Canon i9900 vs Pixma Pro9000?

photobug

[FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]I have a Canon i9900 printer and have been quite happy with it.

I'm planning to upgrade my camera body to a 40D ... and a Pixma Pro9000 printer will probably come along for the ride (to enable a rebate). I will either sell the new Pixma Pro9000 and keep my i9900 or sell the i9900 and keep the Pixma Pro9000. They're both dye-based, 13" x 19" printers.

Has anyone had experience with these printers and can suggest whether it make any sense to switch to the Pro9000? (just "because it's newer" doesn't count :wink, as it costs $$ and switching to new ink tanks is a pain)

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cabbey

photobug wrote:

I have a Canon i9900 printer and have been quite happy with it.

I'm planning to upgrade my camera body to a 40D ... and a Pixma Pro9000 printer will probably come along for the ride (to enable a rebate). I will either sell the new Pixma Pro9000 and keep my i9900 or sell the i9900 and keep the Pixma Pro9000. They're both dye-based, 13" x 19" printers.

Has anyone had experience with these printers and can suggest whether it make any sense to switch to the Pro9000? (just "because it's newer" doesn't count , as it costs $$ and switching to new ink tanks is a pain)

I have the Pro9000, a co-worker has the i9900. We did see some subtle quality improvement in skin tones and sky/water gradiations on the Pro9000 over the i9900 which we attributed to the addition of "photo magenta/cyan" ink (as near as I can tell, it's "half magenta/cyan" in reality... and is used in printing other than just photos.) and the slightly more "square" pixels. I also love the fact that the Pro9000 can print CDs. (hint: not just the european models can, hit the web and you'll find directions on removing the bit of plastic that hides that feature on the US models, and how to enable it, and where to order the cd tray from... it's been like a nice christmass surprise for me. $15 to get the tray and 5 minutes to do that hack and I can do something with my printer I didn't expect.)

If you'd like a print sample of a couple of your images, drop me a PM and I'm sure we can work something out so you can see your images on good paper from that printer to compare side by side with your current printer.

photobug

cabbey wrote:

I have the Pro9000, a co-worker has the i9900. We did see some subtle quality improvement in skin tones and sky/water gradiations on the Pro9000 over the i9900 which we attributed to the addition of "photo magenta/cyan" ink

The i9900 has photo magenta and photo cyan, also. They both have the same 8 colors of inks, although the ink formulations are somehow different.

I also love the fact that the Pro9000 can print CDs. (hint: not just the european models can, hit the web and you'll find directions on removing the bit of plastic that hides that feature on the US models, and how to enable it, and where to order the cd tray from... it's been like a nice christmass surprise for me. $15 to get the tray and 5 minutes to do that hack and I can do something with my printer I didn't expect.)

What? What? WHAT?! A Canon printer that can print CDs??? Hmm! Not that I do it very often, but that's a great feature to have -- would enable us to dump the Epson R200 we got, mainly to be able to print CDs... Thanks for this info!

cabbey

Huh, I understood the i9900 to have 6 inks... does it have red and green as well?

And yeah, the cd printing is very nice! You'd think they'd, I dunno, advertise it?!

devbobo

I have the i9950, they don't sell the i9900 here in Oz.

It has 8 colors and comes with the cd printing thingy.

Moogle Pepper

yeah it has red and green.

I have an i9900. It has 8 in total. Photo magenta, red, black, green, photo cyan, cyan, magenta, and yellow.

photobug

cabbey wrote:

Huh, I understood the i9900 to have 6 inks... does it have red and green as well?

Yep, 8 inks inlcuding Red and Green.

And yeah, the cd printing is very nice! You'd think they'd, I dunno, advertise it?!

Duh. Go figure. I've never seen a Canon printer sold in the U.S. that officially supports printing on CDs/DVDs. I don't know why. Canon USA must not want the support headaches or something.

xris

Here's a maybe...

photobug wrote:

... Duh. Go figure. I've never seen a Canon printer sold in the U.S. that officially supports printing on CDs/DVDs. I don't know why. Canon USA must not want the support headaches or something.

Perhaps they are a bit more sensative to the possibility of civil litigation from CD producers' legal eagles in the U.S.?

cabbey

xris wrote:

Perhaps they are a bit more sensative to the possibility of civil litigation from CD producers' legal eagles in the U.S.?

haha, you know I was thinking the same thing! But it's such a *trivial* hack.

cabbey

photobug wrote:

Yep, 8 inks inlcuding Red and Green.

I just chatted with my co-worker, she has the i9000 printer, not the i9900... I was mistaken.

xris

I may have to git me one o' those?
scratch

I have a Canon MP950. It has 7 inks, including die-based PC and PM inks and the pigment-based C,M and Y.

No red or grn.

But I have 2 blks. A pigment-based blk in a double-sized well (for document printing, I presume) and a die-based blk for photo applications -- call it 'photo black.'

So, I'm currious. Why no photo yellow? And what are the red and grn inks used for in a CMY printing process? Can't do RGB without the blue, conceivably??

Jane B.

cabbey wrote:

haha, you know I was thinking the same thing! But it's such a *trivial* hack.

The patent thing is on the right track. You might want to look at this thread on a different site.
http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=2469

I have interest but have not gotten around to collecting all the detailed information and doing it to a iP6000D. I do use refill tech. that I got for the above referenced forum.

Jane

xris

Oh!

Jane B. wrote:

The patent thing is on the right track. You might want to look at this thread on a different site.
http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=2469

I have interest but have not gotten around to collecting all the detailed information and doing it to a iP6000D. I do use refill tech. that I got for the above referenced forum.

Jane

Great thread Jane!

So that what that little pull-down tray on my printer if for!! Couldn't figure it out for the life of me!!

So. Can anyone tell us WHERE we can get these goodies?

Jane B.

xris wrote:

Great thread Jane!

So that what that little pull-down tray on my printer if for!! Couldn't figure it out for the life of me!!

So. Can anyone tell us WHERE we can get these goodies?

I did a search for "CD tray" on the Nifty-Stuff forum and found quite a number of threads but they were mixed in with a list of things that did not pertain to this issue. So you need to read the individual thread titles before clicking. Also, some of those threads refer you to more complete instructions elsewhere.

Jane

xris

Canon CD trays and instructions
Found some useful data serching Google:

[URL="ttp://reviews.ebay.com/Guide-to-Canon-CD-Tray-or-Roller-Assembly_W0QQugidZ10000000000013038"]ttp://reviews.ebay.com/Guide-to-Canon-CD-Tray-or-Roller-Assembly_W0QQugidZ10000000000013038[/URL]

http://pixma.ulmb.com/?p=137

http://www.instructables.com/id/Canon-Pixma-CD-disk-tray/

cabbey

xris wrote:

So. Can anyone tell us WHERE we can get these goodies?

I got my tray from ebay. The directions from the web. The software from canon's uk site. Oh, and my shiny "epson's can kiss my patented @$%^!" button I made myself.