This is intended to be a follow up to my original review of the Kodak 5300 All in one printer. If you have not yet read my complete review, you may find it under the tab for my other reviews

Since my original review went into detail about the printers positive and negative points, I will try and focus this hub more on the general user experience issues and costs associated with using the printer.

Color Cartridge Yield

Lets begin with ink cartridge yield, or how many pages I was able to print from the supplied ink cartridges. With the color ink cartridge that costs $15, I was able to print 103 color pictures using mostly Kodak 5 star paper (specifically I printed 74 prints on 5 star, 10 prints on 4 star paper, and 14 on generic (non Kodak) photo paper). 5 of the shots were black and white photos but anything on photo paper requires use of the color cartridge so these were included in the total yield of the color cartridge.

The pictures I printed were mainly from a 4 megapixel HP camera with the pictures being a pretty even mix of daytime and nightime shots. The pictures were also pretty evenly distributed between indoor and outdoor shots. One other thing to keep in mind is that I did print about 10 pages of color text and graphics but I did not include these in the computation for yield because they were all different levels of coverage so there was no fair way to evaluate how much ink was used by them.

I paid $12 for 150 sheets of 5 star photo paper (this is the sale price from a local Staples store not retail price) which means each sheet cost 8 cents. If we assume that I had only printed on 5 star paper and still obtained 103 prints the cost would have been about 23 cents a picture ($15 for ink / 103 prints + 8 cents for paper). Not cheap by any means but less than most home printers. If we believe Kodak's claims about 4 star paper yielding 135 prints then the cost would only be 15cents a picture. The quality difference between 5 star and 4 star paper is subtle enough to recommend the 4 star paper because of its cost savings. Also keep in mind that the retail price for Kodak 5 star paper is over $30 for 150 sheets, but I used the sale price in my calculations because I have seen it at this price from more than one store on several occasions over the last few weeks.

One final note about the color photos printed, though they were very good quality they definitely were not as glossy as the Fujichrome prints I had done at a local store. The colors were also a little more dull (very slightly) but overall they were very good and will serve the needs of most people

Black Cartridge Yield

As for the black print cartridge, I was able to print 417 pages with 10% still remaining in the cartridge (that means I should be able to get at least 41 more pages out of this cartridge for a total of 458 pages). Fifty of these pages were draft quality and 30 were Best quality with the remainder being normal quality. Since the black cartridge costs about $10, this means the cost per page will be about 2 cents per page ($10 for the black cartridge / 458 prints). The pages that were printed had very little graphics, and wide side margins for note taking but they should represent most home printing scenarios.

Many reviews of the Kodak printers mentions the lack of individual ink cartridges and how this is wasteful. One interesting thing that I read about the Kodak ink cartidges is that they do not contain the same quantity of each of the colored inks so in actuality the colors that are used more heavily are higher in quantity so in the end each of the tanks are roughly depleted to the same levels. While a printer that uses individual tanks will allow you to use every last drop of ink in each of the color cartridges, it is much more convenient and environmentally friendly to have to replace just one cartridge at a time rather than each color independently.

Also in terms of cost, some people still seem to think that ink replacement costs of printers that use multitanks are about the same as the Kodak because each individual color is (in the case of Cannon printers) about $12 dollars. Well the thing is that if the Cannon used only 3 colors the cost to replace the color cartridges would still run $36 while the Kodak is $15. And if what Kodak is saying about using different quantites of ink for each of the colors in the Single cartrdige, then the yield should not be significantly different.

One final note, the prices I mentioned for the ink cartridges are retail prices. Recently Amazon.com has been selling the cartridges and value packs below retail price. Please check the links above under the heading "Lowest prices" for direct links to the Amazon prices.

Problems:

One of the main issues that I have with this printer is that it tends to print text rather slowly. I printed a 62 page document in 8.5 minutes which means it printed 7.2 pages per minute in normal print quality. That is agonizingly slow if you have a lot of pages. The photograph printing is a different story, the average 4x6 print took about 30-40 seconds which is really good considering the quality.

Another issue that I have with the Kodak printer is that the USB ports and the Memory card reader can only be used to print photos. If you want to print documents you will have to turn on your computer. This is even more painful considering that there is no wireless networking built in, so if you work on a different computer and need to print out your documents, you will have to turn on the computer attached to the printer.

Firmware Upgrade:

The one big issue with the printer was that the firmware upgrade was an absolute necessity. The printer without the firmware upgrade refused to display all of the pictures locate on my SD card or USB drive (it showed only 35 of 179 pictures on the card). Once the firmware was upgraded the card reader and USB port always displayed all of my photos.

While the firmware update is essential, the only serious and major problem I had with the Kodak (apart from the printhead installation issues mentioned in the complete review) occured during a firmware upgrade. While performing the upgrade my computer froze and after waiting over 30 minutes without any sign of it finishing, I was forced to restart my computer. After this failed attempt at upgrading the firmware, the printer simply would not print and instead would spit out blank sheets of paper. I contacted Kodak customer support and they advised me that the printer needed to be replaced. They offered to send me a new one but I chose to return my unit to the store and get a new one. The results of all tests were with the new replacement printer which has performed flawlessly.

Kodak really needs to find a way to make the firmware upgrade less risky because as we all know, computers sometimes act up at inoportune times and this should not lead to the "bricking" of such a useful device!

Networking:

As mentioned in my complete review, the Kodak does lack networking and many Print servers simply will not work with it. I have tried 2 different print servers and no amount of fiddling or adjusting could get them to work with the Kodak. A few people have posted comments stating that the Apple Airport Hub does work and allows the Kodak to be networked wirelessly, though I have not been able to try this personally.

Also the Bluetooth networking potential is really more of a gimmick than a useful feature. I have tried to 2 different bluetooth adapters and neither of them worked, though I have read that the D-link adpaters should work. Either way the bluetooth printing feature only works for pictures so unless you have a pressing need to print those cell phone pictures it really is not worth the hassle. Too bad that Kodak did not allow for built in wifi networking instead of the less useful bluetooth.

Conclusion:

Overall the Kodak 5300 all in one printer is great for home users with moderate printer and copier needs but who want the ability to print low cost and good quality photos at home. Its relatively slow text printing speeds means it probably will not serve well for businesses or offices that print a lot of documents and need fast printouts. Home and business users that do not have any intention of printing photographs at home would probably be served better by the Cannon MX700 which has similar black text printing costs but much higher print speeds and more features overall.

My complete review of this printer can be found at the following link:

http://hubpages.com/hub/Kodak-Easyshare-5300-All-in-one-printer---Review--Owner-Experience

I recently noticed that some of the prints were a little faded and lighter than the used to be. I tried cleaning the printhead but no change. I contacted Kodak and they decided to send me a new printhead. The printhead was sent via overnight mail and they also included an extra color and black cartridge!

Very satisfied with their service.