Canon PIXMA MP150 Photo All In One Printer

• 1200 x 2400 dpi/48-bit scanner for over 281 trillion colors
• ChromaLIfe100 systme for long lasting, beautiful photos
• Borderless 4" x 6" photo in approx. 55 seconds
• Copy photos and documents with versatile copy functions
• PictBridge ready - just connect and print!

This printer is a question of value. Clearly, there are higher quality printers even from Canon. Likewise, there are printers that are less expensive. What I am most interested in knowing about when shopping for something is the relative value of the item. In that way, the MP150 should receive 5 stars. It is an extremely good value for what it is: a quality, at-home moderate use printer.

Printing quality is fast and of high quality. Borderless 4x6 photos are what I would call very good (I have not yet printed larger). I have seen better photos, but not at this price point. You will be very happy with the occasional or semi-frequent picture you print off for friends, family, or yourself. Pictures seem a little skewed to the beige, but I don''t notice any grain or lines. It will not quite replace a photo studio or online provider, but with the low cost of printing digital pictures at your local drug store, 90% of us should not be overly concerned with very, very high quality, at home printing. The Pict Bridge is nice and Canon claims pictures will not fade for 100 years if stored in proper albums.

Normal document printing is good too. Not quite laser, but anyone who need regular business printing should invest in at least a low cost laser. No ink based printer will do what you need if you have a business office in your home.

Scanning is very good and easy. Their software allows for all sorts of imports and scanning, while not lightning fast, is quite good. Copying is a breeze: place your document on the glass (and with an auto-adjusting top, you can easily copy books up to 1-2 inches thick), hit the black or color button, and you''re done. No need to have the computer on.

The paper tray leaves a little to be desired, but not too much. It''s a bit flimsy and doesn''t give you a great deal of confidence that it will pull paper correctly, although it has so far for me. I like the non-turning path the paper takes. Paper goes in the top and comes out straight from the front. This makes labels easier and more successful. The printer seems very good at pulling your paper media quite well without the stutter or mistakes of some HP printers.

Canon offers four ink cartridges for this printer: PG 40 (black) and PG 50 (black high capacity) as well as CL41 (color) and CL51 (color high capacity). Some have said that it won''t accept the high cap cartridges. I haven''t tried yet.

As for what I would have liked to see, the printer, while somewhat fast, can take forever to start printing. It almost always takes enough time for me to think the printer is not going to print. When I then go to remove the paper and try again, it starts up just before I get there like it was waiting for me to make the first move!

The tray is rated to hold 100 pieces of paper. No way. More like 50 if you''re lucky. Ink is high quality and the heads are part of the cartridge, but ink use is higher than average. Normal cartridges are rates for around 200 pages and, because there are not multiple color cartridges, if you run out of one color, you run out of everything.

Finally, when compared to its competitor (HP1401), it is both more expensive and bigger. However, I would take the MP150 over the HP (and since I have both, I should know).

Photo Print Quality: A-

Letter Print Quality: A-

Scanning: A

Copying: A+

Ink Usage: B-

Ink Cost: B

Overall: B+ to A-

Essentials:

USB cable (sold separately)

Replacement Cartridges

Photo Paper (comes with a few 4X6 glossies)

CD/DVD Rom for install

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I just purchased this printer and am VERY impressed with the print quality. Especially the borderless prints that look every bit as good as professionally printed photos.

A couple of small nits to be aware of: The setup instructions that I recieved with my printer bear absolutely no resemblance to this printer. They''re supposed to be for this and a couple of other models, but it asks you to do things that aren''t available on this model (select your language from the LCD panel when there''s no LCD panel, for instance). Having said all that, it still sets up very easily. Windows XP detected it right away and I was up and running in minutes (love that plug-and-play feature of XP, thanks Microsoft!)

It''s not the quietest printer in the regular mode, but there is a special "quiet" mode that you can engage if it bothers you.

Overall an outstanding combination of quality and price.

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Just purchased this printer with a notebook bundle and ending up only paying $49.99 after rebates so for that price I''m happy. We have a very nice HP wireless all-in-one but bought the Canon for my daughter who is college bound. The HP is definitely nicer and quieter but we also paid 5 times as much!

Set up was very easy. For those who are looking to save ink do not use the Canon task bar to print. Go to the main task bar and select File, then Print, Preferences, Custom, then Set. Select the fastest print quality for draft printer and a little higher for other printing. You will save a lot of ink!

I also tried the scanner and copier and both seem to work fine.

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I have bought the printer for around a month and the driver already alerts me that the black ink is running out. Grantly, I print a lot as I''m a student, but I use the "super fast" option whenever possible to save ink. Well, it turns out that doesn''t help much. So I advise any of one that print a lot think twice before you buy any Canon printer using the PG-40 and CL-41 catridges. They can run out very quickly.

Other than this problem, the printer is ok. I like the style, the price, the multifunction capability. The print quality is average. I use HP''s multipurpose paper, which isn''t bad, and sometimes feel the text are not black and bold enough. Color output isn''t bad, and the scanner is pretty good. The copying function is really convenient and the results are satisfying.

Overall, the tiny catridges prevent me from recommending this machine. If you print a lot, look elsewhere or buy a printer-only separate ink-tank model. I wish Canon had not replaced the earlier model which uses the BCI-2x ink tank.

This printer set up easily and produced perfectly good results, especially for the price. I picked it over the Epson CX3810 for scanning resolution and text-recognition software (Omnipage SE included, works fine).

A couple of software surprises:

Maximum scanning resolution was 600dpi in regular mode, unless I went via another button labelled "scan through scanner driver", when the full 1200 dpi became available.

With no LCD (need the MP170 for that), copier zoom isn''t available from the panel, just "fit to page". BUT if you go via computer, using scanner software, you have the option of using it as a copier, with zoom (25-400%) and exposure adjustment available, no need to save to file.

Very happy so far.