Home and SoHo users need printers capable of printing text documents, presentations, and occasionally photographs. Most of you would be delighted if you can save that trip to the local photo studio to get a quick print in an emergency. The Canon PIXMA iP4680 is a photo printer we have for review today, and while it looks good, we will test it to find out if it can deliver what it promises.
The Bundle
Canon PIXMA iP4680
1 black pigment cartridge and 1 black and 3 color dye cartridges
USB 2.0 cable
Power cable
Application and driver CD
User manual and Quick Start Guide
Sample paper
The bundle is pretty much complete with all the required cables, but we would have loved it if Canon would have bundled along some photo papers for people to know how good (or bad) a photo print will turn out to be, since this is a photo printer.
The Printer
The iP4680 looks like a rectangular box with a glossy black and grey body. Since it's got a glossy finish, it is prone to collecting fingerprints and dust (and scratches as well). With its nicely rounded corners and edges, it looks good enough to adorn your desktop, but the overall build quality is not really top-notch. It is rather large for a printer, and when in use, the trays shoot out; so it requires space around it.
This printer has two input trays, which is a great thing. The rear tray and the front tray are capable of holding 150 A4 sheets or legal size paper sheets. Thus, you can load up to 300 sheets at a time for big jobs.
The output tray is present just above the front input tray and has a ramp-like extension that swings out; a folding flap at its end opens up to keep the output paper from falling off the tray.
The input paper has to be put face up with the leading edge in, while the output paper comes face up with leading edge out.
Since this printer can also print CD/DVD labels directly, it comes with a tray for this purpose. You need to place the CD/DVD in the ridge on this tray to print it. This printer supports automatic duplex printing - you can print on both sides of the paper without manual intervention. This saves paper.
When you open the cartridge tray, you will be greeted by glowing red cartridges, like in some of the other Canon printers. Not meant to be pure eye-candy, the LEDs are built into the cartridges and only light up when the cartridge is installed properly. We found that the cartridge ink level is sometimes misreported in the drivers - the black cartridge, which was empty, was reported as being full, and the LED did not warn us either. It is supposed to warn you when the cartridge is empty. It would be good if Canon improves on this system and introduces LEDs of different colors for the different cartridges.
Canon uses five different cartridges for better color printing - Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black based on dye, and an additional black cartridge based on pigment. The pigment black cartridge enhances color contrast and ensures crisp text on plain paper, while the dye cartridges improve color expression and the longevity of the print. This really shows in the results in a big way. Another advantage of having four different cartridges is from an economical point of view - if one ink gets spent, you need to buy only that cartridge, so ink is not wasted, as in the case of tri-color cartridges.
The control panel is virtually non-existent on this printer, the only controls that you may find are the Power button and the paper Cancel/Feed button, and even this is visible only after you open the front tray. Needless to say, there is very little to do here. There are two indicator LEDs - green for power and red for error. You can also see that there is a PictBridge port present just below one of these buttons. This allows you to print directly to this printer from a compatible camera or any other device.
There is a panel at the back, which can be taken off to let you manually clear paper jams.
Software and Drivers
The Solution Menu is a control center of sorts, where you can access all the applications bundled with the printer.
Easy-PhotoPrint EX allows you to easily create albums, calendars, and stickers using photos taken from a digital camera. It also lets you enhance photos and save the items you create.
CD-LabelPrint software lets you create labels for your CDs and DVDs and then print them using the functionality available in this printer.
The driver interface is easy to use and empowers you with total control over the prints.
You can choose the paper size, orientation, and layout in general. Since this printer supports automatic duplexing, you can select it here to save on paper. There is even an option to specify Staple side if you are going to staple the printed paper on one side.
There is a Simulate Illustration function, which processes full-color or 256-color image data in an illustration style. You can also add color effects such as Sepia to the print. The Image Optimizer feature smoothes out jagged edges. The Photo Optimizer PRO corrects the color and brightness of images, which are input from a digital camera or scanner, and is designed to compensate for color shift, overexposure, and underexposure. The Photo Noise Reduction feature can reduce digital noise in a photograph, to produce better prints.
You can also select from amongst a set of print settings saved as Profiles or can even create your own and save to be used later, thus saving you a lot of time.
Maintenance options are also aplenty, with not just print head alignment and cleaning options, there are options to clean the bottom plate and roller as well. There is even an option known as Quiet Mode - an innovative feature that reduces the printer noise. The Auto Power button lets you set the idle time after which the printer will switch off, thus saving electricity. There is even an option to power off the device - useful, if it is placed far from the PC. Before we forget to mention, this printer comes with Mac drivers as well.
While printing, it shows you the print progress with the print queue as well as the ink levels in the individual cartridges.
Installation and Performance
The installation of this printer was pretty smooth, with no problems whatsoever. It hardly took 10 minutes to connect the printer and get everything installed and done. We put the printer through a variety of tests to assess its print quality and speed.
Font size printing test: We printed a page containing all the letters in font sizes ranging from large to very small. The print quality was found to be crisp and the blacks were even.
Text print speed: We printed a page of black text in draft and normal quality to find the speed as well as the quality of printing. In the draft mode, the first page took 8.9 seconds to print, while the PPM (Pages per Minute) in the first minute was found to be around 8.1, reaching 8.33 in consecutive minutes. In the normal mode, the first page printed in 12 seconds; while the first minute PPM was 5.7, it reached 5.9 in the next minute. The above results mean that this is a really fast printer.
Presentation document speed: This document consisted of a page of multi-colored graphs, text, charts, patterns, and photos. The document took just 14 seconds in the draft mode for the first print; while it resulted in a first minute PPM of 5.55, the next minute's PPM was 5.94. It took 24 seconds to print the first page of this document in the normal mode, and the PPM was found to be 2.85 in the first minute, which reached 3.08 later. As far as quality is concerned, we have no complaints - it is good in printing the reverse text as well as the graphs.
Photo print: This one being a photo printer, we had high expectations. It took just 2 minutes 10 seconds to print an A4 color photo. This makes it the fastest printer when it comes to printing full A4 color photos. The print quality is excellent, the colors are vibrant, and the definition is neat with superb color reproduction.
A Final Word
The Canon PIXMA iP4680 is an excellent photo printer and produced some of the best quality prints amongst the printers we have tested thus far. With good printing speeds and an excellent photo print quality, you would not want to get your photos printed elsewhere. It has two paper trays so that you can place different media types in them. The printer is elegant-looking and good enough to be placed on your desk.
Duplex printing option is a huge value-add to this printer, which lets you automatically print on both sides of the paper (as while printing a book) and save paper. The driver interface is good with a multitude of features that are really useful. Drivers for Mac are also provided, so Mac users need not be disappointed. One negative aspect of this printer is the exclusion of memory card reading capability, and this is something that cannot be excluded in a printer touted as a photo-printer. Being Energy Star compliant, it consumes just 14W during operation and 1.3W in standby mode, thus saving on electricity bills. It is considerably silent while operating.
The iP4680 comes with five individual ink cartridges to better reproduce colors and save ink. The black pigment cartridge costs Rs. 795, while the rest of the dye-based cartridges cost Rs. 725 each. This printer comes with a 1-year onsite warranty and is priced at an MRP of Rs.8,155. We feel that the price is a bit high, though the printer performance is excellent, and even though it has functions such as duplex printing, it is just a printer and not an MFD.
Test unit sourced from 20.20 Media
Specifications
