledge, Canon does not use chips in their ink tanks that limit pages or block third-party ink, and the i560 also has a replaceable print head. Overall a significant upgrade from my old Epson 850N that recently quit working.
Mel K. "

(added 11/26/2003)
" I used to have an Epson 1200, which was a very nice wide-format photo printer. Its inks were not lightfast nor waterproof, so the prints I made a few years ago are already fading. Otherwise, a nice printer.

Replaced it with an HP All-in-One 2110, which has an optional 6 color print cartridge (replaces the K with K + light C+M, and keeps the usual C+M+Y carts in place). Prints photos quite nicely for casual use, but it isn't really up to professional standards. The HP software is vaguely colorsync aware, but I seem to have to fight against the driver's built-in color correction every time I apply a profile. (It makes custom profiling of this printer basically impossible.) Prints are expensive in 6 colors as well -- the cartridges don't last for long. The scanner on it is abysmal, which is terribly disappointing, and scans everything with extremely high contrast and very dark (all color adjustments are made post-scan, so this can't be worked around in the scanner driver).
Nik "

(added 11/26/2003)
" hello, you should put a link to the GIMP print drivers at the top of the page. (If he had included it I'd be glad to.) They really are excellent. I'm using them with an epson 980 with os x and have access to paper cutter, roll paper, and perfect quality and choice for both text and photo prints. The printer also have 6 separate cartridges for the colors.
Epson's support sucks, though, and I would recommend anybody from buying an epson printer for os X until they fix this.
Alexandre "

(added 11/26/2003)
" Mike-
First off, thanks for your hard work on making this site the valuable resource that it is. It's one of my first stops of the day.
Just about any current Canon printer would get my vote for an X printer. About a year ago today I found myself in printing hell. I had recently upgraded to X and had just purchased Photoshop 7. All of a sudden my trusty BJC-8200 would not make a decent print to save it's life. The only answer I could get from anyone was that I must have a problem with my color space, workflow, or printer profiles. I tried everything for several months with no luck. Every print was a muddy mess and the only feedback was I must be doing something wrong.
Then Canon announced the i950 and there was a mention that it had X drivers in the box. A call to Canon verified this. I picked one up via a Macworld promotion and the first print out was brilliant. So much for the experts. The drivers for the 8200 would just not play nice with X and PS 7. Sorry if this is a bit long-winded, but it may spare someone else the headaches I went through. Printer driver problems with X has had a long and sordid history. (I agree printing in OS X (from day one) has been a sore spot (more attention seems to have been given to more 'flashy' features)-Mike)

If I may put in a plug here - I do mostly high quality photo printing, and the pile of used ink carts turned into a mountain in no time. Seems no one recycles Canon carts. I tried the refill kit from Weink and have been very happy. The colors match Canon's and have not had any clogging problems, even if the printer sits idle for several weeks. They also have a fill in place system for those who do large volume printing.
Thanks again, and keep up the good work.
David "

(added 11/26/2003)
" Hi Mike, Just a note to let you know about cheap refill inks that work very well in my Canon S9000 printer.

Inkjet Goodies sells kits or carts for as little as 10% the price of the Canon ones. I'm a photo-hobbyist and the quality is about 95% as good as Canon's. For 10% of the cost, that works for me. I discovered this company by several recommendations in the printer forum on the dpreview website.

I bought the full set of carts, syringes and bottled ink, along with some extra Photo Cyan, Photo Magenta and Yellow. It cost about $100 for all that, but it's going to be a lot less expensive in the long run than $12/pop for the Canon refills. I think each bottle is 8-10 refills. Figure 9 bottles times 9 refills equals about 81 of the Canon carts, which is a savings of about $900 (after tax/shipping)!
Cheers!
Steve. "

I've used refills years ago with lesser printers, but I'm leery of at least some non-printer brand carts and refill kits. Here's an PDF File article on Cheap ink tests with Canon, HP and Epson printers. They tested 3 brands but not the "Inkjet Goodies" brand and noted the Canon inks last an (estimated) 27 years, where the other brands they tested lasted a lot less and can result in lower quality prints or clogs. The brand Steve used may be better than what they tested however.

(added 11/26/2003)
" I have a Canon S900 and I've been very happy with it. I've used it with my G4 dual ghz tower under most of the OSX releases (10.3.1 at the moment) and I've always had good results. This printer paired with a nice digital camera (I have a Canon G2) is tough to beat. It prints borderless 4x6 or 8.5x11 photos that are really hard to differentiate from a film camera.

The S900 is pretty well known as being a sweet-spot for value in a photo printer, and after using mine for about a year I'd recommend it to anyone. I think they can be found for around $270.
Matt"

I paid only $199 for my i900D with more features than the older S900 - although the i900D street price is appx $250. (the faster i960 is about the same street price but does not have the LCD, etc.).

(added 11/26/2003)
" Hi Mike,
I agree with your impression of Canon printers. I have had an S9000 (large format version of the 900) for over a year. The printer drivers are built into OS X (10.2.6 and later tried) so there is no extra software installation required.

I bought it to replace an Epson Stylus 700 with a 'dead' black printhead. The Canon is built like a... tank. The print head is user-replaceable in the event of any problem (I had to throw away the Epson printer). It is FAST - even at the highest quality photo setting - and even printing tabloid size pages.

The only beef I have is that ink seems to deplete even without being used (evaporation?). This is a big issue if the printer only sees occasional use.
Rob "

I've not heard of that before (evaporating ink in tanks) but will keep an eye on it. I know I had some past epson printer models that seemed to get clogged when not used for months.

(added 11/26/2003)
" Personally....I've started to use the digital print service at Sam's Club and Wallmart....at $0.26 for a 4x6 (CDN$) it's just cheaper than home printing..
I love the convenience of my Epson 860 (older model) but the quality just doesn't compare to the Kodak services offered outsourced.
I was seriously tempted to pick up an i850....but resisted...may be a great home printer but again...$150CDN buys me 576 prints instead...
Something to consider...when I picked up the Epson 860...outside printing was around $0.75-1.10 each....now it just makes zero financial sense..
Dixon "

For me, there's no way I want to drive to walmart or any other store to have my photos printed out - but for some that may be an option to consider. (My i900D prints to glossy paper look every bit as good as any print I've had even from my 35mm.)

(reports from Nov. 25th follow)

" I really like my Canon BJC-8200 (older), and when they have been on sale, I have really encouraged people to buy the inexpensive S820 that replaced it, and they all love them (my mom and brothers among them). My boss just bought a i960 on my advice and really likes it so far, but its only been a week. For photo printers, I really can't see me ever buying (in the near term anyway) any thing but a Canon 6 color inkjet again.
matt
(he later wrote)

Mike,
I wrote earlier (the BJC-8200) and forgot to include this info:
I'm using Panther (10.3.1), and have been using the 8200 since the first X release (including several developer releases). There initially weren't drivers for the 8200, (Canon initially wasn't going to support it), but then the drivers "magically appeared" in the first software update. I've never installed - nor have any of the other users that I know of - a Canon print driver. They've all just been there, and worked perfectly. Just what I expect from my Mac. Prints great from Photoshop 7 and Indesign 2 (Haven't tried CS yet).

The only "con" about the BJC-8200 is that it's slow and doesn't do borderless - which one of these days I'll get an i960 or whatever's current to rectify. I still like it's output better than most HP's that I've seen and I don't have to deal with the driver nightmare it seems like everyone else has to go through with HP's and Epson's.

I've had good success with carrotink.com cartridges - especially their combo deals/specials - $43 for 7. I've had problems with other (I won't insert the name here, because I'm only 90% sure of their name - mental block I guess :) ) cartridge resellers.
Just FYI because I CAN read what you requested. :) matt"

Thanks Matt. Carrot ink was one of the cheaper inks tested in a Canon printer in http://www.wilhelm-research.com/pdf/PCWorld_Cheap_Inks_2003_10.pdf where they noted much less print longevity (4 years vs 27 years w/canon inks) and "somewhat worse" print quality compared to genuine Canon ink carts.
For now I think I'm going to stick with the under $10 samslub.com Canon ink carts - but thanks for the info.

" Mike, I purchased the Canon i900D when it was first announced after a year of searching for a replacement for my Canon 800S. I am very, very happy with it. I insisted upon individual ink tanks, a small LCD screen and media card reader. The i900D is the only printer made that has all those features.

The Mac OS drivers are very good and provide a good amount of customization. Photo printing is perfect and regular printing is quite good.

The real savings is in ink costs over the life of the printer. Look at "page ratings" for the different colors of ink and you'll realize that you are leaving a lot of ink in the cartridge if you use an Epson or HP that has the 3-in-1 cartridges. The printer driver does a good job at letting you know how much ink is still in each cartridge so you can be prepared. Don't try "refilling" the cartridges though, you'll only make a real mess. :-)

The Canon i900D is a great personal printer. Welcome to the (i900D) club.
Sam W.

If you missed last night's news update - here's the full review of the i900D printer I recently bought for under $200 (a steal IMHO). I'd not trade it for any printer I have seen for twice the price.

" Mike, I recently purchased an Epson 900 Stylus Photo printer (not to be confused with the old non photo model).
This is the first low end Photo printer that prints directly on to CDs.
So far I am absolutely impressed with this printer for home use. Its a 5+1 colour printer and the inks are water fast. Colours are great, speed is ok. My only complaints are:

So far I have not been able to print to roll paper. One of the ideas that attracted me to this product was being able to print on to a roll of Photo paper. Unfortunately I have never been able to do this successfully, the printer always thinks it a single sheet so manages to 'spew' out the remainder of the print roll!

Lack of manuals and software that come with the printer! Basically there is a basic (and I mean basic!) guide that refers you to Epson support website for the online guides. The problem is the first time I tried it lead me to a non existent web page! Secondly all the guides were out of date for OS 9 only. Thirdly I had to download new drivers and the software for CD printing and Epson's own print program were not on the CD.

It takes a little while to calibrate and set-up the CD printing but this works ok once you are used to it. You basically load a printable CD/DVD into a tray and this goes through the back of the printer. Sometimes the tray doesn't get inserted correctly and the print is slightly off centre but this has only happened once.

If I want to print photos then I use the Epson application, so no problems and it works great.

Overall I happy with the purchase and would recommend it to others.
D. "

" Mike, I have a HP Photosmart 7350 w/duplex accessory that works great with OSX! They have really started to increase the frequency of drivers revisions, and it even works great with a jet direct print server. Since I have it on the network, I also use it with my windows PC and the driver actually has feature parity between the two OS.

Pros:
Awesome photos with photo tank (2, 3 color carts for 6 colors total)
Has a 4x6 photo tray and does 4x6 borderless prints
Pretty fast
Duplex

Cons:
Expensive ink tanks
Printer is slightly more expensive than similar models

In all, I really like it, and it just works great with the latest driver.
-Eric
I'm running 10.2.8 and WindowsXP SP1. Haven't upgraded 10.3.1 yet."

" I have a Canon s800. USB printer with drivers built-in to OS 10.2. I share it over my network and have connected to it with my iBook (10.3) on a wireless segment. The printer has individual ink tanks (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black, Photo Cyan, Photo Magenta.) It amazes me that anyone would buy a printer without individual tanks; such a waste of money and ink. (I agree - I really like my i900D that has the same feature - individual ink tanks are available from under $10 (samsclub online) and list for only under $12.-Mike)
These tanks do last quite a long time given their size. I've printed 8x10 photos from a 3.3 mega pixel Olympus camera that look great, smaller sizes look even better. Over a year of light to moderate usage for photos and documents and I haven't needed to change any tanks yet.
Also of note, the print head can be replaced by the user if/when it becomes clogged. (The Epson printers typically can't have the print head replaced by the user.)
Hope this is helpful.
chad "

" I'm using an HP 7960 photo printer, which has a awesome photo quality especially when printing grayscale pictures due to the fact, that this printer offers 8 color printing. A special "photo gray" cartridge delivers great photo quality. (I mentioned this last night)

The printer is working fine on Mac OS X 10.2.8 an 10.3.1. It also offers borderless printing up to DIN A4 format has a color display build in and is capable of reading several flash cards.
In my opinion one of the best photo printers you can get at the moment. Cost about 350 euros incl. German tax.
Best regards,
Oliver "

I asked Oliver what printer driver version he was using (since I had read of problems with the last HP update in 10.3 last week - by they told me they had another update to post to fix that.)
The 7960 is available locally here for $280 or so (samsclub). I was very tempted by it, but I chose the i900D instead - which also has card slots, LCD, better direct camera support (I don't own any HP cameras), individual ink tanks, direct paper path and at other than Black and White photos, I think is the equal in print quality (and costs less to buy and maintain).

" Hi Mike,I'm using an Epson 960 and 2200 with no issue's at all. And my old LW2G is also going strong. G4/533 with a PL1200 cpu and OS 10.3.
The prints from the 2200 are the best I've seen (to date). No cons so far.
Ben. "

" Mike, While I like the toaster size HP photo printers with LCD screen (I bought my mom one) for ultimate ease of use, I recently bought the Epson Photo 900 printer for it's features.

It isn't a "photo" printer in the sense of having media slots, LCD screens, or computerless printing, but it does do everything very nicely. Full page color printing is fast. Borderless 4x6 photos are perfect. And this printer also can print on very heavy stock with a straight through path, as well as directly on printable CD/DVD media using a neat black tray that locates it perfectly. I printed a few test CDs to see, and it is amazing, although a little undersaturated due to the non-pourous nature of the media, they still looked better than movie DVDs you buy.

The software that comes with the printer is good, and the drivers work great in Jaguar and Panther. I'm still trying to figure out how to use a parallel IP print server with it since Epson installs their own drivers (you can't just select IP printing), but I'm sure there is a way. Right now it is connected to a G4 and then shared that way, and the drivers work great via rendezvous, even the borderless printing. All printer options show up on the Rendezvous printer.

One problem is that iPhoto can't do borderless right on this printer. I think it is an iPhoto issue (adding 3 white borders) because the Epson supplied software prints perfect borderless prints. So I just open the pics in their app to print them, but still, it would be nice if iPhoto would work right. I hope Apple addresses this (along with many other iPhoto shortcomings).

This printer doesn't have individual tanks, just a 5 color tank and a black tank. I use a Laserjet 2300d for black and white printing, and this Epson printer fits all my remaining needs. If only it weren't so big on the desk...

With an Office Depot $20 off coupon (on any order over $100), and a $50 Office Depot rebate (which I think is still going on), this $199 printer only cost me $129 plus and tax. They shipped it for free, and it came next day.
Mike K "

" Epson 2200. expensive. stunning quality. using panther on a sdd dp 1.25
Tracey "

" Definitely I'd say the Epson 960 output is a very close second to the Epson 2200. Just wish the Epson 960 had a grey cartridge instead of two blacks and the 2200 didn't require you to replace the Black when switching from Matte to Gloss paper finishes.
The quality is amazing!
Hope this was helpful,
Chris "

My comments on the Canon i900D: (from the Nov. 24th news page)
Last weekend I'd decided to replace my photo printer (Epson Photo 870). A Walmart in Harrisionburg had a good price on the HP 7550 (w/LCD - now replaced by the 7960) at only $120 (new, but boxes showing some damage). But to be honest, after the track record of HP OS X printer drivers and especially after reading about 10.3 driver problems (as of a week ago at least), I returned it the next day unopened. I started searching for online reviews of photo printers and found very good reviews of the Canon i960 for instance, but as an owner of several digital cameras I really wanted a printer with an LCD + memory card slots to allow printing direct from memory cards (or the camera).
Although I had never given much attention to Canon printers in the past, after reading Steve's digicam site review of the i900D, it looked like a perfect fit for my needs. It has individual ink tanks, a 2in LCD, memory card slots, direct camera connection (for PictBridge compatible cameras), very good print quality, can hold both 8.5x11 and 4x6 photo paper at once (and easily switch between them) - plus it has good photo print speed (actual speed - none of the printers I've owned ever came near their 'rated' photo/color print speeds). The i960 is much faster as it has twice the number of nozzles in the print head as the i900D, but I wanted the extra features of the i900D, and its actual HQ print speed is still about twice (or better) that of any photo printer I've personally owned. The i900D also has a USB 2.0 interface. And again quality and features were my prime considerations.
Although several retail chain stores listed the i900D online (for $249 typically), none of their local stores (Ckt city, Staples, etc.) actually had one in stock. The best price I found online last week was at Samsclub.com for appx $198. (Their price as of tonight is $228.74. For once in my life something actually went UP in price after I bought.) In what may be the only lucky break I've gotten this year, a local camera chain store manager actually matched the Sam's club online store price and had the i900D in stock. (I've was floored they did this - I had never seen them match a 'club' store price in the past .)

I downloaded the latest drivers for the i900D at Canon's website and installed them in OS X 10.3. I wasn't sure the drivers were 10.3 compatible (despite the web page date of mid-Oct. 2003) but I've printed successfully in Photoshop and Preview. (But I've not spent a lot of time printing to it from Photoshop yet - if any readers with an i900D have more extensive experience with it in OS X, I welcome your comments.) Printing directly from my PowerShot camera to Canon 4x6 Photo Plus paper produced borderless, excellent quality prints. The quality of 8x10 photos (from a 6.3MP Canon camera) were also great. I've never cared much about photo printer speed, but to get better quality than my Photo 870 at better than twice the speed is a plus. And no more buying $25-30+ ink cartridges when only one color runs out either. (Individual Canon ink tanks list for under $12 - sam's online has them for under $10. Photo printing typically uses up the Photo Magenta and Photo Cyan carts first.)

Bottom line: I'm impressed with the i900D's features and value. For the price I paid (under $200), I don't know of another printer (with all the features of the i900D) near that price that I would rather have. For more details (features, photos, specs, commentary, although a PC was used for the review), see Steve's review of the i900D. He also reviewed the faster Canon i960 model as well as many other photo printer reviews including the HP 7960 (which for Black and White photo printing the new Photo Gray cart. is a real plus) - but I have no regrets about buying the i900D instead. I also prefer its straight paper path vs. the HP's wrap-around paper feed system. Although the latter makes for a more compact printer overall, in the long run I think the straight paper path is less likely to jam and stresses the paper less.