Canon, leader in photographic and imaging technology, today announces the new six colour, 4800 x 1200 dpi PIXMA iP6000D – the personal photo printer with complete connectivity. The sleek printer uses FINE (Full-photolithography Inkjet Nozzle Engineering) technology with 2-picolitre Micro-Nozzles to deliver high contrast glossy photo prints that rival professional photo lab quality. With card slots for all popular brands of memory card, the iP6000D also connects and prints direct from any PictBridge compatible digital camera and digital video camera without the need for a PC. A generous 2.5” colour LCD screen displays image thumbnails from memory cards and provides an intuitive interface for effortless cropping, paper size selection, photo effects and image orientation.

"The iP6000D is the ultimate direct personal photo printer," said Malcolm Hills, Head of Canon Consumer Imaging in the UK and Ireland. "It perfectly embodies the PIXMA philosophy of combining radical, cutting-edge design with unsurpassed quality, speed and reliability. It works seamlessly with contemporary digital camera and digital video devices.”

Designer printing

The new PIXMA printer range is defined by radical, futuristic looking design, reflecting Canon's recognition of the increasing importance amongst consumers of products that excel in both aesthetics and functionality. A lustrous finish completes a clean, integrated shell in a clear departure from traditional 'beige box' design.

Direct and intuitive

A control panel on the iP600D is used to manage printing from slots that take every type of memory card[1] from all popular makes of digital camera. Images stored on any of these media types can be selected, displayed and manipulated on the colour LCD viewer and printed without the need to first download to a PC.

The control panel interface is designed to be easy and intuitive for first time users. In response to ever-increasing memory card sizes, date and time range searches are now available to narrow down the list of presented images. Taking advantage of high resolutions of most late model digital cameras, the graphic user interface now supports image processing functions including trimming and creative cropping. Other specialist photo print functions include colour correction and 'face brightener' technology to improve the impact of portrait shots.

The printer also supports the vendor-independent PictBridge standard. Most current model digital cameras and digital video cameras are PictBridge compliant, allowing them to print directly to the iP6000D via a cable connection, with no need for a PC.

The iP6000D supports the IrDA wireless protocol for direct printing of JPEG images from mobile phones with in-built cameras.

Professional personal photo lab

In a process called FINE, Canon has adapted its own silicon chip manufacturing technology to produce print heads with a tolerance and precision similar to that of integrated circuits. FINE print heads now feature in all PIXMA printers and deliver microscopic droplets with unrivalled speed, reliability, consistency and accuracy that cannot be achieved with traditional ink jet print heads that are assembled from multiple parts. The iP6000D produces photo prints with six ink colours, resulting in professional photolab quality prints.

The printer's nozzle density advantage is particularly noticeable during borderless photo printing, available in 4” x 6”, 5” x 7” , credit cardand A4 formats. The FINE print head also achieves impressive photo printing speeds, printing a 4” x 6” borderless photo in 75 seconds.

Powerful software completes the printer’s photolab capabilities – EasyPhotoPrint and Photorecord give the iP6000D owner a fast route to creating individual prints, albums and more.

Single Ink technology

The iP6000D features Canon’s ‘Transparent’ single ink system, with each ink stored in an individually replaceable tank. To minimize waste, only the ink that is exhausted needs to be replaced. A pop up window on their computer warns users when a particular colour is running low and the printer will not start to print a page if there is insufficient ink to finish.

Versatile installation

One of the key design objectives of PIXMA is to maximise flexibility of location, as well as being furnished with a style and finish appropriate for the home environment. PIXMA printers are the only devices on the market to include both the traditional sheet feeder ('J' pass) paper path and a cassette ('U' turn path), allowing the printer to be stored and operated on a shelf or in other areas where space is at a premium. The dual paper path also permits the printers to be loaded with plain paper and photo print media simultaneously, so both documents and photos can be printed without the need for stopping and changing paper. Dual paper trays, auto duplex printing and CD-R/DVD printing functions are now completely integrated without compromising the printer’s clean lines – a first in printer design.

New photo media

Canon’s new media extend the creative and practical applications of the iP6000D:

• Double sided photo paper (Photo Paper Plus Double Sided PP-101D) in A4 and 5” x 7” sizes. As well as standard packs, this media is available as a kit (Photo Album Kit PAK-101) which includes a high quality hardback album cover to make photo albums, scrapbooks and personal books.
• Credit card size glossy media (Glossy Photo Paper GP-401) - ideal for printing wallet photographs and name cards.
• Photo stickers (Photo Stickers PS-101) - sheets of 16 small photo stickers, for fun and practical purposes.

Quality software for quality prints

The iP6000D is bundled with the following software packages:

Easy-PhotoPrintprovides three easy steps to printing photos. Assisting with options such as media selection and scaling, it includes features such as Face Sharpening for out-of-focus face correction, Red Eye Correction and Digital Face Smoothing to reduce the appearance of wrinkles. In addition, Easy-PhotoPrint works seamlessly with Canon’s new software for EOS-1D series cameras – Digital Photo Professional. Images saved using the camera’s highest quality RAW format can be passed directly from Digital Photo Professional to Easy-PhotoPrint, which uses the camera’s original wide colour space to ensure highest quality output.

Easy-WebPrintsits on the Explorer toolbar and takes the frustration out of web page printing, saving time, ink and paper by correctly scaling output to print one-page-per-sheet, preventing the common problem of having the right-hand side of web pages cut off.

Canon PhotoRecordguides users through printing a personalised photo album, including assistance with printing on Canon's new double-sided media.

CD-LabelPrint for easy creation and printing on print ready CD or DVD media.

PC connection is via USB interface. The iP600D is compatible with Windows98/Me/2000/XP and Macintosh OS 9.x and OSX v10.2.1 or later systems.

The PIXMA iP6000D will be available from October 2004 for around £199 inc. VAT. / €287 inc. VAT

[1] Including: CompactFlash®, Microdrive™, Sony Memory Stick®, Memory Stick ProTM, SmartMedia™, Secure Digital, and Multimedia card. Also xD-Picture card, Memory Stick DUO, Memory Stick DUO Pro and miniSD card, which require an optional adapter.

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