Olympus delivers P-440 photo printer

The P-440 Photo Printer is a workhorse that can print at a wide range of sizes and has a wealth of creative options and image-editing tools.

The P-440 produces five different print sizes up to true 8″ x 10″ in only 75 seconds for either glossy or matte finish prints. Other P-440 print sizes include Postcard, Photo-Album, Index and A5 Wide. The P-440 can also automatically print up to 50 copies of the same image.

The P-440 Photo Printer can print directly from removable xD-Picture Card^TM or PCMCIA Type II cards for SmartMedia^TM, Memory Stick^TM and CompactFlash^TM, simply by inserting the cards into a slot on the front of the printer. This enables users to circumvent their computers for even faster downloading of images. It is also possible to connect the P-440 to a PC or Mac for printing.

The P-440 has a 1.8-inch color LCD to display the easy-to-navigate menu and then preview and select only desired images for printing. The intuitive menus provide many creative options and image-editing tools to adjust layout, sharpness and brightness, as well as to correct color. In addition, the printer includes a variety of filters, stamps, backgrounds and decorative mattings to frame prints. Connecting the P-440 to a television via video cable provides another way to preview and select images before printing.

Prints from the P-440 emerge in archival condition – dry, durable and ready to share. A protective laminate overcoat resists water, scratching, moisture, fading and fingerprints.

In contrast to inkjet printers, Olympus precision dye-sublimation printers do not lay down colors as individual dots that could be detected at close range. Instead, heat vaporizes colors that saturate the photo paper to create smooth, realistic, continuous-tone images. The vaporized colors permeate the surface of the paper, creating a gentle gradation at the edges of each pixel. Because the color infuses the paper, it is also less vulnerable to fading and distortion over time. The 24-bit color gradations of the P-440 produce a palette of approximately 16.7 million colors for outstanding photo-realistic prints.

The black P-440 Photo Printer has a front panel that swings open for quick access to the dye-sub printer ribbon. This allows for a fast replacement of the ribbon, and eliminates the muss and fuss associated with inkjet heads.