Fujifilm NX-70

Great $100 home printer that will display your SmartCard images (up to 1800x1200 in size) on your TV for preview before outputting to 4x6" thermoautochrome paper at $0.50 each. So simple, a kid can use it along with a cheap digicam (eg. MX-1200/1300) and it is cheap enough that the two together won't break the bank (only $300 for both). Images aren't photo great, but better than a Polaroid so there you go. Two minute per print is nice and you can lay out 4-up or 16-up as well.

Easy to use, quick to setup, no PC required. Just insert SmartMedia card and off you go. Quick prints, better than Polaroids, simple menu system. Allows you to look at all your images on TV at the end of the day - even can record that to VCR, too. Pictures at the 1-2MP size come out decently sharp and detailed, though never as great as a real photo, pretty good for any printer. Portable. Just toss into a large laptop bag along with your digicam, drop in a small LCD TV set and cables, and you can be at your friends and print pictures right away.

Picture quality isn't as good as those $500+ dye-sub printers from Olympus, but hey, what do you expect in a $100 printer? At least better than Polaroids. About $0.50 per 4x6" print. Not as cheap as let's say an online photo print place like ofoto or shutterfly, which prints to real photo paper, but decently cheap so you're not breaking the bank like $1+/ea. Polaroids. Color gamut is not as broad as a dye-sub or photo, so don't expect super vibrant color reproduction. Again, better than polaroids though. Can handle only pictures up to about 1800x1200 so no 3+MP images here unless you resize in the digicam before printing. Heavy 4-5lbs. isn't as portable as that Olympus P-200 hardbacksized, battery powered dye-sub model at $500 that you can literally take to the beach and print w/o an AC plug in sight. Still, portable enough to take on trips.

Olympus P-400, P-200. Alps Dye-Sub, Epson PHoto 750/870.

Suprisingly cheap at $100-150 (shopper.com), does a decent job in giving you prints from SmartMedia cards in two minutes that look okay, and plugs into the TV so you can preview all of your photos on-screen. Pictures are, naturally, just so-so to okay, nothing like a real photograph, but good enough if you don't want to go through the hassles of downloading your pictures to a PC, then to a printer. Easy-to-use and setup means even kids can use this easily (not much more complex than a Gameboy), so you can give this out for gifts. A good buy for the price if you don't want to deal with PCs, don't have the money for a better stand-alone printer, and want something that'll do in quality between those yucky Polaroids and a great photo inkjet printer/real photograph, but aren't too picky about print quality. It won't be the right pick for everyone, but it can be a great choice if you're the right type. eg. a cheap $200 Fuji MX-1200/1300 with a $100 NX-70 can be given to many people as a great 'starter' system for Xmas, with both being decently affordable that you won't cry if broken, but fun enough that you can carry both around in a big laptop saddle bag to and from work, plug the NX-70 in after you've taken shots of an office party with the MX-1200/1300 digital camera, then print out pictures right away for everyone to see and take home. (you don't even need a TV, just set which pictures to print using the in-camera DPOF feature, then let the printer print all of the pictures -- I believe it's only one button press to print a DPOF-set SmartMedia card.)

Quick to setup, easy to operate, no mess or fuss. Just hook it up to a TV set, insert card and paper, and press print. Fun to use, and good for the quick prints of any digital image, esp. for mug shots, quick previews, etc. You can zoom and crop an image, print 4 or 16 different or the same image on one 4x6" page, automatically print those images set by DPOF in the digital camera, preview the final layout, and adjust color balance/hue/brightness/contrast/sharpness/etc. as well as leaving it in full auto mode.

Image quality is so-so to okay, but what do you expect for a 100% automated stand-alone box? Color range isn't as broad, and you won't get that broad gamut vs. photo prints, but it is certainly better than a Polaroid! ;) If you take good daylight pictures with your digital camera, they'll come out okay to not-bad looking. Just don't sit and compare them to a real photograph or you'll be disappointed (nor a great photo inkjet printer like the Canon 8200 on photo paper). It won't adjust that much for yellow pictures taken in nighttime shots, or green faces in fluorescent lighting, but that's more of an issue with your camera, not this printer. Anyways, expect bad lighting to equal yuckier prints. Occassionally, you'll see some banding along the picture, but that again is what you'd expect from one of these cheap printers. Print size is about 3x5 on a 4x6" page.

Epson Photo 750/870/1270. Canon 8200. HP 97x series.