Introduction
The world of personal printers is divided into three camps. The multifunction, see our last survey, is very popular and represents 60% of sales. Sales of monofunction A4 printers have gone down drastically, from 100% of the market share 4 years ago to less than 30% at the end of 2005. The remaining market goes to the 4" x 6" printers. This is a fast growing domain and growing 3 figures per year.
Briefly, here is the deal. For 150€ you have the choice between:
- an A4 printer with a scanner, copier, photo lab and memory card player functions
- a printer with a dedicated memory card player for 4" x 6" prints
From this point of view, except for the space gain, it is difficult to see the interest of the second choice. Especially if we take into account another limitation. Except for the HP printer that supports 5" x 7" format, the others only take 4"x6" paper.
A surprising problem of format
If you have a reflex camera like the Canon 350D or Nikon D70s you won´t have any problems. The first takes photos with a resolution of 3456 x 2304 pixels, and the other in 3008 x 2000. If the length is reduced to 15 cm the height will be exactly 10 cm for the first and 9.97 cm for the second. This is the perfect world where everyone would be equipped with a reflex camera. Here back on Earth, the compact camera is the most common and represents more than 95% of sales.
Let´s stick with the same two manufacturers. With the Canon PowerShot A620 (7 MP) and the Nikon Coolpix P1 (8 MP) we take pictures in 3072 x 2304 pixels and 3264 x 2448, respectively. If we apply the same rule, take a picture length of 15 cm, the height ratio is 11.25 cm.
Taking out our calculators this gives us 11.25 – 10 = 1.25 cm. This is the amount of the photo that isn´t printed. 11% of the pictures systematically disappear. For a tight portrait, it ends up with the hair and the chin cut. It is unfortunate because even if we aren´t photo professionals we take the time to center our shots.
Photo costs are reduced but lab prices tooPrinter manufacturers started a price war. Little by little, the print cost is reduced. From 39 cents last year for a cheap printer, the cost of a standard 4"x6" printer fell to 29 cents for 2006 models. Printers are 25% cheaper to use this year. In fact they don´t have the choice, because they are in competition with photo labs that are increasingly cheaper to use. One picture in 4" x 6" format often costs 24 cents in small quantities, but if we look a little on the internet it is possible to find prices below 5 cents. Even for low volumes. The only drawback is that you have to wait a couple of days for your pictures.
Conclusion: it hurts!In a nutshell, for the same price as a multifunction, we buy a printer incapable of printing office document and that cuts pictures. Who would want this? And why do we address this problem in introduction instead of in the conclusion? We wanted to first understand the expectations of those who want to buy a 4" x 6" printer in spite of this.
They are those who want no hassle printing, don´t want a big printer at home and /or want to print right now, immediately have a photo, etc.
Based on these criteria a good 4" x 6" printer must be:
cheap to use
fast (printing 20 photos should not take an hour)
compact
easy to use, without having to take a look at the manual
equipped with memory card players, to avoid to have to connect it to the computer (or else we would take an A4)
capable of printing all pictures, even the ones that have been edited,
equipped with a readable color LCD monitor to select pictures and options
capable of reproducing vivid colors and always naturals
capable of a detail level comparable to a photo lab. We don´t want to see that it comes from a printer.
If one of these criterion is left aside, we can forget about 4" x 6" printers. It would be best to have an A4 printer with all these functions. However, if we have all of the above, why not quickly print pictures at home with professional quality and at moderate costs?
