HP2605dn or inkjet?

[GeoffH]

Hello all,
Recovering from extensive bladder surgery & a heart attack the
following day whilst in hospital, I now find I have time on my hands
to hopefully soon pursue my hobbies of building plastic kits &
figurine painting.

I would like to experiment with my digital SLR by taking photos of
progress during building/painting, and print photos onto 5x3 with
really good photos to a larger format.

My problem will be that I will not be printing on a regular basis, so
clogging of ink jet heads worries me.

The HP2605 colour laser series has received good reviews.
Print speed is not an issue.
I would prefer a decent lifespan on prints.
Can ink jet prints be sprayed with lacquer or similar for protection?

Anyone have any advise/thoughts on what printer would suite me?

My only experience with colour ink jets, was the very first HP500C,
which I gave up due to cartridge heads dryingout due to lack of usage,
& messy refilling.
Never needed another colour printer until now.
Regards
GeoffH
(The Pirate)
Norfolk - UK not VA

 

[Lisa40]

Hi GeoffH,

Just to address one of your questions:

I would prefer a decent lifespan on prints.
Can ink jet prints be sprayed with lacquer
or similar for protection?

I still have an old can of Lyson PrintGuard which I save for special
things that I don't want to fade (it was expensive - cost me something
like $14 per spray-can, many years ago when it first became available,
so I'm miserly with it - that's why I still have some left).

It has worked well for me, especially when I was still printing things
using the old, beautiful but fade-prone *original* (the very first one
they made) 6-color Epson Photo printer (amazingly, that printer lasted
up until about a year ago, despite perpetually battling minor print-
head clogs from not printing stuff often enough).

As might be expected, the spray works best with multiple light coats
rather than one heavy coat, as the directions say. It might cause a
barely-noticeable appearance shift with some inks; probably best to
test it on small samples before spraying all your stuff. (Nag: use
adequate ventilation; it's not good to breath that stuff)

Although I did a quick Google search and turned up the following link
where they discuss some problems, and evidently some other brands as
well:

<http://www.inkjetart.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=3792>

I don't know about your other questions - hopefully other people will
have more useful info there.

Hope that helps,
Lisa40
- I'm in "digest" mode; I hope this reply
works like it's supposed to - this is
my first post here so if I'm doing something
wrong please be gentle

 

[Fred McKenzie]

The HP2605 colour laser series has received good reviews.
Print speed is not an issue.
I would prefer a decent lifespan on prints.
Can ink jet prints be sprayed with lacquer or similar for protection?

Geoff-

A color laser printer may be quite good, but laser prints on glossy
laser paper do not compare with good ink-jet glossy photo print. If
that is what you want, then you may not be happy with the HP2605. On
the other hand, color laser prints on plain paper may be adequate for
your needs. Only you can decide.

Yes, there are spray coatings that claim to offer UV protection for
ink-jet prints. Yes, there is some improvement. No, it doesn't make a
significant improvement. If a print fading or color shift would be
noticed in one year without coating, it might take 18 months for the
same effect with the coating. That still is a short time compared to
other methods.

Ink-jets that use pigmented ink rather than older dye-based ink, will
take longer to fade or shift colors. Epson has some long-life pigmented
inks for example. There have been claims of new developments in
dye-based technology that extend the life approaching that of pigmented
inks. However I haven't read any test reports to confirm the claims.

Fred

 

[Ivor Jones]

[snip]

A color laser printer may be quite good, but laser prints
on glossy laser paper do not compare with good ink-jet
glossy photo print. If that is what you want, then you
may not be happy with the HP2605. On the other hand,
color laser prints on plain paper may be adequate for
your needs. Only you can decide.

I can confirm that. I have an HP 2605dn and the quality of photo prints on
photo paper is not as good as the same paper in my cheap Dell 720 inkjet.

However, I didn't buy the 2605dn for photo printing. For what it *is* used
for, it is *far* better than any inkjet.


Ivor