It seemed like only yesterday that I bought my Lexmark Z52 inkjet color printer. But four years has already passed. Though nothing is wrong with my Lexmark Z52 it's time to update and take advantage of new technologies in the printer arena. Such as edge to edge printing . . . eliminating the white border on all four sides of the page, and with the Lexmark Z52 the border on one end is about a half of inch. The photo capabilities of the new printers are far superior too. Photos printed on regular 20lb printer paper looks nice but when you use photo paper —— your pictures look and feel like the real thing. In addition, many of todays’ printers come with a good LCD screen and special functions so you can use the printer without booting up your computer. The built in card readers made it easy for anyone . . . including a child . . . insert the digital card from your digital camera and print immediately. After carefully researching the various brands of printers on the market, I opted for the Lexmark P915 Home Photo Printer for several reasons.

Out of the box the Lexmark P915 Color Photo Printer takes about fifteen minutes to set up and start printing, if you are attaching the printer to your computer. Installation was a breeze. Once I had the printer attached to the computer via a USB cable (not supplied), AC power and installed the included cartridges. I dropped in the accompanied CD ROM and let the system do the rest. I watched the monitor. When it asked what type of cartridges are installed I inserted the correct information and finished. I ran a test page to check for accuracy. Everything went without a hitch.

With this printer you do not have to attach it to a computer to use it. It makes a great stand-alone unit for anyone with a digital camera. The Lexmark P915 has a built-in card reader that accepts most of the popular digital media used in digital cameras today. Just remove the digital media card from your camera and insert it into the appropriate slot. In a few seconds the reader will gather the information on your card and present the images on the built-in LCD screen. The button layout is clean and simple. Navigation is a matter of following the onscreen menu selection. Very easy to operate. You can print out and index page that shows all of the pictures on your memory card. You can select to print only the pictures you want. No more wasting ink, paper, time or money. You can print them out in any size just they way they are or you can crop the image to remove excess visual information you may not want. Then print.

Cropping your images does not alter the images on your digital media. Regardless of the changes you may make to your image on the printer such as: resizing, cropping, contrast, red eye reduction etc. No actual changes will be made to the image on your digital media card. With this printer you can forget about those trips to the store to develop your film or digital media. Having a party or family reunion . . . bring out the Lexmark P195 and your digital camera and have fun. You can print out photos and give them to your guest before they leave as reminders of what a fantastic time they had. Photo prints you won't be embarrassed to give out. Each photo print looks just like what you are use to with regular film cameras. Without the expense of film and developing. Depending on the quality of prints you choose — photos can be printed in a few seconds. Obviously the higher the quality and image size the longer it will take to print. See specifications below.

Don’t want to print. No problem. The Lexmark P915 has a built-in slide show function. Depress the ‘Menu button’ select slide show and then depress the ‘Select button’ and your images will play from beginning to end. The only thing that could make the slide show feature even better would be the ability to attach it to your television. But the built-in LCD screen is a good size. The LCD screen is crisp, clear and bright.

Don't remove your stand alone card reader just yet. The built-in card reader does not function exactly like a stand alone card reader. You can only use one type of digital media card at a time. If you have a compactflash card inserted, you can not use a smartmedia card at the same time. This was a bit discouraging because I use more than one type of digital memory card. I prefer to have the memory cards in the reader to retrieve the information I want without the need of swapping out memory devices. Not going to happen with the built-in card reader. You can access the card reader with your computer to download images onto your hard drive, to delete images etc.

I haven't tried the Picbridge or an USB digital camera on the printer, but will shortly, to update this information.

The Lexmark P915 color printer has a small footprint that requires little desk real estate. It handles a variety of paper sizes and types (regular paper, photo, transparencies, iron-ons, stickers etc.) including envelopes and card stocks. Most are handled without any interference from the user. What? The Lexmark P915 color printer sports new technologies like paper detect. The printer can distinguish the difference between the types of paper you have loaded in it. Then the printer prints at the best optimal setting for that particular paper. No more fiddling with the printer properties to set the type of paper you are using, the quality of the print you want, or the paper size. If you have photo paper in your printer. The Lexmark P915 will detect it and print at the highest photo quality available -- 4800 dpi. Or normal printing on standard printing paper. Don’t fret, Lexmark provides manual settings for those unique results only human intervention can achieve. Therefore, you can opt to make manual changes to the printer settings temporarily or permanently. The default settings have pleased me thus far. I’ve only had my Lexmark P915 a week now. What printing I’ve done has come out gorgeous every time.

The AC power for this printer is very nice too. I’ve owned two other Lexmarks and the power supplies were always large and bulky. The AC power for my Lexmark Z52 was so large it set outside of the printer. The Lexmark P915 has a small compact AC power supply that attaches in the rear of the unit. This is a vast improvement and the weight of the printer is merely 8.91 pounds. Lite enough for almost anyone to tote around from room to room or travel with. I would highly recommend this printer for students as well.

Cartridges rarely come with a printer and if they do — the starter cartridges only have sufficient ink for a handful of printed pages. The cartridges supplied with the Lexmark P915 are the same you would buy at retail. It comes complete with a Photo and Color cartridge. They didn't skimp here by suppling a black cartridge.

How freely or conservative the Lexmark P915 is with its ink supply is yet to be determined. I’ve printed a variety of images and text at different levels of quality on eight and a half by eleven inch paper. I’ve noticed the color cartridge is about three forth’s full and the phot cartridge is approximately ninety-eight percent full. This is after printing eight 4"x6" photos on photo stock, ten pages of text a five percent covering, and three News Releases on photo stock. The color cartridge appears it will be the first to deplete its resources. For optimal results you should always use a photo and color cartridge together. But to save money you can buy a black cartridge in place of the phot cartridge. With just these few pages printed, it looks as if the color cartridge will be the first to empty out. It's only logical, considering the color cartridge must combine its three colors to reproduce the color black.

It may be somewhat vain and superficial. But the cosmetic appearance of a printer is important too. I always seek out a style that will compliant my current equipment and decor. The Lexmark P915 is a stylish piece of hardware. Very modern and streamlined. Though easy setup, installation and function are the main priorities when considering which printer to buy.

In the box you will find a Lexmark P915 printer, power supply, a setup sheet, color print cartridge, photo print cartridge, user's guide software CD (a USB cable is not included but should be for the price). What you won't find is a parallel coble or a parallel port sported on this printer. For me this is a good thing, the USB cable is smaller and faster. But you will not be able to use this printer on an old computer unless it has a USB port or you can add one with a add-in card. There are cables out there that have a parallel connector on one end and a USB connector on the other. I have no ideal how well these cables function.

The photo printing software that accompanies the Lexmark P915 is very user friendly. Select the icon for the function you wish to perform like: Print photos, e-mail photos, fax photos etc. If you have photo software that you are comfortable using and you prefer not learning another program. Your new printer will work just fine. I don't intend on using the supplied software mainly because i'm happy with what I use presently.

Whether you are looking to buy your first printer or replace your current printer, the Lexmark P915 Home Photo Color Printer is a premium choice. It’s stylish, easy to use out of the box with or without a computer. Software and drivers are easily installed (a child can do it). Everything you need to get started is in the box with the exception of the USB cable. The LCD screen is bright, crisp and displays images extremely well. The built-in card reader is reasonable fast and accurate.

I looked at other printers with very similar characteristics, but elected the Lexmark P915 for its compact size, quality, features, and reasonable price. Past experience with two other Lexmark printers that served me well over the years also factored into my decision to purchase this unit. Lexmark manufatures nothing but printer and they do a very good job. Several of the competitors in the printer market place are actually manufatured by Lexmark. Why pay more for the same ease of use, function and quality printing?

I highly recommend this printer to anyone -- students, moms and dads, and grandparents. Whether you need a printer for school work, home printing for arts and crafts, and scapbooking, of for promotional flyers etc. This printer will satisify almost all of your needs.

At present the only con to the Lexmark P915 is the rate ink is consumed. The ink can be regulated by printing at lesser quality which is fine for drafts. I will update this section more after I’ve had an opportunity to work this printer. It has a monthly duty cycle of 3000 copies per month. I doubt if the printer will see that much action. But it will work hard.





Print technology: Thermal inkjet
Color technology: 6 color inkjet - cyan, magenta, yellow, light black, light cyan, light magenta, optional black cartridge for true black text
Maximum print speed (draft, black): Up to 22 ppm
Maximum print speed (draft, color): Up to 15 ppm
Maximum print speed (normal, black): Up to 12 ppm
Maximum print speed (normal, color): Up to 6 ppm
Print resolution, black: Up to 2400 x 1200 dpi
Print resolution, color: Up to 4800 x 1200 dpi
Supported operating systems: Microsoft Windows 2000 (all versions), Microsoft Windows 98 (All versions), Microsoft Windows Me, Microsoft Windows XP (All versions), Apple Mac OS X (10.2.3-10.2.8), Apple Mac OS X (10.3.0-10.3.5)
Paper input capacity: 100 sheets of plain paper, 10 envelopes, 25 sheets of card stock, 25 greeting cards, 25 sheets photo or glossy paper, 20 transparencies, 100 iron-on transfers, 20 sheets of banner paper
Media types supported: Card stock, coated paper, envelopes, glossy paper, labels, plain paper, transparencies, banner (A4 or letter), hagaki card, index card (3"x5"), iron-On transfers, photo paper
Media sizes supported: 10 envelope (4.125" x 9.5"), 7 3/4 envelope (3.875" x 7.5"), 9 envelope (3.875" x 8.9"), A4 (8.27" x 11.7"), A5 (5.83" x 8.27"), B5 envelope (6.93" x 9.84"), C5 envelope (6.38" x 9.02"), DL envelope (4.33" x 8.66"), 6 3/4 envelope (3.25" x 6.5"), A2 baronial (111mm x 146mm), A6 card (105mm x 148mm), B5 (182mm x 257mm), C6 envelope (114mm x 162mm), custom (Up to 8.5" x 17"), hagaki card (100mm x 148mm), index card (3" x 5"), executive (7.25" x 10.5"), legal (8.5" x 14"), letter (8.5" x 11"), 4" x 6" photo or post card, statement (5.5" x 8.5"), L (3.5" x 5"), 2L (5" x 7"), chokei 3 (120mm x 235mm), chokei 4 (90mm x 205mm), chokei 40 (90mm x 225mm), kakugata 3 (216mm x 277mm), kakugata 4 (197mm x 267mm), kakugata 5 (190mm x 240mm), kakugata 6 (162mm x 229mm)
Standard connectivity: USB 2.0 specification hi-speed certified, PictBridge digital camera interface
Optional network ports: Lexmark N4000e for Ethernet 10/100Base TX (print only), external 802.11g Wireless
Print noise level, operating: 49 dBA
Maximum duty cycle: 3,000 pages per month
Memory card support: Supports CompactFlash Type I & II, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro, Memory Stick Duo with adapter, Multi Media, Secure Digital, SmartMedia, Microdrive and xD cards
Borderless printing: Yes
LCD screen: 2.5" color screen
Control panel functions: Power, rotate, number of prints, display, print preview, resize, select, menu, toggle, stop/ clear, start
Included software: Lexmark Imaging Studio, Lexmark Print Center
Replacement ink cartridge options: #31 (18C0031) photo color print cartridge, #32 / (18C0032) black print cartridge, #33 / (18C0033) color print cartridge, #34 / (18C0034) high yield black print cartridge, #35 / (18C0035) high yield color orint cartridge
Width: 16.85"
Height: 5.9"
Depth: 9.33"
Weight: 8.91 pounds
Warranty: 1 year, limited
In the box: Printer, power supply, setup sheet, color print cartridge, photo print cartridge, user's guide software CD (a USB cable is not included but should be for the price).


Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 94.98
Operating System: Windows and Macintosh