Customer Reviews
Black ink bleeding into Yellow ink tank 
2008-02-11
I have owned this printer for a few years now and cannot even imagine the number of photos I've printed with it. It's been an absolutely fabulous printer and I cannot say enough good things about it ... until yesterday. All color prints started printing very dark. A print head cleaning (via software) did nothing to fix the problem, nor did the print head deep cleaning. I searched Canon's KnowledgeBase - nothing. Did a few Google searched and found this is a common problem due to the blank ink 'back washing' into the Yellow tank. Sure enough, that was my problem -- when I pulled the recently replaced Yellow tank, the ink still in the tank was black. The article I read suggested using a paper towel to try to blot up the black ink that was in the 'sponge' thing in the printer under where the print head parks - it was full of black ink. I replaced the Yellow tank, and I was back in business. Hopefully, this isn't going to reococcur again or else I'll have to look for a different printer. Canon's Customer Service (via email) wasn't very helpful and suggested using only Canon tanks (which I have!) and Canon paper (that, too), and taking to the nearest Canon Authorized Service Facility for servicing or ordering a print head replacement. Since both of these options are likely going to be expensive and I've had the printer for a few years, I think I'll limp through this and replace the printer with a new one if it happens again.
This does seem to be a pretty common problem, although Canon did not admit that in their email response. I would not let this deter me from purchasing another Canon photo printer since I've love this one so much.
i 950 Not a good printer 
2007-09-28
I have also purchased a new print head after the dreaded 7 flashes.
Nothing works. This printer was well taken care of and not used that often. Canon rushed these printers into production with very little if any field testing and reliability testing.
Do NOT buy this printer. YOU WILL be sorry.
CRAAAAAAAAAP 2007-08-28
I'm so dissapointed with this piece of junk I don't even know where to begin. It used to print VERY decent pictures (when I bought it) but after a while color was fading. For a while now the color is way off...and finalyyyy 5 min. ago when I tried to turn it on to print something it wouldn't turn on. SO FRUSTRATING!!! P.S. just WASTED over $50 on cartridge too a week ago!!!! now when I have to throw it away
Piece of junk... 2007-05-29
I received this printer as a Christmas gift a couple of years ago. As a result, I will never buy a Canon printer. The ink is extremely expensive. The pictures faded over time (yes, I printed on photo paper). And now to top it off, the printer head is going bad with minimal use over the years. I have nothing positive to say about this printer.
i950 4 years of fantasic photos 
2007-01-31
This printer nearly equals even the most recent PIXMA printers iP6700.
Silent, fast and color accurate, PERIOD! Extremly satisfied!
The only suggestion for those using this printer is to print in bulk. After 4 years the waste ink tray filled up and was pooling on the print head. The ink was leaching back into the yellow tank(became almost black). In fact all colors were affected, but yellow was the easiest to identify. The reds printed out black, colors were simply horrible for the first 4-6 prints, the longer the printer wasn't used the more prints had to printed to clean the head.
The waste tank is where all the ink goes when you decide to clean the print head. It is also where all the ink goes whenever you turn on the printer or print the first print. A small amount of Ink is used from EACH tank whenever you turn on the printer or print the first print! Remember this tidbit when you want to buy that neat 8tank printer.. Eventually there is no place for the wasted ink to go. After 4 years I had about 9ink tanks worth of ink in the waste tray!! No wonder it seemed like it ate ink. ONLY PRINT IN BULK. Just turning on your printer to print one photo wastes as much ink as printing a whole 8X10. Borderless prints also waste ink. Ever stop to think how they do that? The ink oversprays the paper and goes to the waste tray. It helps to print a bordered print if you are just testing a print.
Canon service is useless. They claimed they never heard of such a problem. Many hours searching the net proved otherwise. This is very common!
Great - Solid photo printer 2007-01-18
The Canon i950 Photo Printer delivers both incredible speed and superbly detailed images. Its print head features 3, 072 precisely machined nozzles ejecting consistent prescribed-volume droplets in a microscopic 2-picoliter droplet size perfect for ultra-fine, ultra-fast printing. Canon advanced MicroFine Droplet Technology is remarkably accurate, and you'll see it in your photo results. The i950 Photo Printer achieves an outstanding resolution of up to 4800 x 1200 dpi with up to 49 gradation levels for breath-taking detail and color fidelity. Technological innovation and cutting-edge design make the i950 Photo Printer the "sophisticated" photo printer choice for the photographer in everyone.The i950 Photo Printer enables you to print true borderless photos, with the look and feel of a traditional photograph. Now you can produce 4" x 6", 5" x 7" or 8.5" x 11" borderless prints with stunning color accuracy and fine edge-to-edge detail. How fast? In just about 37 seconds you'll have a spectacular 4" x 6" borderless print.The i950 Photo Printer features the Canon Think Tank System with its six individual ink tanks coupled with an intelligent ink management system. Replace only the color that runs out rather than the entire cartridge - a real advantage when printing high-intensity color photos.The i950 Photo Printer supports the worldwide standard Exif 2.2 (Exchangeable Image Format File), so that when an Exif-compliant camera captures a photo, important camera settings and shooting conditions are saved in the JPEG image file. Canon exclusive Easy-PhotoPrint software (Windows only) analyzes the recorded data and then automatically adjusts printer driver settings for optimum image processing. The result is exceptional digital photos that can be virtually indistinguishable from traditional film-based photography.
I'm still a Canon fan but... 
2006-12-27
I am concerned that my Canon i950 printer will have to be trashed. I purchased the i950 in July 2003. I was amazed at the beautiful color photo prints, and I would have had nothing negative to say about this printer for 3-1/2 years. I take photos with a Canon G3 camera, always buy Canon photo paper, and always buy Canon ink cartridges. (I even use Canon's Zoombrowser EX, and the very simple to use - Canon Easy Photo Print software.) I was always impressed with my results. And quite frankly, I thought my printed photos looked better than everyone else's that used non-Canon equipment.
Moreover, I understand that moving mechanical parts can require service beyond just turning the printer on and printing. However, I never had to perform any physical cleaning of the print head or any other part of the interior of the printer since I owned the i950 for 3-1/2 years. And that also goes for the Canon BJC-250 printer I used for 6-7 years without fail. Overall, I have been very pleased indeed, with my Canon printers.
However, I was recently printing Christmas cards and the color red was not red, it was printing out yellow. Not very Christmasy! After reading the user's manual, doing the print head cleaning over and over, deep cleaning it too, nothing was improving. Red was still printing yellow. Cleaning with alcohol did not work for me. I tried to align the print head several times too, but I was still missing the C and H colors on the printed test readout. I even tried to overcorrect and under correct on the alignment. Nothing worked. I also noticed that the BJ Status monitor (the one showing the amount of ink left in the 6 cartriges) was not reading the magenta cartridge correctly. I installed a new magenta cartridge and it still showed on the status monitor it was 1/3 full. No!
Now what? Well without spending any hard-earned money getting it serviced and the expert telling me that I may need a new 100 dollar print head, I have determined after reading other Amazon i950 reviews, that I would be beter served to just start shopping for a new printer. I will still look at the latest Canon printers first. Canon has always impressed me.
I used my i950 for 3-1/2 years without any problems. I guess I may have been one of the lucky ones. However, I did expect it to last longer. Woe is me.
Faulty printhead 
2006-12-06
Here is one more negative review to add to the Canon i950 printhead woes. I too bought the i950 a few years ago on amazon and was blown away by the high quality prints of digital photos that came out of this thing. After about 2-3 years of very light use, the printer started acting up. First it was white streaks on the prints, followed by odd color casts on all prints. Finally, it just blinked the "orange light of death" and gave error messages all day long and refused to print; one error message even specifically said to reposition the printhead and if that did not work, then the printhead needed to be replaced.
I was most unhappy to find out that a new printhead costs upwards of $100, and even if you go to eBay, it will cost you about $80 including shipping. Not to mention all the wasted photo paper and TONS of ink cartridges I went through (for cleaning runs and deep cleaning runs) already in the process of trying to diagnose the problems.
I will never buy another Canon photo printer again. Too bad, because the print quality was quite good. But what a cash sink! Such low reliability! My friends use Epson inkjets and have not had similar problems, even when they leave their printers unused for months. HP might be good too, since many of their printers have the printheads built into the actual ink cartridge (but that's another bag of problems in itself).
Buyers beware.. 2006-11-29
Like many of the reviews written, I share the same experiences.. It worked great for the time under waranty and then it stopped working,, Called Canon, charged for the call and then told me it needed repair.. If I wanted, Canon had a customer loyalty program and could get a new printer with a 10% discount. Having done that with a scanner that I purchased at the same time I refused.. Never another Canon product for me..I had both the scanner and printer less than two years, and then both failed.. Canon should be ashamed..
Yes another bad review - product doesn't last 2006-10-28
I'm really disappointed in the Canon i950. Started out great but like others I've learned that the printer head needs to be replaced. The cost of the printer head is not worth it and certainly makes the printer a poor value. I like Canon cameras but definitely not a fan of this printer. Spend your money elsewhere.
