Canon imageProGraf W6200

Wide-format printers can be lifesavers for offices and institutions that create banners or posters on a regular basis. So if you find yourself running to the nearest quick-print shop more than once a month because your printer can't handle anything larger than 11-by-17, then you might want to consider the $3,495 (list) price of the Canon imageProGraf W6200 wide format printer. It prints on 24-inch-wide rolls of paper and gives you gorgeous output at breathtaking speeds.The printed output is spectacular by any standard, giving you total control of your output.

Looking for some figures to justify this great large format printer to your accounting department?   Canon provides an estimate indicating that printing a large (about 6-square-foot) glossy poster with the W6200 costs $3.86. If you go to Kinkos to have this same poster printed, look to spend around $75.

The W6200 is not hard to set up but it can be tedious. This is a large printer, and requires the assembly of the stand and the output catcher. The print engine setup is basically the same as for any inkjet printer.  The hardest part of setup I see is that of manual print alignment, unlike the auto alignment seen in standard inkjets. Network is also more troublesome than it should be. The network setup program finds the printer but you must manually tell it how to turn it on..

Speed and output quality are outstanding, thanks to a printhead with 7,680 nozzles. Printing an A1-size image at standard quality (600 by 1,200-dpi) took just 3 minutes 25 seconds. Compare that to printing a photo at high quality on your deskjet or photo printer.

Printing at the highest quality (1,200 by 1,200 dpi) took 6:04, and that includes having the automatic cutter slice the image off the paper roll.

Output qualifies as true photo quality when viewing poster-size output from an appropriate distance. If your business requires a good high quality wide output, you would do well with the W6200 large format printer.