Samsung SPP-2040

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Features
The SPP-2040 uses dye diffusion thermal transfer ensuring consistent 4 x 6-inch printouts at a maximum resolution of 300 x 300dpi. The unit comes with a total of 1MB flash and 16MB DRAM for processing. A color cartridge good enough for 10 prints is bundled along with 10 pieces of photo paper in the retail package. That may not seem a lot so you would have to purchase an additional pack at S$39 (US$27.71) which includes the color cartridge and 40 pieces of photo paper. Cost-wise, that works out to approximately S$0.98 (US$0.70) for each 4R photo.

The 7-in-1 card reader on the front of the printer.

This photo printer provides a wide range of connectivity options within its compact size from accepting memory cards to direct printing from cameras using PictBridge. With an optional Bluetooth adapter, images can be sent wirelessly to the machine.

7-in-1 memory card reader

Compact Flash Type I and II; xD-Picture Card; MultiMedia Card; Memory Stick; Secure Digital; Smart Media.

With the LCD panel, the user can preview and select single or multiple images for viewing and printing. Other features include cropping a particular portion of an image to be printed and options to adjust the color, clarity and brightness of our photos. Several print layouts can also be chosen via the additional functions menu--including the borderless print setting.

Effect	Settings
Color mode	Normal; black and white; sepia; antique; vivid; red; green; blue; warmer; cooler; less blue; less yellow
Sharpness	Normal; hard; soft
Brightness	Normal; darker; darkest; auto; lightest; lighter
Borderless	On; off
Layout	2-up; 4-up; 30 x 40mm; 1.18 x 1.57-inch; 20 x 30mm; 0.79 x 1.18-inch; 35 x 45mm; 1.38 x x1.77-inch; 50 x 70mm; 1.97 x 2.76-inch; Off
Print all	No; yes
Language	17 languages

Performance
Installation of the printer driver on our test computer--HP Pavilion t488d--took 3 minutes. The setup of the unit was completed within three steps--by plugging in the power cord; inserting the color cartridge and sliding in the cassette tray--and the printer was ready to go. Note that there has to be approximately 200mm of space behind the unit as the machine employs a see-saw motion printing sequence, which will see the photo paper sliding out the rear and being re-fed back into the slot three times.

The SPP-2040 took a staggering 13 seconds to boot up and another 2 seconds to shut down in between print jobs. Generally, it took a longer time to read images which were larger in terms of size and resolution. As a gauge, a 2,250 x 1,766-pixel photo with 11MB size took the unit approximately 30 seconds to read directly from a Secure Digital (SD) card.

We used a variety of media including an SD card, Bluetooth and direct printing from a Panasonic camera and did not encounter any problems. The timings for the various outputs are summarized in the table below.

Print mode	Time taken (4 x 6-inch; 1,600 x 1,200 pixels)
SD card	1 min 03 seconds
PictBridge	1 min 05 seconds
Bluetooth (with optional adapter)	1 min 25 seconds

Image Quality
The print quality, which varies according to the size and resolution of the images, was rather satisfactory. Printouts were consistent due to the dye diffusion thermal transfer technology. Generally, the printer detected colors correctly though the printouts tended not to be very vibrant.

The help instructions that come in 17 different languages were minimal. We had to take into account the cropping of the sides of the images when printing borderless photos resulting from the different aspect ratios of the images not matching the paper size.

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