Review of Smartphone Photo Printer Item # 206589
Two or three years ago, the marketplace was awash with new portable photograph printers. HP alone now makes five portable (or, in some cases, "pocket") photo printers, including the Sprocket Studio, the model closest in design and functionality to the $129.99 Liene 4x6″ Instant Photo Printer (Amber Serial). A close competitor to the Editors' Option–winning Canon Selphy CP1300 Wireless Compact Photo Printer, Liene'due south Instant Photo Printer is a dye-sublimation device that prints terrific-looking photos at a reasonable cost per impress, making information technology a viable alternative to the Selphy, the Sprocket Studio, and several other snapshot and wallet-size photo printers.
Portable Design
Measuring 3.4 by 8.1 by 4.9 inches and weighing 4.ii pounds, the Instant Photo Printer is somewhat larger and heavier than nigh of its competitors, which, amongst many others, includes the aforementioned HP Sprocket Studio and Canon Selphy CP1300, as well as the HP Sprocket Select, the Kodak Photo Printer Dock, and the Lifeprint 3x4.5. Among these devices, the Selphy, the Sprocket Studio, and the Photograph Printer Dock are the most similar. All three are dye-sub printers and store photo paper in detachable trays that extend out from the chassis, rather than within the motorcar.
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Dissimilar Zink-based snapshot printers that store newspaper inside the device itself, like the Catechism Ivy Mini (left), the Instant Photograph Printer (right) stores paper in a detachable 20-sheet tray.
The waxy, dry out dye-sub ink comes in cartridges that transfer to newspaper at specific (hot) temperatures. (I'll get into consumables, paper, and the general economics of using this printer a little farther down.) Smaller "pocket" machines, such equally the Sprocket Select, the Canon Ivy Mini, and Lifeprint's photo printers, are based on an inkless technology called Nada Ink (Zink), which embeds piffling deposits of colour into the paper.
Zink photos tend to run smaller than the iv-by-6-inch format used by the Instant Photograph Printer and other dye-sub devices. The Sprocket Select, for instance, prints on two.3-by-3.4-inch Zink media, and both Lifeprint models, the 2x3 Hyperphoto Printer and 3x4.5 Hyperphoto Printer, announce their supported media sizes in their names.
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When the Instant Photograph Printer is out of service and packed up ready for travel in your backpack or figurer pocketbook, its 20-sheet paper tray resides in a recessed area on top of the printer's chassis. A magnet on the underside of the tray holds information technology in place.
The Instant Photo Printer box contains setup instructions, a paper tray, an ink cartridge, photo paper, the printer itself, and a power adapter.
The ink cartridge slides into a hatch that opens on the correct side of the printer. Each cartridge is adept for 40 four-by-vi-inch prints. You accept limited functioning options from a thin control panel on the forepart of the device, where you'll notice only a Power button and iii status LEDs (Power, Service, and Wi-Fi). The machine is optimized for operating from handheld mobile devices and Liene's mobile app.
The control console—what at that place is of it—consists primarily of status lights.
On the back of the printer, you'll find (from left to right) a newspaper exit slot that facilitates the four-pass press process, in which the photo travels back and forth over the printhead to selection up three layers of color (cyan, magenta, and yellow, or CMY) and a clear coat that protects the prototype and helps colors popular on glossy paper. To the right of the slot is a USB 3.0 Type-C port for connecting to a PC, smartphone, or tablet, and next to that is a barrel-style ability port. You can power the printer from Air conditioning power with the arranged adapter or over USB.
On the back of the unit of measurement are an exit slot, a USB Type-C port, and a power port.
On the right side is the hatch that houses the ink cartridge. This photo besides shows the newspaper tray resting snugly on acme of the printer.
Ink cartridges sideslip into this hatch on the right side of the chassis.
Making It Get
The Instant Photo Printer supports both USB and Wi-Fi connections. You tin can connect up to 5 computing devices (Android, iOS, macOS, or Windows) direct to the printer itself, or a multitude over a Wi-Fi network.
The Liene Photograph Printer app, available for both Android and iOS, lets you edit and heighten your photos, add together text and borders, and apply unproblematic filters. You lot tin can also print straight from your phone's photo gallery, or from any app on your calculator.
The mobile app provides various editing and enhancing tools.
Functioning and Prototype Quality
For these niggling photograph printers, print speed probably shouldn't superlative your list of criteria; that iv-pass process takes a while. For testing, I connected the Instant Photo Printer to the USB Type-C port on our Intel Core i5 testbed PC running Windows Professional. (I likewise ran some tests over a wireless connection and got similar results.)
For the near part, the Instant Photo Printer averaged around one 4-by-6-inch print per infinitesimal, as did the Catechism Selphy. The HP Sprocket Studio averaged ii minutes 5 seconds. The Zink machines, even though their prints are notably smaller than 4-by-6-inches, typically take longer than their dye-sub counterparts. The HP Sprocket Select, for example, prints 2.3-by-3.iv-inch images in one minute 16 seconds, and the Lifeprint models took 1 infinitesimal sixteen seconds (for two past 3 inches) and one minute xxx seconds (for 3 by 4.v inches) to impress.
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Non only are the larger-format dye-sub models faster than their Zink counterparts, only print quality is likewise notably better. On prints from the Instant Photo Printer, colors are bright and detail is articulate. The premium glossy newspaper feels and looks much nicer than the thinner and less substantial Zink media. I wouldn't go then far every bit to say that these photos are up to the quality you would get from 5- and six-ink consumer-grade photo printers from Epson or Catechism, but for a relatively fast, no-hassle, reasonably priced meaty photograph printer, print quality is better than acceptable.
Price Per Photo
As for running costs, among the dye-sub devices discussed here, the Instant Photo Printer'southward 42 cents per print sits between the Canon Selphy's 35 cents per and the HP Sprocket Studio's 44 cents. The good news is that those numbers include both ink and photo paper.
Each $16.99 consumables pack comes with ii 20-sail packs of four-by-vi-inch sleeky photograph paper and a dye-sub ink cartridge skilful for 40 prints.
The smaller Zink models, the HP Sprocket Select and Lifeprint 3x4.five, require only paper, yet their paper packs sell for $0.65 and $1.25 per sheet, respectively. At one time, dye-sub printers were expensive to buy and expensive to use; compared to mainstream inkjet photo printers, that's still true, but among portable photo printers, dye-sub is the lower-cost pick. In any example, $0.42 per photograph isn't bad at all.
No-Frills Quality Photos
The Liene 6x4" Instant Photograph Printer is i of those no-nonsense devices that is easy to recommend, if not a standout. It'due south easy to set up and use, and it has versatile connectivity options and good print quality. That'south plenty to warrant its place amidst our electric current favorite iv-by-6-inch portable photo printers. On the other mitt, it'due south not notably better than similar and similarly priced competitors, and the Canon Selphy CP1300's congenital-in screen gives it the edge to remain our Editors' Choice.
Liene 4x6" Instant Photograph Printer
Cons
The Bottom Line
The Liene 4x6" Instant Photograph Printer churns out proficient-looking modest snapshots chop-chop and inexpensively, making information technology a dandy selection for families.
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Source: https://www.pcmag.com/reviews/liene-4x6-instant-photo-printer
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