A bigger printer for better photos
If you have a good-quality digital camera, you probably have thousands of great pictures stored at high resolutions. But when you view them, you probably do so on a relatively coarse computer screen. A high-end colour printer might encourage you to commit more of them to paper in their full-size glory.
The Pro-100S is an A3+ inkjet, meaning it can print at more than twice the size of A4 – enough to do justice to a 24-megapixel image. A3 is 297x420mm, but Canon promises anything up to a 360x430mm option (14x17 inches in old money). It can print ‘borderless’, right to the edges, on all sizes.
And it prints beautifully. With eight ink tanks, very fine shading is possible both in colour and in black and white. The only limitation is that the inks are dye-based, and so won’t survive as long before fading compared with the ‘archival’ pigment-based inks used by more expensive printers. Canon says prints should last 100 years if they are encased in a photo album, 30 years displayed under glass, but as little as 10 years exposed to the air.
The benefit of dye-based inks is bright, bold colours, especially on glossy paper, and those from the Pro-100S won’t disappoint. Our only concern was that blacks could have been a little deeper, but colour accuracy was excellent.
At three-and-a-half minutes for A4 and five-and-a-half for A3, speed is reasonable for top-quality prints. Ink costs start at about 19p for a 4x6in (100x150mm) photo, which is more costly than with an ordinary inkjet, but not prohibitive. To get the best results from the Pro-100S, you’ll need to spend as much again on paper, although it copes with all paper qualities.
There’s no real difference between this new model and the old Pro-100. Don’t buy it if you need an all-round text-and-graphics workhorse, but if you’re prepared to invest in a separate printer for big photos, it’s still a great pick.
SPECIFICATIONS
4800x1200dpi maximum print resolution • 8 ink cartridges • USB 2.0 • Ethernet • 802.11n Wi-Fi • 215x689x385mm (HxWxD) • 19.7kg • One-year warranty
VERDICT
As long as you don’t need archival quality, this is an excellent A3+ photo printer, though big and pricey.