HP T120 vs Designjet 130

In short: the HP Designjet 130 (DJ130) produces (much) better looking photo prints than the HP Designed T120 produces on any cut sheet paper including the dye ink dedicated HP Premium and Premium Plus photo papers. On roll media, the quality is equal (but the prints are not the same). This is despite the fact that the DJ130 has been designed 10 years earlier than the T120. The reason that the DJ130 is better is simple: the DJ130 is designed as a photo printer while the T120 is designed as a graphics printer. Yes, this design choice makes all the difference in the world (different droplet size and pigment black versus photo black are just two of these design differences). Based on my experience with both printers, both have their own strengths and weaknesses when it comes to photo printing.

Pro's DJ 130:

  • photo quality is significantly better that the T120 (wider gamut, less
  • grain, slightly sharper) on cut sheet paper and equal (although different) on roll media
  • even smaller footprint than the T120
  • fantastic red and black reproduction
  • reasobaly smooth gradients, skies and skintones
  • no grain in prints visible (solid single color large surface repdocution)

 

Con's DJ 130

  • ink dries very, very slow (a week or more is normal, months before fully dried)
  • old machine, printer setting issues with Windows 10 although printer driver itself works fine under windows 10 (32bit and 64bit)
  • weak paper handling (both roll and sheet feeder)
  • roller marks visible on every print
  • prone to banding (probably due to clogging in the print heads and tubes)
  • ink tube and print head clogging when used infrequently
  • ink (mostly black) is embossed, even after the inks have fully dried (some people like this for its paint like look, I do not)
  • some but not much bronsing visible (black mostly)
  • prints not very sharp

 

Pro's T120

  • acceptable photo quality (6 out of 10, I would say) on roll media (such as HP Premium (Plus) photo paper
  • somewhat sharper than the DJ130 on roll media (considerbly less sharp than the DJ130 on cut sheet)
  • ink dries very fast (almost instantly, also on swellable papers) meaning prints can be mounted almost straight out of the printer 
  • almost no embossed ink visibile (gone after ink has fully dried)
  • virtually no bronsing visible
  • less prone to banding and has paper advance setting (but auto mode is hampered)
  • no clogging of print head (plus ink tube-less design, so no ink tube clogging)
  • very usable LCD screen
  • good build in webserver for printer settings

 

Con's T120

  • poor photo quality (4 out of 10, I would say) on cut sheet photo paper such as HP Premium (Plus) photo paper, I think due to paper advance issues with cut sheet paper handling (manual paper advance adjustments per paper type is critical)
  • limited color reproduction (limited gamma, only three dye colors and one pigment black) - carefull set your color rendering intent in the print application to avoid further impact on the gamma reproduction
  • poor gradients, skies and skin tones reproduction
  • black ink drops are visible with the bare eye in lighter colors that are mixed with black ink by the printer (this is probably due to the 12(!) picoliter droplet size for black ink versus the 5.5 for the three color inks)
  • very prone to paper advance alignment issues when printing on cut sheet, resulting in grainy prints (further reducing gamma and sharpness)
  • occasional roller marks visible, but not as bad as with the DJ130

 

Comments: 4
  • #4

    www.printelf.com (Saturday, 24 June 2017 12:02)

    This is surely a very good blog, thanks a lot for sharing such nice information here.

  • #3

    Obat Benjolan Pada Buah Zakar (Friday, 28 October 2016 11:28)

    thanks

  • #2

    www.55 printing.com (Wednesday, 05 October 2016 07:48)

    This is an informative blog by which I have got that info which I really wanted to get.

  • #1

    Kantor Sunhope Jakarta (Thursday, 08 September 2016 04:11)

    your website is really interesting i learnt a lot of facts. Well done!