That's the kind of sticker shock I like!

Jodi-

Pup, I think that in one of your posts you mentioned that you have to use Kodak photo paper in your Kodak printer. Is the Kodak paper price competitive with other papers? I have a Canon MX310 which prints very well but the ink is pricey and doesn't last long enough to suit me. There have been very good sales on Kodak printers, but I was wondering about the print quality and the price of the paper, since I have quite a bit of non Kodak photo paper. The price of the ink that you quoted in your post above really got me to wondering if I would be better off to get a Kodak printer than buying a color and a black replacement cartridge, which I need soon.

Do you not find that your printer stops printing, telling you that the printer cartridge is low? Yet there is still ink in it?

My step-father finds that, and that is a huge bug with him and his Kodak printer. So essentially it is not cheaper, as they advertise, if you have to buy new cartridges before the others are empty.

Hi mare wbpa,

Maybe it would be worthwhile to write to Canon (put a shot across their bow, so to speak) to ask how come Kodak can put out cartridges at such a lower price ...

... and can they give you one good reason why you shouldn't sell your Canon on eBay (which won't bother them, as there'd be a purchaser to continue to buy their product) ...

... or junk your Canon ... and go buy a Kodak?

ole joyful

Ok...let me take these questions in order....LOL

Mare wbpa

I do not have to use Kodak paper, but if I use any paper other than Kodak I have to run a test print to do the setup to match the printer to the paper, but that test page is common to all the other printers I have ever used. The advantage with the kodak paper is that kodak has printed a bar code on the back side of the paper that is read by the printer and it automatically does the setup. For my purposes that is extremely handy because I often switch from Glossy, to Ultra-glossy or Matt and I don't have to mess with test prints, just pop in the paper I want and it works perfect.

I find that at Staples there is a substantial difference in price between the kodak paper and the HP or generic, but at Walmart the Kodak 100 sheet pack of 4x6 paper is about $8 which is about $1 more than the HP amd the 8.5 x 11 is about $3 more per 100 sheets and believe it or not, the price of photo paper at walmart is cheaper than what you can find on ebay.

Now in regards to print quality. I have on three occassions printed 6 prints on this printer, then had the same prints printed at Walmart photo center & staples photo center, then we laid the prints out side by side to see which looked better, and in all instances even the photo techs running the photo centers agreed they like the kodak prints better.

jasdip,,,

I don't know what model of kodak printer your stepfather has, but I have the kodak ESP 7250 all in one, printer scanner and I have never encountered any problem with the printer stopping, In fact, I have printed right down to were a print comes out missing the black or one of the colors.

The printer does have a service monitor that keeps track of the ink level and when a cartridge gets down to 1/3 it will post a popup window that informs you that it is low on ink and reminding you to order a new cartridge, but it does not stop printing.

For plain paper copies I don't buy printer paper. I buy the cheap $2.50/ream copier paper and when I print a document that has a photo the photo even comes out looking good on the cheap copier paper.

Another thing I really like is that the ink is completely dry and the photos are ready to handle as soon as they come out of the printer.

Another thing I like is that this printer has two paper trays..you can put 4x6 or 5x7 in the top tray and 8x10 or 8.5x11 in the bottom tray and you just select the size of print you want when you send the photo to the printer.

The thing you have to realize is that printers are not major moneymakers for the companies. They make their money from the supplies (ink, toner, etc). To ask them why theirs is more expensive than the competition is akin to asking why one car is more expensive or gets worse gas mileage or the like. Or asking why a restaurant charges more than the competition. The go with what the market will bear.

I'd like to see something where the amount of usable ink is stated or a standardized print comparison, something similar to what most laser printers state on toner use. I've usually found that more expensive cartridges usually have more ink in them. My old Lexmark had a lot of ink in it so even though it was 2x the price, I could print 3x the copies compared to others. And when I started refilling it saved even more.

As for the cartridges not printing to empty, this is common and certainly not unique to Kodak. My Epson has a little button you press to reset it and continue use. My laser printer has a different way of using the remaining toner. From cursory research there's a little gadget you can use on Kodaks to override their setup. Each manufacturer is different so you need to do a little research on what to do for your particular printer.

Thanks for the info Pup.

OJ, they'd probably tell me that their printers and ink are superior to Kodak. They know Kodak is selling ink for less and haven't, to my knowledge, lowered their prices.

Some people whose judgement you respect tell you that the product that Kodak puts out is of high quality.

They may not listen much to one message, even if it's a (real) letter ...

.. but were they to receive a hundred, it might cause them to re-evaluate substantially.

Companies do pay attention ... if enough people squawk.

ole joyful