Canon iPF5000 Printer update

WARNING

the canon 5000 wiki does not recommend the purchase of this printer until and if major issues of ink cartridge failure and lack of replacement are resolved. Currently you have one month to install and use a cartridge - any failure beyond that is not covered - I have $1000 worth of replacement ink cartridges waiting for use, all of them over a month old - so presumably if any fail, I am out of luck.

This MUST be resolved before considering purchasing this printer (and you have to wonder about the advisability of purshasing any canon printer at this point.

My status is as follows:

- none of the starter cartridges is anywhere near empty after making about 75 8.5X11 prints and about 25 13X19 prints - boy does it use less ink than my Epson 4000!

- none of the starter cartridges have failed - fingers crossed.

- using this printer has been an absolute pain in the ass - before upgrading the firmware (took several attempts), sheet after sheet of manual feed was rejected for being skewed - not that I could see.

- lining up paper to the right edge is easier than with my Epson 4000 but that micky mouse sliding left edge holder for manual feed is almost useless - too tight and it binds, not tight enough and as paper moves back and forth in the loading process, the paper can become skewed (enough even I can see it - so even with new firmware which is more tolerant of skewing - I run into trouble often).

- having to press buttons on the printer several times for every sheet of paper is outright silly - someone needs their wrist slapped. Bad programmer! Bad programmer!

- updating the firmware was in no way obvious - you have to install the installer - but that doesn't do the update, then you have to install the update, then you have to perform the update - ridiculous!

- in black and white, you have no profiles - because you have no colour - what this means though is you are totally on your own to develop custom curves for each paper you use - I'm not clear on why we can't have icc profiles for black and white too - which would set the tonal curve. Fortunately you can save curves and the Photoshop 16 bit print utility saves the last curve used anyway.

- the updated software at least lets you use most of the manual feed papers print surface - the old version didn't let you use the last inch and a half of paper in each side - so you lost 3 inches of paper each way - but now when I specifically set manual 3 mm. I'm told it won't work with the paper choice I made, but that was critical for matching my paper choice - round and round we go!

Does this sound like you are ready to fork out $3700 Canadian for this printer (printer plus one full set of replacement inks)? I thought I had waited long enough before purchasing it to avoid teething problems - sigh.

-Oh, by the way, when you can get it to work - it does make nice prints.