There are only a handful of digital inkjet printers that cost less than $1,000 and will give you a print life of 60 to 100 years. An analog (traditional, wet darkroom) print will last from 20 to 60 years so prints from the best archival printers will outlast a traditional photographic prints.

Two of the medium-large format (13×19 inch paper) archival printers are made by Epson, the recently announced R1800 (see this post) and the Epson 2200 which I have been using for about 2 1/2 years. The R1800 may be meant as a replacement for the 2200, but Epson isn’t saying yet. In the mean time, the Epson 2200 is used by thousands of professionals, semi-pros, and serious amateurs to print and market their own photos. As prices continue to drop (a sign that it will be discontinued?), the Epson 2200 continues to be a very attractive proposition for photographers who want to print their own work.

I just posted a revised and expanded article on Epson 2200 ink usage.

So how much does a print cost? The bottom line is that ink for a photographic print costs less than 1.4 cents per square inch. A 7×10 inch print on letter size (8.5×11) Epson Premium Luster photographic paper (one of my favorites) will cost about 98 cents for the ink and another 59 cents for the paper for a total of $1.57 per print (USD, not counting tax).

My initial review of the Epson 2200 is here. Links on the bottom of the review page will take you to a sale on the Epson 2200 for less than $620 with free shipping (as of March 24). Or you can just go here.