The little printer that can

The Epson R200 is one those hard to find things called a bargain - forget buying it to print your term papers or your knitting patterns and recipes off the internet, it is a photo printer... there got that out of the way, feel much better.

The box says R200 photo printer and that is it's target market, I actually bought one because it can print direct to DVD and CD disks and found the quality of it's photo images to be amazing - I also run an Epson 4000 pro (big brute of printer at 85 pounds, costing $1700)so I have some idea of what a photo printer should do.

The R200 is a no frills design, no little LCD display, no card slots and no scanner copier. It is pure and simple, a print engine that needs a computer to print with. It is a 6 cartridge printer, meaning each color has a separate ink cartridge. At first thought expensive, but when you realize you only need replace the color that runs out, it is actually quite frugal.

Print results are amazing - I have used both Epson and Ilford paper in it, I would give the edge to the Ilford. I took this printer into a photo class I was teaching after asking students to bring in images to print on it, the verdict was unanimous, it was amazing.

The shadow detail is fantastic helped in part by having a light cyan and a light magenta to give a wide range of shading.

If you have a computer and are looking to buy a printer, my vote goes for the following, buy an R200, drop $150 on a cheap laser and buy a card reader (if neccessary get a USB hub). That way you can have cheap black and white text printing, excellent photo printing and access cards directly - sure it takes up desk space, but the results and reduced running costs are worth it.

One other cool thing about the R200 is it's ability to handle wide format printing - you can print a panoramic image up to 40 inches long.