HP Photosmart 7960 printer

Page 5.

First prints. UPDATED 3/9/2003

Before I take a closer look at the printer, inks, media and other features, I will show you some of the first prints that I have produced. I will of course be publishing a lot more pictures later in the review and in particular b/w prints using the new No. 59 cartridge. The test file is the same that I have been using throughout my reviews, this will give you some idea as to how this printer compares next to other favourites. You can download the test image by clicking on the "Original" picture.

Original	HP Premium Plus	Canon i950 pppg - auto

The first A4 print took a staggering 12 minutes 10 seconds to produce. The colours are very strong with a slight tendency to becoming oversaturated especially in the reds. Blues are exceptionally good. Skin tones are clean and very natural. The yellows are vibrant and almost jump of the page. Compared to the Canon i950 printer, the HP 7960 has less punch, but it retains all the detail in the shadow areas - look at the blue cotton reels. The HP print closely matches the screen version, but with a slight bias towards magenta.

HP 7960	Canon i950

The eye picture reveals a lot of information. The HP eye is probably nearer the correct colour, i'm not sure where the extra blue has come from. The HP picture is suffering from slight oversharpening, this has been automatically applied by the printer, neither file has had any manual sharpening applied. You must bear in mind that these enlargements are enormous, if the child was actually the size you see here then she would be 10 ft tall (heaven forbid)

HP 7960	Canon i950

In the above blue reels you can see how the Canon picks up the extra punch, although the HP has visibly more sharpness. Looking at the complete set of reels below you can see the full range of colours and make your own mind up which you prefer. Just for your interest I have also included a Epson 2100 print, this has softer tones but lacks the depth in the colours that both the HP and Canon display.

HP 7960

Canon i950

Epson 2100

B/W first samples

Just as a small taster, I have printed the two images below using the No.59 cartridge and the same images on the Epson 2100 with the Grey Balancer turned on. All pictures were printed within minutes of each other, no alterations were made to the file between printing on the two printers. The prints were scanned in using the same settings.

HP 7960 with No 59 cartridge
Epson 2100 with Grey Balncer turned on
HP 7960	Epson 2100
HP 7960	Epson 2100

The Epson 2100 images have been re-printed and scanned since I first published this page. The above pictures closely match the original prints.

I don't really need to make any comments here, in fact when I saw these prints coming out of the 7960 printer I was dumb struck. The only thing that I have seen that matches the HP prints is my DeVere enlarger. The HP prints are slightly warmer than the original files, I achieved similar results with AGFA Brovira paper together with a special brew of Aculux developer. I thought the Epson was good, but the HP 7960 has just changed the rules. I will be printing more prints and uploading them in the morning.

© Vincent Oliver 2003 www.photo-i.co.uk
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