Kodak EasyShare Printer and Dock G600 

Unlike the other recent mini printers that I have reviewed from Canon, Epson and HP this can only print direct from the camera, the PC or via Pict Bridge, so no card slots.

It is 20x18x10cm without the paper tray inserted this adds another 15cm to the 18cm depth. You will also need around 12cm clear at the rear when printing as the 15x10cm sheets are pulled from the tray and then out of the rear to prepare for the four pass Dye Sub printing. The unit weights just under two kilos.

Admittedly this unit was new but it was rather difficult to get the cover of the paper tray to open but once filled a few times this became easer - or perhaps I knew exactly where -and how hard- to pull - it. The right side is where you insert the Dye Sub cartridge, it comes - as with the Canon - with only a five sheet cartridge and five 15x10cm sheets of photo paper. Unlike the Canon these are exactly 15x10cm and have no selvedge. They are also somewhat thinner and do tend to curl a little once printed.

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The left side has a Pict Bridge slot so you should be able to print from your camera if it supports Pict Bridge. The rear is where the optional battery pack is inserted and where the USB lead - from a PC - connects. It also has the power brick input.

With your Kodak camera such as the recently reviewed P712 and Z710 you get a plastic sleeve that fits over the docking point on the G600 do not throw this away if there is any likelihood of you buying this unit, all the sleeves differ between cameras and you will not be able to use the dock unless you have it.

Place your sleeve onto the top of the dock in the marked position and whatever recent Kodak camera you have will now be able to transfer/charge/print using the dock. The G600 has no display so all selections are done on the camera.

There are basic controls on the G600. At the back right the on/off button. Then a line of four along the front with three LED's just behind but in front of the camera. The three LED's tell you when you need a new print cartridge, more paper and if charging is taking place.

The four buttons are Transfer of images to the PC, Print layout one, two, four or nine images per sheet the default is one, Red Eye reduction and finally the print button.

Just in front of the buttons is a pull out handle to enable easy movement of the printer.

This unit - to me - only just qualifies as a mainstream mini printer as it is so orientated to printing images from Kodak cameras. The saving grace is the much maligned Pict Bridge socket. So if your camera of whatever make supports Pict Bridge then you could use it.

The supplied software is good and you can use it to manipulate the image on the PC however this is outside the scope of this review as if you need to be tethered to a PC then you may as well use an A4 printer that supports A5 (15x10cm) printing.

I was happy with the quality of the images it printed but not so happy with the curling that the rather thin paper tended to do. Dye Sub does have the advantage of being immediately dry and some images printed using conventional inks are not.

Doing my Internet searches could not find this new product on sale anywhere but direct from Kodak at £129 including free delivery.

http://www.kodak.com/eknec/PageQuerier.jhtml?pq-path=9387&pq-locale=en_GB&_requestid=1698