First Look: Polaroid's Snazzy Photo Printer
Thermal printer produces great-looking snapshots, but they don't come cheap.
Polaroid's PP46d Thermal Photo Printer may look more like a toaster
than a printer, but the sleek-looking black and silver device produces
impressive 4-by-6-inch glossy photos just the same. Unfortunately, its
per-print cost is notably higher than what you'd pay at most online photo
finishers.
The $229 PP46d stands upright, so it takes little space on your desktop. Measuring 9.4 inches deep, 4 inches wide, and 7.4 inches tall, the PP46d weighs about 4.5 pounds--light enough for you to take it from room to room, but not so light that you'd want to tote it on vacation. The printer has a USB port for connecting to your PC, but Polaroid doesn't include the necessary USB cable.
Panels on three sides of the printer open to reveal various slots. The top has a slot for the four-color thermal printer ribbon cassette. On the left side is access to the cassette where you insert the paper. You pull the front of the printer down to access a 2-inch LCD, seven buttons (including power, mode, print, quality, and select buttons), one slot for CompactFlash, and another slot for Memory Stick, SmartMedia, SD Memory Card, and MultiMediaCard. You can use Memory Stick Duo, XD-Picture Card, and MiniSD with an optional adapter.
Also on the front are a paper slot and a print output slot. The printer's dye-diffusion thermal transfer printing method applies each of its four colors one at a time, which means the printer slides the paper in and out of that front slot. The finished picture pops out of the print output slot and into the included paper tray.
I tested a shipping PP46d by printing images taken with a 5-megapixel camera and stored on a CompactFlash card. The print quality was great, prompting one of my colleagues to remark that the prints looked like "real pictures." The unit also reproduced colors accurately, with skin tones, landscapes, and even a white wedding gown looking crisp and clean.
Printing directly from my 1GB CompactFlash card proved a bit taxing, though, as I was forced to navigate through more than 800 images using the PP46d's 2-inch screen. On more than one occasion, I printed the wrong image. One nice touch: As you are working your way through the images, you can mark the shots you would like to print, and then you can print all of them in one batch.
You can also print from your PC, and Polaroid includes a copy of Adobe's Photoshop Elements 2. Sorting through hundreds of photos on a computer screen instead of the PP46d's tiny display is much easier.
Regardless of the image source, with each print making four trips through the printer, getting my images in hand was a slow process. Individual prints took about 3 minutes each; a batch of 27 prints took well over an hour.
And then there's the cost. Beyond the printer's up-front cost of $229, to make it work you'll need Polaroid's PM46d Print Pack, which includes 36 sheets of paper and an ink-ribbon cassette. The package sells for $25, and Polaroid doesn't even throw in the first one for free when you buy the printer.
Polaroid rates each ink ribbon to last exactly 36 images, which translates into 69 cents per print. Having the same number of 4-by-6 prints processed (and shipped back to you) at online service Ofoto would cost you 29 cents per print, plus $2.49 for shipping, for a total of $12.93 (or about 35 cents per print). Of course, the PP46d offers the instant photo gratification so many digital camera users crave. Still, over time that price-per-pic difference adds up.
Bottom line: If you want great-looking photos--and you're willing to pay to get them right now--the PP46d could be the printer for you.
Liane Cassavoy, PC World
