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When you've taken a perfect photo, you want to keep the image fresh for years to come. But for digital shutterbugs who make their own prints, that isn't as easy as it sounds.

Both the paper you choose for your ink jet printer and the ink you use with your hardware make a big difference in whether your snapshot will last or will fade within a year or two--and sometimes whether it will print well at all.

Fortunately, since we first looked at photo-print longevity last year, manufacturers have made big improvements. For $152, you can buy HP's Deskjet 5550, a PC World Best Buy this month (see "Top 10 Printers"), which produces great-quality prints that should last over 70 years--with the right paper and ink (see the chart "Someday Your Prints Will Fade"), and with the proper care.

As consumers switch from film cameras to digital models in droves, more and more people are expected to face these choices. Lyra Research, which covers the imaging industry, says that 63 percent of PC-owning households print digital photos, and photo printing even accounts for 10 percent of printer usage among people without digital cameras.

To evaluate the best printer/paper/ink combinations this year, we again worked with Wilhelm Imaging Research, an Iowa-based firm whose founder, Henry Wilhelm, has been researching the topic for more than 30 years.

Wilhelm employs special high-intensity lighting and temperature techniques to accelerate the aging process and project print longevity. This year he looked at the latest crop of printers, inks, and papers from the leading printer manufacturers--Canon, Epson, Hewlett-Packard, and Lexmark--to see which produce the longest-lasting prints.

For the first time, the study also tested five common third-party papers sold at computer and office-supply stores. We found some to be fairly good bargains, combining lower cost with acceptable print longevity. But prints made on many third-party papers won't endure long, and in some cases the print quality is so poor, you wouldn't want them around anyway.

Few Bargains

For the best longevity and quality, the Wilhelm study confirms that you're better off with the manufacturer's recommended papers and inks instead of the typically cheaper third-party brands.

Bargains do exist: In a few cases, the study shows prints on third-party papers were projected to last as long as 12 and sometimes even more than 20 years (all reported results are for prints framed under glass in a fairly bright room--see "Display Permanence Test Methodology" for details on the testing procedures). But in many more instances, photos either were projected to fade within a couple of years or didn't print well in the first place. The inks dried improperly and ended up pooling or smudging onto nearby paper; in some cases the photos exhibited defects such as bronzing, in which blacks and other colors take on a metallic sheen. Still, using inexpensive paper for test prints might make sense.

Moreover, paper that works well with one printer may not work well with others. For example, pictures printed on Kodak's 87-cents-per-sheet Ultima Picture Paper High Gloss were projected to last 21 years with HP's printers--a good showing--but just 3 and 4 years with some printers from Lexmark and Epson, respectively. Prints from Canon's S900 and S9000 series should last for about 7 years, but the Kodak paper didn't absorb the ink properly--it puddled on the surface and never dried as it should have.

Hammermill's Jet Print Photo Professional paper did reasonably well with Canon printers, yielding prints rated to last about 12 years, and was fairly good with HP and Epson printers, producing prints projected to last 8 and 4 years, respectively. With Lexmark's printers, however, neutral colors ended up bronzing. At 50 cents per sheet, it was also the second-most-expensive third-party paper that we saw. (We dropped Jet Print Photo Multi-Project Photo Paper from the study because it yellowed after exposure to light.)

Prints on CompUSA-brand papers had good fade resistance; they were estimated to last over 20 years with HP's printers. But the papers consistently had problems absorbing inks and drying properly, or they distorted colors. Staples' Premium Glossy Ink Jet Photo paper, at 25 cents per sheet, was the cheapest in the study; but its print life was rated at just 1 to 3 years with most of the printers (although it did not exhibit drying or color-distortion problems).

The Staples and Jet Print Photo papers were the only third-party media able to print with Epson's new Stylus Photo 2200. Like its predecessor, the 2000P, the 2200 uses pigment-based inks, which tend to be more stable than the more common dye inks. That often helps prints resist damage from light, water, and air pollutants, so they last longer. But pigment inks require specially matched papers to ensure that images look good. The Kodak and CompUSA papers couldn't handle the 2200's inks properly, and so were not included in the results. The Jet Print Photo and Staples papers did very well with this printer: Their print life was projected to be approximately 30 years. (As we went to press, these longevity tests were still in progress.)

Prints and Paper

Why do results vary so much with different printer-and-paper combinations? It's all in the chemistry. Each printer manufacturer has its own set of formulas and creates products that work together to give the best results.

HP has made a particularly noteworthy breakthrough by creating new papers and inks for the company's Deskjet 5550, as well as its Photosmart 7150 ($180), 7350 ($250), and 7550 ($400) printers. Using dye-based inks--including a specially developed magenta--and a new Premium Plus Photo Paper (Glossy), HP's printers produced prints that Wilhelm's study projected to last for 73 years. That kind of longevity rating was previously exclusive to pricey archival printers such as Epson's Stylus Photo 2000P ($899) and 2200 ($699)--and to the best traditional prints from film.

What's more, in PC World's tests of the Deskjet 5550, we found its photo quality among the best we've seen. The model also offers good speeds and reasonable ink costs of 4.4 cents per page for text and 13.1 cents for graphics. For the best photos, though, you'll have to pay for the premium paper, which runs about 80 cents per sheet and is one of the more expensive we tested.

One snag: HP's system has three different ink cartridges, and with the low-cost Deskjet you will have to switch them manually--it can handle only two at a time. The defaults are the regular #56 black and the standard color cartridges, not the #58 photo cartridge (which includes special black, magenta, and cyan inks and must be purchased separately, as it does not come with the printer). You do get the #58 photo cartridge (but not the #56 black) with the company's Photosmart printers, along with other amenities like digital camera media-card slots (for easy printing) or preview screens (on the 7550, which also chooses between the inks for you). You will pay more for those units, however.

Both Canon's printers and Epson's dye-based Stylus Photo printers make prints with good projected longevity: for example, up to 38 years for the $499 Canon S9000 Bubble Jet Photo wide-format printer and 27 for the $149 Epson Stylus Photo 785EPX, often with good print quality as well. (Results apply to other Canon and Epson printers that use the same inks and papers.) But for the longest-lasting prints, you must spend 77 cents per sheet for Epson's paper and a pricey 93 cents per sheet for Canon's. Still, Epson's $99 Stylus Photo 820 is such a good value that you may not mind the high paper costs.

Costs are higher for prints with the longest life expectancy. Epson's new high-end photo printer, the 2200, boasts the longest projected print life in this study--more than 90 years--but it costs $699 and paper for prints projected to last longest costs about $1.25 per sheet. This printer is the first model in the mainstream market to print in seven colors, and it uses new pigment-based UltraChrome inks that produce images that are more vibrant than those from the 2000P.

Those new inks do sacrifice some longevity: In last year's study the 2000P produced images that were projected to last more than 100 years with each of the tested papers, while the 2200's prints should last over 90 years with specialty watercolor paper--but only from 30 to 50 years with all-purpose (and cheaper) glossy and matte papers. Still, all of the 2200's prints should last about as long as the best traditional photographs.

At the other end of the longevity spectrum are Lexmark's Z55 ($129) and Z65 ($170) Color Jetprinter models. But even Lexmark has improved its inks since the last study: Prints made with the recommended Ilford Printasia Photo Glossy Paper should last six years, compared to less than one year with the Kodak Premium Picture Paper and the Z52 printer tested last year. (Lexmark is the only printer vendor in this group that does not have its own photo paper.) Lexmark's printers are fairly inexpensive and have been well rated in PC World tests (see this month's "Top 10 Printers").

Overall, we found that you don't have to break the bank to create long-lasting prints. Advances by HP and other companies mean that you can create prints with extremely long life expectancy by using a printer that costs just $150.

In addition, Epson is working to bring pigment inks into the mainstream with its new $149 Stylus C82 (which also made our Top 10 chart this month). The company markets this four-color ink jet printer as a general-purpose model and not as a photo printer (which is the reason we excluded it from this study), but its prints are rated to last for up to 80 years, depending on the paper. If the Stylus C82 is successful, Epson may introduce a six-color version into its Stylus Photo line.

You can also save some money by using third-party papers, though you will have to experiment to see which brands work with your printer. The bottom line: Select your printing hardware and supplies carefully, because printers, inks, and papers are not created equal.

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