Canon Pixma G3260 Review: Is This Printer Really Worth The Money?

3
1330
Canon Pixma G3260

Credit: RTINGS.com

Verdict

The Canon Pixma G3260 is an excellent family printer. It has a high-resolution flatbed scanner with color depth, which is ideal for scanning images. While the photo printing quality and color accuracy are just acceptable, they should serve for casual photo printing and hobbies. Both black and color papers have a very low cost-per-print. It has Wi-Fi printing and a mobile app, but it can’t print straight from a USB flash drive or SD card, unfortunately.

Amazon Logo

Pros

  • Running costs are extremely low
  • Excellent print quality, especially for drawings and photographs
  • Lightweight and compact
  • Instagram’s 5-by-5-inch photo size is supported
  • The ink capacity of up to 7,000 pages

Cons

  • There are few options for mobile connectivity
  • There is no support for flash memory devices
  • There is no automated document feeder
  • It does not support faxing

The Canon Pixma G3260 Wireless MegaTank All-in-One Printer is a low-volume all-in-one printer designed for small businesses or home offices. The G3200, like the Pixma G1200, is one of Canon’s MegaTank G-Series printers, which are meant to compete directly with Epson’s EcoTank and Brother’s INKvestment printers, such as the Epson Expression ET-2550 EcoTank All-in-One Printer and the Brother MFC-J985DW XL, respectively.

The G3260, like the G1200, prints remarkably effectively, particularly photos, and its operating expenses are quite low. It lacks an automated document feeder for transferring multipage originals to the scanner, which should be standard on any $300 inkjet AIO. That, along with a few lacking mobile connectivity features and the lack of fax capabilities, keeps it from displacing the Brother model as Editors’ Choice for an inkjet AIO for usage in a small, home, or micro office, Also, you can see the best sublimation printers

The G3260, like the G1200, prints remarkably effectively, particularly photos, and its operating expenses are quite low. It lacks an automated document feeder for transferring multipage originals to the scanner, which should be standard on any $300 inkjet AIO. Additionally, the wireless setup process could be improved to provide a smoother user experience. These limitations, along with a few lacking mobile connectivity features and the lack of fax capabilities, keeps it from displacing the Brother model as Editors’ Choice for an inkjet AIO for usage in a small, home, or micro office. Also, you can see the best sublimation printers

Canon Pixma G3260 Review

  1. Specifications of Canon Pixma G3260
  2. Design and Features
  3. Setup and Software
  4. Print Quality
  5. Print Speed
  6. Printing Cost
  7. Conclusion

 

Canon Pixma G3260

Credit: Amazon

 

Specifications of Canon Pixma G3260

Dimensions

‎17.6”(W) x 13.0”(D) x 6.6”(H)
FunctionsPrint, Copy, Scan
ISO Print Speed

Black: Approx. 10.0 ipm,

Color: Approx. 6.0 ipm

Paper Capacity100 Sheets of Plain Paper
Auto Document FeederNo
Mobile Device PrintingYes
Weight‎10.6 pounds

You can check out for a detailed review of the Canon Pixma G3260 Wireless MegaTank All-in-One Printer.

Design and Features

 

Design and Features of Canon Pixma G3260

Credit: Canon

G-series printers, like Epson’s EcoTank all-in-one printers, use bottles of ink to fill reservoirs that contain enough ink to print thousands of pages instead of ink cartridges. The tanks on G-series printers, however, are built into the front of an entirely new chassis design, rather than being added to the double side of an existing design, as they are on rival EcoTank printers. The left side has a huge black ink reservoir, while the right side has the other three containers (cyan, magenta, and yellow). Even though both the EcoTank and MegaTank techniques function effectively, the front-facing built-in reservoirs provide the G-Series machines a more attractive appearance and make checking ink levels easier. In any instance, the only method to tell how much ink is left is to look at the machines themselves. However, the G-Series machines will alert you when one or more inks are critically low.

Design and Features of Canon Pixma G3260

Credit: Amazon

The G3260 is small and has light dimensions 6.5 by 17.6 by 13 inches (HWD) with its trays closed and weight 12.7 pounds. It’s around the same size as the Epson ET-2550 and the Brother MFC-J985DW, with the former being a few pounds heavier and the latter being about 6 pounds lighter. Each of the three types is small enough to fit on a typical desktop. Unlike the standalone Pixma G1200, which only has USB connectivity, the G3200 has Wi-Fi and USB connections, as well as a few mobile and cloud connectivity options via Canon’s Pixma Print and Pixma Cloud Link applications for iOS and Android. However, Wi-Fi Direct and near-field communication are not available. Both the Brother and Epson versions featured here include Wi-Fi Direct; the MFC-J985DW also has NFC and Ethernet, making it more suitable for offices with wired networks.

Access “The Complete Guide to Canon G3260 Wireless Setup” here for a step-by-step walkthrough on setting up wireless connectivity for your Canon G3260 printer.

 

Design and Features of Canon Pixma G3260

Credit: Canon

The G3260’s only paper source is a tray that rises upward from the rear of the machine and stores 100 sheets, similar to the Pixma G1200 and other G-series devices; the output tray pulls out from the front. The footprint is somewhat bigger with both trays extended, but not enough to be noticeable on most PCs. Because the G3200 lacks an automatic document feeder (ADF), you’ll have to scan multipage documents one at a time. You’ll need to upgrade to the G4200 to receive an ADF from a MegaTank model. Canon also does not provide a maximum monthly duty cycle or a suggested monthly page volume for the G3200, as it does for the G1200. The control panel is sparse, with only five buttons—Power, WPS, Stop, Black, and Color—and four status LEDs: On, Wi-Fi, Alarm, and Ink—in comparison to what you’ll find on numerous rival models. Furthermore, flash memory devices are not supported. It’s also worth noting that Instagram’s 5-by-5-inch photo format is supported by all G-series printers.

 

Setup and Software

 

Setup and Software of Canon Pixma G3260

Credit: Sylvia Juncosa

Although the setup was a little different from other inkjet printers, it was simple and quick. In addition to filling the ink reservoirs from bottles, G-series printers, like comparable Epson EcoTank printers, need the installation of two print heads. One print head is in charge of the black ink, while the other is in charge of the other three colours. We observed on the Pixma G1200 that they reminded us of some entry-level Pixmas from a few years ago that came with only two ink cartridges. In any case, dumping the ink into the containers was the most time-consuming part of the installation process. In addition, whereas Canon’s ink bottles need squeezing to deposit ink into reservoirs, Epson’s EcoTank bottles freely flow ink, making the MegaTank bottles less messy.

 

The software bundle also includes two more programmes in addition to the drivers. From My Picture Garden, you may apply special effects filters, image correction and enhancement, regulate scanning, and access Canon’s Full HD Movie Print, an application for printing frames from video shot with Canon digital cameras. Quick Menu is an always-on tool that appears in your PC’s system tray and gives you quick access to My Image Garden features as well as a few additional choices, such as buying ink and Canon photo paper. This may not appear to be much of a software package, but My Image Garden, as basic as it is, has the majority of the tools you’ll need to scan and deal with images. The Brother MFC-J985DW is a business-oriented printer that includes document management and optical character recognition software. However, the Brother model incorporates an ADF, which makes OCR and scanned document handling easier.

 

 

Print Quality of Canon Pixma G3260

Credit: Sylvia Juncosa

The G3260’s print quality, like the G1200’s, is one of its best features. Text was clear and readable as tiny as I could see without magnification during testing, and even some of the colourful typefaces we tested were legible at point sizes lower than expected. Even with dark gradients and backdrops that numerous other printers had difficulties replicating without defects, our test Excel charts and graphs, as well as our PowerPoint slide presentations, reproduced without obvious banding or streaking.

 

Apart from the Pixma G1200, the other printers described thus far were tested with different documents and hardware, making a comparison to the G3200’s performance impossible. When compared to another fairly equivalent all-in-one printer, the Epson Expression ET-3600 EcoTank All-in-One Supertank Printer, the G-Series models’ print rates are disappointing at best, with results of 12.9ppm for monochrome pages and 6.2ppm for more complicated documents.

 

Canon rates the G3260 at 8.8 ppm for monochrome pages and 5 ppm for color pages, similar to the G1200 and other G-Series machines. I ran the test on our normal Core i5 testbed PC, which was running Windows 10 through USB. The G3200 churned out 7.1ppm when printing our minimally prepared Microsoft Word text page, one of the worst rates we’ve seen from any printer recently and roughly identical to the G1200. When I added our graphics- and photo-heavy Acrobat, Excel, and PowerPoint documents to the mix, printing speed dropped by more than half, to 3ppm. 3ppm is the slowest we’ve seen with our current benchmarking approach, aside from the G1200’s 2.9ppm.

 

 

Apart from the Pixma G1200, the other printers described thereby far were tested with different documents and hardware, making a comparison to the G3200’s performance impossible. When compared to another fairly equivalent all-in-one printer, the Epson Expression ET-3600 EcoTank All-in-One Supertank Printer, the G-Series models’ print rates are disappointing at best, with results of 12.9ppm for monochrome pages and 6.2ppm for more complicated documents.

 

Printing Cost

Canon’s G-series printers, like Epson’s EcoTank printers, have extremely low operating costs. In comparison to conventional ink cartridges, the ink bottles themselves are affordable, with per-page ink prices of less than one cent for both monochrome and color pages for both EcoTank and MegaTank brands. The black ink bottle contains 135 mL and is enough for 6,000 points, while the three color bottles each contain 70 mL and are good for 7,000 pages. We computed the G3200’s cost per page at 0.3 cents for monochrome pages and 0.8 cents for color pages using Canon’s claimed bottle pricing and these estimated page yields.

 

These numbers are roughly equal to those of the Epson ET-3600 and ET-2550, and far less expensive than the Brother MFC-1-cent J985DW’s monochrome and 4.9-cent color cost per page. Pages for less than a penny, especially color pages, are hard to beat. However, keep in mind that these figures apply to normal document pages with a low percentage of ink coverage. Photos will cost much more than non-MegaTank (or non-EcoTank) models, but will still be significantly cheaper than non-MegaTank (or non-EcoTank) models.

 

Conclusion

The Canon Pixma G3260 Wireless MegaTank All-in-One Printer is slow and lacking in functionality when compared to some of its competitors. Any $300 inkjet all-in-one printer that lacks an ADF, for example, is effectively disqualified as an Editors’ Choice. However, Epson’s ET-3600 costs $100 more and lacks an automatic document feeder. The Brother MFC-J985DW, on the other hand, has an ADF and fax functionality, as well as Ethernet connectivity and a more comprehensive software package, but its photographs and graphics aren’t as outstanding as the G3200’s. This Pixma also lacks several mobile connectivity capabilities as compared to comparable models, but Canon’s mobile applications will simply scan to and print from phones and tablets. Most customers’ criterion lists, however, include print quality and operating costs, and the G3200 excels in both. As a result, it’s a fantastic fit for small and home-based offices with low-volume print and copy needs but high-quality output, particularly print photos.

Reviews
  • Canon Pixma G3260
4.3

Summary

In general, the Canon PIXMA G3260 is a wireless family printer with a lot of flexibility. It simplifies everyday printing with its multifunction features and capable specifications. This tool is perfect for students, parents, and individuals who work from home.

Sending
User Review
5 (1 vote)

3 COMMENTS

  1. I hope the G3260 actually does fix the G3200’s unforgiveable weakness, which was the waste ink counter that forced an unrecoverable error code. Customers should be warned that head priming and cleaning waste a lot of ink, reducing the attractiveness of the megatank feature, and that these printers clog very easily.

    At least the G3200 instruction manual shows an easy-to-remove waste ink sponge and claims that simply replacing it will put the unit back into operation, instead of in the e-waste bin.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.