- Print brilliant, true-to-life photos and fine-art prints with HP''s new pigment-based Vivera inks
- Get precision color consistency and vivid, true-to-life hues
- Produce affordable studio-quality photos
- Cherish long-lasting color photos that resist fading for more than 200 years
- Replace only the cartridges that runs out among eight individual colors
One acid test that I''ve been throwing at today''s digital photography printers is to see how closely a black and white print from the digital printer matches a darkroom produced photographic print. I miss film, darkroom chemicals, and the touch and feel of enlargers, and watching prints slowly resolve as they wash through the developing agent. But I especially miss the silvery blackness of the prints against the glistening whites of the paper.
The whites have been captured well. Inkjet paper, at its best, looks as good as photographic paper finally. But what about the blacks? Here, we''ve been dependent upon the ink to carry the day. And black ink doesn''t typically look just like the black of a monochrome print straight out of the wash sink.
The HP 38 line of ink comes incredibly close. Can I still tell the difference between a real print and an inkjet print? Sure, but the ink is becoming less the critical factor. With the HP printers, you can sometimes see the telltale sign of the geared wheel that drives the paper forward. And up close, you can see the spray of the inkjet on large solid areas of the image. But stand back a foot and those issues disappear. Now the question is simply: do the blacks match?
The HP38 Photo Black is about a 9 out of 10 where 10 would be a match for a photographic print. We''re real close now, with only an oil like sheen when the light strikes the print from a certain direction to differentiate the inkjet print from the real print.
As others have noted, these inks run out quickly. If you like 13x19 prints (that''s the whole reason to get the printer), then you''ll go through these quickly. And when they run out, it might just be in the middle of a picture. You can swap inks, however, in the middle of a print run should that happen so my rule of thumb is to have one extra of each cartridge, ordering another one as soon as I''ve fed the replacement to the printer.
The carts have expiration dates on them, however, so you want to make sure that it''s not going to sit on the shelf for two years before you feed your printer with it (the printer, amazingly, knows if the ink has expired and warns you and tells you that you''re voiding the warranty, blah blah blah, before accepting the offering).
So great ink, incredibly expensive per drop but you have no choice in the matter. If you have the printer, you must have the ink.
Buy HP 38 Photo Black Pigment Ink Cartridge in Retail Packaging Now
Five Stars because the HP 38 Photo Black Ink Cartridge was shipped immediately and arrived promptly in good condition. If you use HP 38 ink in your printer, you must have all eight colors in the HP 38 series for your printer to operate properly, so price is a big consideration. Buying blind can cost you more for a complete set of inks, including more than one cartridge for the light gray and a couple of other colors that are used up faster than the others, than a new printer, and in fact I have heard of people that simply buy a new printer (of a different make) because it''s cheaper than the inks. Amazon has a selection of vendors, but be wary I recently picked the lowest price for each color, mostly from one vendor, and when I went to check out I found that this particular vendor charged $9 per cartridge for shipping and handling, making them the most expensive vendor on Amazon.
I stock up on inks only occasionally. The trigger event is when the warning light on the printer for a particular color comes on, and I don''t have that color ready to change. When that happens, I check out what I do have, flesh out what I need to have a complete set including two of light gray, light cyan, and light magenta, and order them all, usually on Amazon. I like genuine HP inks on Amazon because that''s where the price, Amazon Prime free shipping, vendor reliability, and prompt delivery all come together. I need genuine HP inks because I have this printer for studio-quality color prints and I depend on it for my most-invested hobby, and I don''t have the time or patience to deal with cartridges that require color re-calibration or don''t provide the color fidelity that I expect of an 8-ink printer, or that don''t last as long as HP 38 ink cartridges. One of the reasons that I selected this printer was the combination of quality prints, low cost per print, and long life of the ink cartridges, a rare combination.
I recommend genuine HP 38 inks to anyone with a printer that calls for these inks, and recommend Amazon.com as the first place to check for best price. You can depend on Amazon and their associated vendors to deliver the right product promptly every time.
Read Best Reviews of HP 38 Photo Black Pigment Ink Cartridge in Retail Packaging Here
Most local stores do not carry #38 ink. It is great to order it online and get free, fast delivery from Amazon!
Want HP 38 Photo Black Pigment Ink Cartridge in Retail Packaging Discount?
Is this good ink? Um...sure. It''s at least as good as any other, so by all means don''t hesitate to buy it based on quality. That said, it comes in tiny cartridges that don''t last long -especially the blacks -and are about $30 each, which wouldn''t be so bad except the printer in which I use them (HP''s B9180) requires 8 of these cartridges to even operate. Thus, it''s a rather expensive printer for a small business to keep operational, unless your circumstances allow you to charge clients for this expense as part of your projects. Most of my clients, on the other hand, would balk at that. But I digress.
Anyway, I should also note that when I say that I think this cartridge is overpriced, that does not mean that you should buy a generic alternative cartridge for less instead. Not only would they probably not be guaranteed to last 200 years, but to my knowledge, you can''t. They do not exist. Which is all the more reason to consider again whether this is the way to go.
Of course, you may read this and think, "Hey, that''s more an indictment of the printer than of the ink cartridge." True enough, but given their intertwined relationship, I think it''s fair to point out that if you are now exploring the real costs of operating a piece of machinery for your office (the B9180), it''s definitely worth looking around some more to see if you might get just as good a capability via another printer at a lower ink cost.
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Hey,
Just one thing about this ink. It runs out too fast!
