I would like to give the Canon Pixma mg8120 and solid 5-star rating for the photo printing alone. I just got this printer yesterday. It was on sale for [...] with free shipping. What a deal!
The set-up was well-documented and easy. The only glitch I ran into was an error message on the LCD display that said the "inner door" was open and I needed to close it. It took me several minutes of messing around to bumble into this thingy inside that I pulled down and then pulled back up--a lever of some sort. That was the "inner door" and that fixed the problem. Someone else asked what the inner door was for. I'm asking the same question. It's not a big deal and I'm not complaining. I just included this experience in case someone else runs into the same glitch. Don't panic. It's fixable.
The machine is solid and quiet and not as heavy as I thought it was going to be. And it is beautiful. Not that I care. But it's a nice perk. My HP 6988 shakes all over the place when it prints, but I thought it was pretty quiet until I got the Canon, which hums along very pleasingly and steadily.
I'm an artist and I make prints and cards from my original paintings. I'm fussy beyond the telling. I want my collectors to have the best quality artwork. Even my Canon Pixma Pro 9500 MkII cannot print on simple card stock like this printer can. The images are just gorgeous. I haven't tested it with fine art paper yet, but that's not as big a test as doing bright, accurate, detailed images on plain ol' card stock. Beautiful.
The document quality is so-so. I wanted to be totally in love with the Canon 8120, I was so excited to get it. But all my HP's have printed text that is sharper and blacker at every setting. The HIGH setting on the Canon prints nicely, although just a tad less sharp than the HP. And who wants to spend a fortune on ink by printing at the highest setting all the time? However the duplex feature works very well. On the HP the duplexer is attached at the back and this is the second HP on which the duplexer shakes loose during printing, causing paper jams if you don't snap it back in.
The scanner is okay. It did a respectable job on some dusty old slides. In fact it provided very good resolution, which I punched up in Photoshop. However in copying and scanning regular photos or artwork, it looses detail and the colors are not as accurate as I would like. To be fair, I need to practice with it and learn what tweaks will get the best results. I think my Epson 4180 does a better job, but we'll see with time. I'm still glad to have a nice scanner with the printer. And please keep in mind that I want copies and scans of my artwork to be PERFECT! So, for most purposes the scanner is good enough.
All in all, I really like this machine. It's worth what I paid for it for it's photo printing alone. But honestly, I would not have been pleased to pay the full list price considering the not-so-perfect text quality in standard mode. I will continue to use my HP for printing documents. As for the scanner, it is pretty nice. I think I just need to learn to use it better. And as I tweak things in Photoshop all the time, that isn't a problem for me. Canon PIXMA MG8120 Wireless Inkjet Photo All-In-One Printer (4504B002)
PROS: The print quality is great both for photos and normal paper documents. It prints very fast and I like the duplex printing. The scanner is also excellent. The scanned images are absolutely incredible in detail and color. And it scans fast. Installation was very easy and so far I haven't had any problems with wireless printing. Works every time.
CONS: I can only think of one right now. This printer drinks ink like there's no tomorrow. I don't really print that much (since I bought this printer maybe 150 pages and about 5 photos) and the cartridges are almost empty. Now I have to admit the cartridges are very small and not so pricey. So time will tell if the cost for ink is higher than normal or not. I think it'll take a year before I can actually judge this by comparing how much I paid for ink per year before and how much I'm paying now.
SUMMARY: I love this printer, it works flawlessly and delivers excellent print and scan quality. But ink consumption seems very high.
I loved the scan features for photos and slides, also the print quality of the ink. However, it appears that 30 copies of black and white word documents eat up the ink. At the cost of close to $100 to replace all the cartriges this printer is not economical at all. I have looked into bulk ink but cannot find the where tos or how tos. If Cannon wants to sell this kind of quality printer then they need to make the ink economical and last thru at least a ream of paper.
I've owned a lot of printers in the past only to have them not meet expectations and/or printer driver become obsolete within a year. I do a lot of research before I make a purchase, to include professional reviews and ultimately consumer reviews. I have used this printer now for almost a month and have been impressed with ease of use and yesterday was awed by the photo print quality of a picture I took with my new Canon Rebel SLR camera. It was better or as good as done in a store. I only printed one, so not sure how much ink this printer would use if I printed my normal quota. However, I did not buy it for printing photos, but wanted a wireless 3-in-1 which included ability to scan negatives. I have used all functions associated with the printer and each one has met my expectations. The wireless setup was easy, scanning documents and printing also went smoothly. Impressed with speed of printing documents wirelessly...actually faster than previous attached printers I've owned!
Overall, I'm very impressed with this purchase and I would definitely buy a Canon in the future. I don't have any negative issues as of today, the only concern I would have is probably with the ink. Yes it does contain five separate ink cartridges with the theory that you would not have to purchase ink as often if you only have two. I'll have to update later if I'm buying ink, even though it may be only one or two of the five cartridges, at the same intervals as my previous printers. - All-in-one - All In One Printer - Multifunction Printer - Wireless Printer'
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