Kodak Personal Picture Maker 200

May 2001

An Affordable Inkjet Printer That Works Without a Computer

By Tatyana Sinioukov
Digital cameras are proliferating, and photofinishing opportunities are everywhere—on the Internet and in retail stores and kiosks. Yet the home digital picture printing experience could stand some improvement in terms of lower cost, greater ease of use and more flexible features. Kodak's new inkjet printer stands out in all three categories.

In 1999, Kodak launched the Personal Picture Maker 100 as a way to make digital picture printing easier and more affordable for most folks. Kodak's new Personal Picture Maker 200 ($199), manufactured by Lexmark, has two distinguishing features we will see more of in printers of the future.

First of all, the PPM 200 functions when connected to a computer and as a stand-alone device. It includes two separate slots for Smart Media and CompactFlash memory cards, so you can print directly from the memory card. The PPM 200 can also act as a memory card reader for transferring pictures from your memory cards to a PC via the USB cable. Kodak's PPM 100 and the Lexmark 5700 before that could only read a memory card for printing but could not transfer images to a computer.

The second feature is the 1.8-inch color LCD screen, a rarity for a printer. The LCD screen can be used for both setup and to preview images from your memory card.

As a stand-alone, the PPM 200 can only print at 600 x 600 dpi resolution. You must use a computer to go up to 1,200 x 1,200 dpi. The printer uses six colors and two inkjet cartridges at a time (three altogether), in two combinations: color and photo cartridges for printing photos; color and black for printing black-and-white documents and those with both images and text.

You can size, crop, rotate images after you view them on the small LCD screen and change their layout before you print them. You can also print panoramic images and add borders.

I used Kodak's 3 1/2 x 5-inch Photo Glossy and 8 1/2 x 11-inch Premium Picture high gloss inkjet papers to print images from the Samsung SDC-80 1,024 x 768 dpi digital camera ($249.99) and the high-end, 2.1-megapixel Olympus C-2100 ($999).

On Premium Picture paper, the black-and-white images I shot with the Samsung camera had deep, rich blacks and a good amount of detail. Some color images, however, appeared too yellow (I used only unedited pictures). I had better luck with the Olympus C-2100 pictures—they looked sharper, the colors were more saturated and more accurate. I also got some ink smudges on the blank side of the Premium Picture paper sheets when I was printing in batches, four to eight sheets at a time. I didn't have any ink smudges on the Photo Glossy 3 1/2 x 5-inch paper. The color accuracy of the prints made on this paper was similar to those made on the 8 1/2 x 11-inch paper. Also, when the colors were slightly off, they seemed to be more on a magenta side, not yellow.