The $250 Hero 9.1 is Kodak’s newest flagship printer with do-it-all features including a fax machine, a 4.3-inch touch screen, and dual paper trays, and for only $50 more than its linemate, the Kodak Office Hero 6.1. Competing models from HP, Canon, and Lexmark offer similar features to the 9.1 at the $250 price point, but Kodak sweetens the deal with its new e-mail print feature that lets you send jobs from any Web-based device. Despite its minor setbacks like a smaller paper input capacity than the 6.1 and average print speeds, the Kodak Hero 9.1 remains a smart all-in-one device for getting work done quickly and efficiently in the home or office, and I recommend it to anyone shopping for a do-it-all device.

Design and features
The Kodak Hero 9.1 does away with the tactile keypad and speed-dial buttons that gave the 6.1 its business-friendly productivity. This one has an adjustable 4.3-inch touch-screen display with a slim profile that matches the chiseled angles and alternating glossy black, silver, and perforated matte black finish of the whole machine. In fact, if you don’t necessarily need the buttons, I don’t see why graphic designers and general offices wouldn’t be satisfied with its aesthetic. Like the 6.1, the Hero 9.1′s exterior gives off a more streamlined attitude than the older Kodak ESP line with a small red strip marking off the control panel and the hidden scanner bay. The angled display contrasts with the narrow auto-document feeder up top that can hold up to 30 sheets of a document at a time for hands-free copying and scanning.

The printer also has a small green Wi-Fi indicator LED on the right side of the control panel, and just below the buttons you’ll find a multimedia card reader for Memory Stick, xD-Picture Card, SD, and USB via the PictBridge-compatible port just above it.

The auto-duplexer that flips pages over for double-sided printing adds a bulky extrusion to the back of the printer, but the extra weight is offset by its economic benefits for offices that print more than the usual amount. Kodak estimates that the 9.1 can handle about 12,000 printed pages a month before it loses steam, which should be more than enough for SMBs and home offices with moderate to large output.

Kodak throws in two separate paper trays along with the matte touch screen to lure shoppers into choosing the 9.1 over its Hero line cousins, and with good sense. You get a diminished 100-sheet main paper tray for everyday printing on the bottom of the unit and another 40-sheet tray on top for smaller media. Depending on your intended uses and monthly output volume, the 140-sheet total input capacity may dissuade you from purchasing this printer. If that’s the case, the Epson WorkForce 845 all-in-one serves your needs better, with a combined paper input capacity of 500 pages.

The Hero 9.1 uses Kodak’s model 10B and 10C cartridges with a single tank for black ink and a separate five-ink cartridge of pigment color. Kodak claims its ink totals the lowest cost per page in the industry, and my calculations based on their XL-capacity cartridges corroborates those claims at just 2.4 cents per black page and 7.2 cents for a page of color, but keep in mind that all five inks are bundled into one cartridge, so you’ll need to buy a new one when the first color runs out. That’s why it makes more fiscal sense for photographers to print snapshots on competing photo printers that house five and sometimes six individual ink tanks.

Kodak offers several ways to print to the Kodak aside from the standard USB connection. You can hook it up to an office network using wired Ethernet or distribute it wirelessly using its 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi server.

Headaches quickly arrive when its time to connect a printer to a wireless router, but I’m impressed with Kodak’s streamlined handshaking–the printer is set up for the Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) computing standard that boils the process down to a push of a button, if you have a compatible wireless router. It’s just as easy to connect without WPS, however, but you’ll need to create an ad-hoc connection using the USB cable first. Unfortunately, Kodak doesn’t provide this cable in the box.

The printer ships with a helpful driver disc that walks you through the installation process and includes Kodak’s All-in-One Home Center software. The Home Center acts as a hub for the copy, print, and scan functions, but remember to check for firmware updates soon after you connect the printer; Kodak said version 7.3 is coming soon. The copy feature is easy to navigate and offers a unique collage copy setting that duplicates several pictures in the same orientation as the originals. The scanning center is simple as well, but lacks the option to scan directly to a fax in lieu of scanning directly to a Google Doc, which serves a similar purpose if you want to send a link to a PDF file.

The new Home Center also lets you print 3D images, which means you’ll need a pair of red-and-blue glasses to see them pop. The 3D print process works as you’d expect, with the device printing dual images close together but slightly offset so viewing through the paper glasses makes the image come alive. The 9.1 comes with a 3D starter kit that includes two pairs of 3D glasses and a sample pack of photo paper for experimentation.

The Hero 9.1 is also accessible on the run using the free Kodak Pic Flick App for iOS, Android, and Blackberry device. Though the app doesn’t offer the opportunity for heavy photo editing, you can specify the print quality and canvas size from 2 inches by 3 inches all the way up to the standard 8.5 by 11.

Printing from the cloud is perhaps the most convenient feature across Kodak’s entire Hero line, and you get two simple ways to print from any computer with an internet connection. The most ubiquitous is Google Cloud Print, a free utility that lets multiple users share your printer over the Web with a simple username registration and a compatible device running the Google Chrome Web browser. Google stores your device information on its servers to keep your computer clutter-free and simplifies the process even further by keeping drivers and firmware up to date.

The other side of the 9.1′s cloud-printing diligence is Kodak E-mail Print. It’s designed to release users from the shackles of the print driver by assigning a unique e-mail address to every printer that you can use to send jobs directly from any connected device. When you send an e-mail to the printer, you can choose to either attach a compatible file (Microsoft Word, Microsoft Powerpoint, Microsoft Excel, PDF, text files, BMP, PNG, GIF, TIFF) for formatted documents or just paste text in plain or HTML form to the e-mail body. Kodak provides the address for your particular device during the wireless setup process, and the virtual instructions walk you through it step by step.

Performance
The Hero 9.1 neither impressed nor disappointed us with its output speed results, though it did print at a noticeably slower rate than other printers in the $250 range. Kodak couldn’t keep up in three out of the four tests, but actually fared well in the single-photo print test, placing third in the lineup with 0.96 page per minute (ppm). The disparity in the other three will likely appear negligible unless you’re printing long-form documents.

Once the printer eventually spits out your job, you’ll be impressed with the resolution quality. Graphic documents and everyday text prints came out looking the best out of all the tests with acceptable saturation levels that I wouldn’t hesitate to use as presentation materials for an office meeting. Scan quality is satisfactory as well thanks to the 9.1′s new 2,400 dpi scanning bay, and the upgrade resolves the dark compression issues that marred previous Kodak models.

Service and support
Kodak supports the Hero 9.1 with a one-year warranty for toll-free phone and online-chat tech support available every day. The Kodak Web site provides access to manuals, driver downloads, troubleshooting tips, graphic tutorials, and a list of frequently asked questions.

Conclusion
Kodak’s latest all-purpose machine shows off Kodak’s versatile set of features like a fresh exterior design, cloud printing, and mobile print apps coupled with dual paper trays, an auto-document feeder, and simple double-sided printing. It might not outshine the competition in performance speeds, but homes shopping for a new multifunction printer certainly won’t be disappointed by the Kodak Hero 9.1′s array of intelligent technologies.

(Review by Justin Yu on CNET – Justin Yu covers headphones and peripherals for CNET. When he’s not scouring eBay for useless ephemera or eating hot dogs for breakfast, he spends his time making fun of Internet culture every morning on The 404 podcast.)

The year 2012 is going to be a good one for printers. While printing technology will (most likely) not change, printer manufacturers will be adding mobile printing via Wi-Fi and cloud printing via email to all the printer models they release in 2012. This technology will allow printers to follow their users away from their desks and on to their smartphones, tablets, and other mobile devices.

Gone are the days where we must be using a computer sitting next to a printer to print anything. Now we’ll be printing from just about anywhere we want, to any printer we want. Get ready to embrace mobile printing and cloud printing.

In 2011 Apple, Google, HP, and Lexmark all introduced mobile and cloud capabilities in their printers and services to enhance our printing capabilities. Google’s Cloud Print App lets users print via email on any printer connected to a computer that has Internet access. Apple introduced AirPrint, which lets you use Wi-Fi to send a variety of print jobs directly from an iOS device to any nearby AirPrint compatible computer. HP unveiled ePrint, a service allowing you to email a print job from anywhere to an ePrint compatible HP printer. Lexmark’s SmartSolutions apps allowed users to display a limited amount of web based information on their printer’s LCD screen.

In 2012 we will see these manufacturers expand their mobile and cloud print offerings while others begin to get in the game. Canon, Epson, and Kodak will all release printers, this year, that are mobile and cloud print enabled. Canon’s printers will offer Easy-PhotoPrint (for printing from Android and Apple phones and tablets) and PIXMA Cloud Link (for printing from Google Docs and Gmail from your mobile device) apps. Epson will will release the same type of printer apps under the name Epson Connect.

Kodak will following suit, but has chosen to focus on the size of the email message users can send to their printers. As of now, mobile and cloud printing apps only accept print jobs of a certain size. I imagine other printer manufacturers will follow Kodak and over the course of 2012 we will see less limited size constraints.

If you are in the market for a printer this year, definitely make sure you check out mobile and cloud printing apps before buying. They promise to be a very useful technology.

Office Max has jumped on the Kodak band wagon and, in an effort to save you $100 a year on printer cartridges will now be offering the Kodak ESP All-in-One printers online and in their stores. This is the first time that Office Max will offer Kodak printers.

In their effort to expand their share of the printer ink cartridge market, Kodak has struck deals to put their printers in both Staples and Office Max. These stores have traditionally stocked printers made by HP, Epson, Canon, and Lexmark. A quick online check shows that Staples, currently, only carries 1 Kodak printer, 60+ HP printers, 20+ Canon printers, 50+ Epson printers, and 40+ Lexmark printers. Office Max is offering 3 Kodak printers and a similar number of each of the other printers.

Great move by Kodak, and Office Max. Kodak needs more exposure for their printers. Doing so through retail chains is a great way to do it. But, they are relying of Office Max employees to direct customers to their printers rather than the more popular HP, Epson, and Canon printers (I purposely left Lexmark off this list). Office Max needs to something to boost their sales to catch up with office superstore rival Staples. Piggy backing on Kodak’s large marketing budget will help as long as they can offer a larger selection of Kodak printers than Staples can.

Let me know what you think of Kodak printers. Thanks!

I received an comment on the post I wrote the other day about getting rich with Kodak ink. Dan O’Day, who commented on the post suggested that:

But if you spend $100 to $200 more for a printer whose higher cost is recouped after using 3 (or 4 or 5) cartridges, isn’t that a good investment?

This got me thinking more about the potential savings. I decided we should take a look together.

I did some quick online shopping, at the manufacturer web sites, and found  you can purchase the Kodak ESP Office 6150 printer for $299. I think looked at the features and found a comparable HP printer, the HP OfficeJet Pro 6500, for $199. Difference in cost of $100.

For the purpose of this exercise let’s say you decided to save the $100 and go with the HP printer. You’ve saved $100 and can now put that toward purchasing printer ink. Now, let’s say the average printer cartridge costs $25. For the $100 you saved you will be able to purchase 4 printer cartridges before you’ve matched the full price of the Kodak printer.

Dan’s question is a good one, and here is why. He says that Kodak is a good buy if it only took you 3-4 cartridges to recuperate the additional cost. Is it? I have to ask how long will it take you to use the 4 cartridges you purchased when you saved that $100 dollars. On average, printer users buy a new cartridge every 3-4 months. If you are one of these folks it will take you a year to spend the $100. Probably not to bad. But, what if you are one of those folks that uses 1-2 cartridges a year? Now you are talking about 2-4 years to recuperate your $100. Probably not a good deal.

Remember also, that if you spend that $100 extra for the Kodak printer you are going to spend just under $50 on printer cartridges in the same amount of time you would have spent the $100 by buying the HP printer.

Now, I stand back and look at all I have just written and I say . . . Huh?

Okay, as we first mentioned the other day we are not talking about a lot of money here, $50-$100 a year. That’s $4-$9 a month. Not huge savings, but a savings none the less. Is it enough of a savings for Kodak to build an entire marketing campaign around?  You make the call.

My recommendation. Kodak’s proposed theory would work for those that are higher volume printers. Maybe those that use 3-4 cartridges every month or two. If you use any less than that, you should probably take the immediate savings and choose a different brand printer.

If anyone is looking for a good deal, check out Amazon.com. You can purchase the Kodak ESP Office 6150 printer for $185.93 and the HP OfficeJet Pro 6500 Wireless for $150.49.

So, thanks for the comment Dan. You are welcome to come back and leave your thoughts any time. For everyone else, you need to weigh in on this topic. Leave some comments. Thanks!

Today’s inspiration was a Kodak radio commercial. The commercial touted the high cost of using your inkjet printer because of the high cost of printer cartridges. The commercial mentioned a web site (www.printandprosper.com) that customers should go to and find out more about Kodak’s printers. Well, I had to take a look.

Wow, I love marketing! When you get to the web site you start to see a theme that makes you think you can create personal wealth through using Kodak printers and cartridges. You are met with “Spread the Word. Spread the Wealth,” and “What has high price ink cost you?” It reads as though we could solve our economic woes by buying Kodak printer ink. Kodak says that Americans overpaid for their printer ink by $110 last year. One hundred Ten Dollars! I don’t want to discount the value of even one dollar, but that’s $9.16 per month. Eliminate one or two trips to Starbucks a month. Eat one less meal a month at a restaurant. Funny Kodak has decided to build a whole marketing campaign on people throwing away $9.16 a month. I hate to say it, but that is what that amount of money is . . . Throw away money.

I then watched a video about how I can print and prosper with Kodak. Wow! It starts with:

Do you suffer from anxiety? Despair? Anger? You may have an unhealthy dependence on overpriced ink.

What? Now we are talking about printer ink causing psychological disorders. I wrote something about his a few months ago, but I was joking. Can Kodak be serious? I’d have to think so because the video is based on the various steps used to end addictions.

I could go on forever with this, but just take a minute to watch the video yourself. When you do so, please remember the following.

Yes, Kodak offers printer cartridges that are priced less than those made by other manufacturers. But, Kodak offers printers that are priced higher than those made by other manufacturers. You will most likely spend $100-$200 more on a Kodak printer than you would on the equivalent printer made by another manufacturer. Where are the ink savings now? You could have used that $100-$200 in savings to buy yourself 3, 4, even 5 ink cartridges.

So, what did you think of Kodak’s video? Let me know. Thanks!

Well, they are at war about as much as two companies that sell printer cartridges can be. But they did do some verbal sparring on the mean streets of Twitter.

Things heated up a while back when HP called attention to Kodak’s marketing techniques and the FCC got involved. Kodak was claiming that using their printers and inkjet cartridges would save consumers $110 a year. After an FCC investigation Kodak had to change their claim to a savings of $110 per year if you print more than 4 pages a day.

So, what was today’s tweeting all about?

HP came out and criticized Kodak’s marketing claims and the quality of their printers. Kodak responded by trying to take the high road using the “shame on you HP” tactic. HP then followed up with “We are HP. You can’t possibly beat us.”

Here is where it gets interesting though. Kodak decided they would try to change the game by charging more for their printers and less for their printer cartridges (polar opposite to everyone else). Kodak must be making some sort of dent in the market share for HP to come out like this. Last time HP reacted, Dell was giving away printers with every computer they sold and gaining 13% of the market. Where is Dell now?

Okay, back to Kodak . . . Expensive printers, cheap ink. Kodak is now deviating from this philosophy and cutting prices on their printers. As of Monday, BEST BUY.com lists three Kodak multi-function printers for 25%-40% off. HP printers are discounted as much as 30%. Additionally, both companies are offering $50 trade-in credits.

As with most price wars, the consumer will be the winner (yeah for us!). So we’ll all be enjoying our inexpensive printers this holiday season, but wouldn’t we like to see HP and Kodak fighting over the price of printer cartridges? This all seems like a well played out scheme to sell more printers and then reap the benefits of selling cartridges for these printers. Let’s face it; cartridges are where their money is! So, if you need one, buy a new printer and enjoy the savings. Just remember, you will still need ink.

Let’s take a second to address HP’s claim about the quality of Kodak’s printers. A quick online search of printer users shows that most of Kodak’s printers are receiving average ratings (2.5 or 3 stars out of 5). I’ve read a lot about how pretty their printers look (they’ve done a very good job on design), but not much else gives a sense of quality. Most complaints focus on how loud the printer is, troubles with the drivers, and the extensive number of error messages. CNET really did not have much good stuff to say in their reviews. Their best summary, “Your money would be better spent on alternative multifunction printers.”

My personal opinion . . . Take advantage of this price war and buy an HP printer. You will definitely be able to get more features for the money you spend. HP has a proven track record and some excellent printers that will fit your home or office needs.

Kodak is an upstart. Not to say they won’t make a printer worth your money, they just have not made one yet.

If you’ve had an experience with a Kodak or an HP printer you would like to share, take a minute and let us know. Thanks!

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Kodak made a big splash on the printer cartridge scene two years ago with their inexpensive printer cartridges ($9.99 for black, $14.99 for color). As their printers and ink cartridges gained popularity they also gained the attention of the Federal Trade Commission . . . Because of Hewlett Packard (HP).

HP complained to the National Advertising Division trade group that Kodak’s advertisements were unfair. The FTC must have agreed, in some way, because they go involved. Kodak’s advertising had claimed consumers could save $110 a year on ink costs by using Kodak’s All-in-One inkjet printers.

Pressure from the FTC has caused Kodak to agree to add that the $110 in savings depends on a consumer limiting their printing to 1,500 pages a year, or four pages per day. From now on, Kodak said it would advertise that consumers can, “Save on average $110 per year on ink based on just four pages per day.”

Kodak considers the case closed. We are not sure how HP feels about this, but you can let us know how you feel about it. Also, if you’ve got a Kodak printer, let us know how you like it.

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One type of inkjet printer that we haven’t heard too much about is standalone compact photo printers. They started appearing on the market around the same time that at-home photo printing took off, but today they still only make up a relatively small portion of the photo printing market. Even though a lot of people like printing their own photos, so far they haven’t seemed to be totally on board with owning a printer that probably just prints 4 x 6s and nothing else. Companies like Kodak, HP and Canon make an effort to have their customers use their cameras and then hook up those cameras to their compact printers and print with their ink on their paper. Since we haven’t provided too many reviews on any of these kinds of printers so far, we thought we would point out an article in the NY Times that takes a look at five of these printers.

They take a look at the HP Photosmart 475, the Lexmark P450, the Canon Selphy CP170, the Kodak EasyShare 500 and the Epson PictureMate Deluxe. They don’t do any real in depth testing on the machines, but they compare the basic and important stuff like print quality, print speed and general usability. They don’t declare a clear winner, but their top choices are the Kodak and the Epson. Like with most other printers, Lexmark disappoints. They note that the HP has “gadget appeal” but that it is slow and its first print jobs all jammed. The Canon had potential but it had some technical issues.

The Epson and Kodak machines both run about $200, so they right around the same price as some regular photo printers.

Anyone out there own a compact photo printer?

The Joys and Pitfalls of One-and-a-Half-Minute Photo Processing [NY Times]