Canon Pro 100 printer questions.

Ironwood

Senior Member
Thinking about buying one of these. I know a few members have one of these printers , so hoping to get a bit of insight.
Unfortunately I will have to pay the Australia Tax when I buy mine, will cost me about $600aus. including taxes and delivery.

I have had a few photos printed by commercial printers lately, but I would like to have my own printer to take some control of the process, and learn about process as well. I have been reluctant to pay to have prints done, because I am not sure if they will turn out OK or not.
I have done a bit of research on various sites, but I still have some questions.
My concerns are,
1- It is said, if you don't use your printer regularly, you can damage your printheads. How long between printing sessions do you think is OK.
2- they say dye based inks are not as good for longevity of prints as pigment based inks . For my own personal use, I don't expect this to be a problem, I would just print a new one if it looked faded. But I might like to sell some prints at some stage, should I be worried about this if I was to sell any ?

At at this stage I plan to use OEM ink cartridges, I have heard mixed stories about the aftermarket inks and refilling. I have had bad results refilling cartridges before, so am a bit wary.

At this stage l am about 80% sure I will get one, but still a bit unsure that I will use it enough on a regular basis to prevent clogging of the printheads.
 

Danno

Senior Member
Thinking about buying one of these. I know a few members have one of these printers , so hoping to get a bit of insight.
Unfortunately I will have to pay the Australia Tax when I buy mine, will cost me about $600aus. including taxes and delivery.

I have had a few photos printed by commercial printers lately, but I would like to have my own printer to take some control of the process, and learn about process as well. I have been reluctant to pay to have prints done, because I am not sure if they will turn out OK or not.
I have done a bit of research on various sites, but I still have some questions.
My concerns are,
1- It is said, if you don't use your printer regularly, you can damage your printheads. How long between printing sessions do you think is OK.
2- they say dye based inks are not as good for longevity of prints as pigment based inks . For my own personal use, I don't expect this to be a problem, I would just print a new one if it looked faded. But I might like to sell some prints at some stage, should I be worried about this if I was to sell any ?

At at this stage I plan to use OEM ink cartridges, I have heard mixed stories about the aftermarket inks and refilling. I have had bad results refilling cartridges before, so am a bit wary.

At this stage l am about 80% sure I will get one, but still a bit unsure that I will use it enough on a regular basis to prevent clogging of the printheads.

I have the same printer and I do not use it as much as I should. I Print a test sheet about once a week. It uses a minimal amount of ink but keeps them from clogging up.

As for refilling ink. I use precision color. They have their own channel on youtube and Jose Rodriguez who has his own channel as well. He gives all the ins and outs of refilling and he is very straightforward. He covers the 100 at length and answers these questions in detail. His link is below. Precision Colors is the second link.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCz9YXaSulpM90vC24lmAeZA
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC11h9HbpqWHSI8PUZrOf-Ow
Jose Rodriguez
 

Fred Kingston

Senior Member
I've gone months at a time without printing, and never had an issue... It just takes a few minutes for the printer to warm up, and wake itself up as it goes thru all its self tests and waking up... As mentioned... when I do print after a long time, I just print the Inkjet Color printer test page... you can find them on google...

I use LDs ink cartridges on Amazon instead of the OEM cartridges... they're 1/2 the OEM prices... haven't had a problem...
 

hark

Administrator
Staff member
Super Mod
Contributor
Many Canon printers offer the option to either clean the heads or perform a deep cleaning of them.

Canon : PIXMA Manuals : PRO-100S series : Cleaning the Print Heads from Your Computer

I have an inexpensive Canon all-in-one printer that began having color issues. I ran the deep cleaning option, and that cleared it up right away. I hadn't used it for a while which is probably the reason it happened. So either do a head cleaning or print something once a week, and you should be fine.
 

LouCioccio

Senior Member
Jose aka jtoolman has a bunch videos on the Canon Pro's he does recommend Precision Color Ink (Canada) for refilling your cartridges. Also every two weeks or so check out Canon website (sales) they some times have free paper with the purchase of ink. Sometimes its great other times its not.
If you are running Mac OS X there is a free utility called Inkjet Plumber that will send a small print cleaning to the printer in fact it will work with other Canon Printers especially my wife's MX 920 she seldom uses it for printing that the magenta clogged and I had to go through several cleaning cycles now with that little piece of software no clog's on her printer. Yes it does waste a sheet but if you reload as I do on the Pro 100 I can use the sheet four times. Window's user you have to set a task scheduler. I haven't tried that as I use Windows as virtual Machine in side my Mac's.


Lou Cioccio
 

Ironwood

Senior Member
I have the same printer and I do not use it as much as I should. I Print a test sheet about once a week. It uses a minimal amount of ink but keeps them from clogging up.

As for refilling ink. I use precision color. They have their own channel on youtube and Jose Rodriguez who has his own channel as well. He gives all the ins and outs of refilling and he is very straightforward. He covers the 100 at length and answers these questions in detail. His link is below. Precision Colors is the second link.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCz9YXaSulpM90vC24lmAeZA
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC11h9HbpqWHSI8PUZrOf-Ow
Jose Rodriguez
Thanks Dan. I have started watching some of the videos in the first link.
 

Ironwood

Senior Member
I've gone months at a time without printing, and never had an issue... It just takes a few minutes for the printer to warm up, and wake itself up as it goes thru all its self tests and waking up... As mentioned... when I do print after a long time, I just print the Inkjet Color printer test page... you can find them on google...

I use LDs ink cartridges on Amazon instead of the OEM cartridges... they're 1/2 the OEM prices... haven't had a problem...
Thanks Fred. Good to hear you can get away with not printing for that long, I have read many similar stories on the Internet now that I have been researching. Though I will probably err on the cautious side and do the test prints on a regular basis if I am not using the printer for extended periods.
 

Ironwood

Senior Member
Many Canon printers offer the option to either clean the heads or perform a deep cleaning of them.

Canon : PIXMA Manuals : PRO-100S series : Cleaning the Print Heads from Your Computer

I have an inexpensive Canon all-in-one printer that began having color issues. I ran the deep cleaning option, and that cleared it up right away. I hadn't used it for a while which is probably the reason it happened. So either do a head cleaning or print something once a week, and you should be fine.
Thanks for the link Candy. I also have a cheap Canon home printer, the colour prints it does look like crap, I have always put it down to cheap aftermarket inks I have used, and extended periods where it doesn't get used.
 

Ironwood

Senior Member
Jose aka jtoolman has a bunch videos on the Canon Pro's he does recommend Precision Color Ink (Canada) for refilling your cartridges. Also every two weeks or so check out Canon website (sales) they some times have free paper with the purchase of ink. Sometimes its great other times its not.
If you are running Mac OS X there is a free utility called Inkjet Plumber that will send a small print cleaning to the printer in fact it will work with other Canon Printers especially my wife's MX 920 she seldom uses it for printing that the magenta clogged and I had to go through several cleaning cycles now with that little piece of software no clog's on her printer. Yes it does waste a sheet but if you reload as I do on the Pro 100 I can use the sheet four times. Window's user you have to set a task scheduler. I haven't tried that as I use Windows as virtual Machine in side my Mac's.


Lou Cioccio
Cheers Lou. I use a Mac, so will definitely check out the Injet Plumber.
I haven't started looking at paper yet, but from all I have read, it is better to stick with the Canon paper, so go in that direction.
We don't get the good deals like you get over there, so am stuck with paying full price for almost everything.
 

nickt

Senior Member
If you decide that you do not want to re-ink, save your empties anyway, they sell pretty good on ebay. Search 'empty cli-42'. I bought the re-ink kit but haven't used it yet. I bought a second set of Canon ink and got a good paper deal on Lou's advice.
Save the orange twist off caps from the included ink tanks. I picked mine out of the trash after realizing I might need them for re-inking. Even if you don't re-ink, they might get you a couple extra $ if you sell the empties. You can buy nice snap on caps for re-inking or use the old caps with a rubber band.
As for your decision, to buy or not buy, good luck :). I don't think drying up will be a problem. Canon likes to clean those heads for you. I like having the printer. I don't use it as much as I should, but I was constantly talking myself out of sending for prints. So I mostly didn't print. Now I'll just print and see how it looks without over-thinking it. For me, the deal was too good to not just try it. Printer was $60 after rebate and came with a $50 pack of paper.
 

Ironwood

Senior Member
If you decide that you do not want to re-ink, save your empties anyway, they sell pretty good on ebay. Search 'empty cli-42'. I bought the re-ink kit but haven't used it yet. I bought a second set of Canon ink and got a good paper deal on Lou's advice.
Save the orange twist off caps from the included ink tanks. I picked mine out of the trash after realizing I might need them for re-inking. Even if you don't re-ink, they might get you a couple extra $ if you sell the empties. You can buy nice snap on caps for re-inking or use the old caps with a rubber band.
As for your decision, to buy or not buy, good luck :). I don't think drying up will be a problem. Canon likes to clean those heads for you. I like having the printer. I don't use it as much as I should, but I was constantly talking myself out of sending for prints. So I mostly didn't print. Now I'll just print and see how it looks without over-thinking it. For me, the deal was too good to not just try it. Printer was $60 after rebate and came with a $50 pack of paper.
Thanks for the advice Nick, I wouldn't have thought to keep the empty cartridges.
That deal you got would be too good to pass up, I think I would have bought two, one for a spare.
 
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