Ergonomics and design

Ergonomics and design

The 5300 is pretentious enough to have a price of 200 Euros and this is clearly in the high end. In this price range we usually find a fax, document loader, WiFi interface and sometimes even a double-sided mode.


Unfortunately, none of this is found on the EasyShare 5300 and it offers functionalities closer to models at 120 Euros. The product’s design is also surprising. While its large moveable LCD screen is nice, the adjacent buttons seem from another era. This is all the more true now that we are in the time of touch sensitive buttons, notably with the iPod, or almost touch screens. Kodak seems to be rowing backwards and comes back to large high and hard buttons. At least when they are pressed we can fell that the command has been carried out.


The bulkiness of this product also wasn’t really to our taste and the 5300 appears massive to us.


Finally, that which we did not like at all:

- the folding paper trays on the front side. They give off an extraordinary impression of fragility which is worrisome.


- the transformer block on the back of the printer. It’s big, bulky and unattractive. Also, the one we obtained on the test product whistled. Here we are more forgiving because this is just bad luck and a defect covered under warranty.



- the sound the chariot (going back and forth) started to make after a few thousand pages were printed. At first it was silent, then little by little this degraded:

Kodak EasyShare 5300 : its sound

Office quality

Office quality: color fidelity and precision

The following extracts are used to compare the Kodak ES 5300 with its Canon and HP rivals. Also, on the bottom of the page we give you a laser printer, the HP Color LaserJet 2600n.

Graph, color original version	Original text
X3 color enlargement	Original Text enlarged X3
Kodak EasyShare 5300	Kodak EasyShare 5300
Brother DCP-440CN	Brother DCP-440CN
Canon Pixma MP510	Canon Pixma MP510
Canon Pixma MP600	Canon Pixma MP600
Epson RX560	Epson RX560
HP C6180	HP C6180
Lexmark X9350	Lexmark X9350
HP Color LaserJet 2600n	HP Color LaserJet 2600n

Our opinion

If we don’t compare them to the others and they are quickly looked at, the 5300’s results are entirely satisfactory. However, if we take the time to carefully examine them, we can find defects where colors border each other. This printer behaves almost like Epson photo models, and there are small interactions between adjacent colors. We can see this on the yellow text, which is partially encroached upon by the green background. The black lines also pose a problem. In reality, it’s less accentuated than on our enlargement, but we can see this type of ink blotter effect on the right.

However, text printed on a white background is close to perfection. Another reason to be satisfied here is that we will see in later tests that the speed in printing text is very good.

Photo quality

Photo quality: enlarged X3 and X6

The 5300 has barely been released in a few countries and it already has a bad reputation for photo printing. We were therefore expecting very poor results. However, we were actually pleasantly surprised!

Like during the previous test, we added a reference, the Canon Pixma CP730, a small 10 x 15 cm thermal sublimation printer. Here is what we can get on a very good photo printer with results close to those of photo labs. Invisible dots, nice sharpness, contrast - we can indeed print nice images in our own homes. Some of the ink jet printers tested can stand up to the comparison others don’t do as well.

Note that the below extracts are an X3 enlargement on the left and an X6 on the right. This isn’t what you necessarily see, but is likened to a careful examination of photos. All the same, the more drops are apparent, the less convincing the photo will be, while some models offer quality that is comparable to professional labs.

Photo 1 original	Photo 2 original
X3 enlargement	X6 enlargement
Kodak EasyShare 5300	Kodak EasyShare 5300
Brother DCP-440CN	Brother DCP-440CN
Canon Pixma MP510	Canon Pixma MP510
Canon Pixma MP600	Canon Pixma MP600
Epson RX560	Epson RX560
HP C6180	HP C6180
Lexmark X9350	Lexmark X9350
Canon CP730	Canon CP730

Our opinion

Kodak has, we have to say, slightly missed their chance with the press with the launching of this product. The first units we received were truly problematic and , in our opinion, not suited for testing. With excessive banding, overly visible drops, and a red dominance things were a total catastrophe. With time, subsidiaries received new units, and we finally got our hands on the last version or that which will go on sale. This one was a lot better than expected. The banding disappeared, colors were quite good, and drops were almost invisible. To truly make us happier, we would have liked to see a little more orange in photos, which would have slightly added more fidelity and warmth.

The second supposed problem with this Kodak is that they offer two papers. There is a light one at 185 g/m² and a heavier one at 285 g/m². With the first, prints come to 10 cents, ink plus paper, and with the second, the price mounts to 15 cents. Of course, there were those who were quick to condemn the quality of the lighter and more economical of the two papers. Try the blind test for yourself. Which result do you prefer, A or B?

A sample

B sample

Sample A is the 185 g/m² paper and B the 285 g/m². We have to admit that the two are very close, and even if we take the time to examine them up close we can see that A is more contrasted and a lighter « harder » version of the sample on the right. Of course, in hand we prefer the 285 g/m² because it’s heavy and thicker, however, the more economical paper will be enough for photos that you hang on the wall or for albums.

Note that there is one strange particularity with this printer in that it doesn’t take all types of paper. Sometimes it works if you reduce settings in the pilot, at other times it simply refuses. For example, it was impossible to print with HP sheets. This isn’t too serious, because those that have chosen this printer have done so in theory to have inexpensive photos and will therefore mostly opt for Kodak paper.

Scanning quality

Scanning quality at 300 and 1200 ppp, recommended resolutions to reproduce a photo and then enlarge it X16.

10x15 photo @ 300ppp	Stamp scanned at 1200 ppp
Kodak EasyShare 5300	Kodak EasyShare 5300
Brother DCP-440CN	Brother DCP-1440CN
Canon Pixma MP510	Canon Pixma MP510
Canon Pixma MP600	Canon Pixma MP600
Epson RX560	Epson RX560
HP C6180	HP C6180
Lexmark X9350	Lexmark X9350

Our opinion

While there was a lack of orange in prints, in scanning there is an excess. This is unfortunate because otherwise precision is good. You can compare its sample in 1200pp with the competition’s to see that the 5300 is in top tier if we forget about color rendering. However, this is something quite important especially for a product at this price level and it appears not to have received too much effort.

Printing speed measurements

Speed: basic measurements

Here we give you the time to print a color office document and a 10x15 cm photo. We also measured the maximum speed of the engine, draft mode, monochrome, A4 prints, etc.

Our opinion

The 5300’s color speeds are entirely satisfactory when compared with its rivals in the same price range. With this good result, there are also monochrome text documents that are printed at a rate of almost 10 pages per minute, which is the fastest result with our test document.

Ink costs

Ink costs

Kodak offers a color ink + 180 10x15 cm (4x6 inch) sheet pack for 18 Euros, which simply works out to 10 cents per photo, ink and paper included. Just in ink costs alone the competition is already higher.

On the other hand, Kodak doesn’t give any figures on the cost of printing office documents except that it’s 50% more economical than its rivals. We measured this printer's office autonomy on a new ISO reference document.



Photo cost: The costs given for the HP C6180 and Kodak EasyShare 5300 include paper and ink, while other manufacturers simply give ink costs. So, there isn’t much to say here and the Kodak is by far the most economical.
All the same, we can honestly say that given its design, functions, and print quality, the EasyShare 5300 could be compared to a more modest product like the HP Photosmart C4180. The biggest difference between them is the 5300’s LCD screen is much bigger while the C4180 has better office print quality. Speeds are comparable and the HP scanner isn’t better. Otherwise, neither have WiFi, a document loader, nor faxes, which are functions usually found on printers in the 200 euro price range.
The C4180 is at a recommended price of 99 Euros, and its photo pack (paper and ink) offer prints at 29 cents. So the question is; how many photos do we have to print to make the Kodak more inexpensive than the HP?

99 + photos x 0.29 = 199 + photos x 0.10.
= 100/0.19 = 526.3 photos.

If you only print photos, after the 527th the Kodak printer becomes a good deal. Assuming that the product’s life is 3 years, this means printing a minimum of 15 photos per month to get your money out of the EasyShare 5300.

Office print costs : Kodak isn’t too off the mark because their printer is indeed half the price of certain rivals. However, these are Lexmark and Brother products, which aren’t the most serious competitors. Compared to HP, Epson and Canon, the Kodak All-in-One still gains a non- negligible 33%. Not bad!

Let’s do the above calculation again compared to the HP C4180.

99 + text documents x 0.09 = 199 + text documents x 0.06.
or text = 100 / 0.03 = 3333 pages. Over three years, this gives us an average of 93 pages per month for the Kodak to be a more economical printer in the long run.

In conclusion, you have to be a large ink consumer to gain from buying the Kodak: almost 100 pages of color text, or 15 10x15 photos per month. Or a combination of 50 pages + 7 photos, etc.

Does the 5300 waste ink?

Does the 5300 waste ink?

Amongst other things, to welcome this product on the market Epson took the opportunity to have a study done by a German lab on the 5300‘s ecological aspects. As we could have guessed, because this was the subject of the study, the result was merciless. In an office document test, it showed that Canon and Epson separate cartridge printers consumed 80% of their ink, compared to only 40% for the Kodak. So this means a waste of 60% in the 5300!

We had to carry out an autonomy test based on the new ISO reference document. The color cartridge was emptied after an honorable score of 415 pages, which was an even better result considering this included all colors except the black for office prints and only costs 15 Euros. In the previous page, we saw that the cost per page was a mere 6 cents and 30% less than the most economical previous separate cartridge printers.

Kodak 5300 : opening the cartridge
(the video is in French, but it speaks for itself)

A new cartridge weighs 116 grams (thank you Théo).
The empty cartridge we removed after the test in ISO document autonomy weighed 96 grams, which means that 20 g of ink was consumed.
As we see in the video, we tried to extract what was left in the cartridge, at least 31 grams and probably a little more because we didn’t count the photo stabilizer (the white well).

However just based on these figures, this already means that the 5300 used 20 grams of ink from a total of around 51 grams for all colors in the cartridge. Only 39% was consumed and 61% remained in the wells when it was supposed to be empty. This is indeed what Epson said.

This is indeed the risk if you just print text and if you don’t print any photos, the photo black ink and stabilizer are not used at all. The EasyShare could have been the most economical printer - it isn’t in ink - and we recommend recycling the cartridges in stores that offer this service.

The Kodak EasyShare 5300: The verdict

Kodak EasyShare 5300 : The verdict

For a first try, if we exclude the Kodak printers based on Lexmark components that came out several years ago, this is a success. The 5300 breaks several big taboos that were established by the four main powers on the ink jet market (Canon, Epson, HP and Lexmark). Yes, costs per page can be decreased. This 5300 is a perfect example with a cost per page in office documents 33 % lower than its most serious rivals (including separate cartridge multifunctions) and photos two to five times less expensive than the competition. Its prints at 10 cents apiece have an honest quality and are very good for an album, for example. On the other hand, we can’t tell you anything about the longevity of colors on photo paper.


Office print quality in black and white is perfect and there are a few defects in color. The colored inks slightly interact on normal paper (80 g/m²) resulting in a small loss in precision like on Epson photo multifonctions. In this area, Canon, HP and Lexmark are better. In speed, however, all are equal and Kodak even has an advantage in black and white with rates of almost 10 pages per minute with our test document. It is 30 to 50% faster than its All-in-One competitors at the same price.

As for the price, the EasyShare 5300 is indeed expensive for its characteristics. Its rivals at the same price often offer a document loader, fax or even WiFi. Here there is none of this except the large LCD screen, which is appreciable in the end. So the ultimate interest of this product is if you are a relatively large consumer of ink or at least on a regular basis. If you print more than 100 pages of text per month or 15 10x15 photos (or any combination of this i.e. 50 pages + 7 photos) , the 5300 will be a better deal in the long term than a classic product for 100 Euros.

Conclusion: This first effort is promising and we can only hope that it will push the competition to lower the price of its ink cartridges/paper. Nevertheless, we already know that there will be no miracle for the end of 2007/beginning of 2008 and the cartridges will be the same for new products from Canon, Epson, HP and Lexmark. No lower priced photo kits are planned for the moment with these manufacturers. If you are currently looking for a multifunction, print a lot of text and photos, are not looking for the ultimate best quality but rather satisfactory performance, this EasyShare 5300 is a good choice. If quality counts more than the long term costs in use, than the competition wins every time. The 5300 isn’t perfect in color office prints, its photos don’t necessarily dazzle you, and the scanner renders colors that are disappointing.

One last thing to add, and we hope it’s because this is a very new product…While this printer was silent when we received it, after 1000 pages, chariot movement started to make a whining noise as we hear in page 2 in this test.