Rihac CISS Review

Performance
To test the Rihac ink against the genuine Canon option, an image was printed on glossy Kodak photographic paper before and after installation. The same piece of paper was used for both to keep the test fair. The print heads were aligned and cleaned before both prints. The result is as follows:

Unfortunately it's difficult to distinguish the quality difference since the camera shot doesn't do either justice. After inspecting the photo, I've come to the following conclusions:

1. Bleeding is not evident in either image. I cannot differentiate between each photo in this respect.
2. Reds are rich in both photos, and again, I struggle to see a difference
3. Blues on the other hand, are more prominent on the Rihac image. The image has a distinct cool colour reproduction, whilst the Canon is warm in nature.
4. Yellow is pretty much identical, although the image doesn't contain large amounts of this colour.
5. Blacks are very strong in both images, no perceivable difference here.

So far the tests show that this system is a capable replacement for the expensive Canon offerings. But before you go out and buy one, lets check how it fairs on Reflex plain white paper.

With both prints set to the default high quality setting, it becomes clear that the Rihac inks aren't particularly appealing on standard white paper. Sharpness appears to be the same as the Canon inks, which suggests that bleeding might not be the fault here. The cooler colour reproduction has caused the darker parts of the image to become too dark. Both images have caused the paper to warp, suggesting too much ink has been applied to the paper. This is common for inkjet printers, however the Rihac ink (by nature of being dye based) penetrates the paper further, making it warp slightly more than the genuine ink.

To test the hypothesis that surplus cyan (blue) ink was being output, I compared the 'Print Check Pattern' from the Canon ink with the Rihac ink. The magenta output is almost identical, as with the yellow and blacks. The cyan was not. On the Rihac output, cyan is significantly more profound. This suggests that this is the cause for cooler/darker images. So I tried adjusting the colour settings.

Using the manual 'Color/Intensity' option within the Canon settings, I tinkered with colour saturation. I finally settled with the settings Cyan -15, Magenta 0, Yellow 0, Brightness -10. I found that lowering the brightness reduced unwanted colour infusion and warping. The end result was quite stunning - so much that it actually trumped the genuine ink in areas!

Rihac ink - custom colour settings (advantages):
- Brighter greys
- Less warping (almost insignificant)
- Richer blacks

Canon genuine ink - auto colour settings (advantages):
- Slightly less bleeding
- No need for custom colour configuration
- Overall looks closer to the colours displayed on my LCD monitor, but only by a tiny margin

Note: The LCD monitor in question uses a standard TN panel. It may not represent accurate colour reproduction. For this review, we assume that the LCD is displaying the desired photographic output.

Text documents were quickly compared to check for fuzziness. The Rihac ink isn't as sharp in this case, with slightly rougher edges around printed characters. Again, this is an effect of the dye bleeding into the page. From reading distance, the difference is not really noticeable.

In the end, both inks are very close in quality. But which can last the test of time? I placed a large drop of water on the corner of each of the paper prints to see which is most affected by water. To my surprise, the Canon ink distorted significantly, while the dye based Rihac ink managed to maintain its colour with minimal colour infusion/bleeding.

Rihac ink:

Canon ink:

The images are self explanatory. Water damages both images, yet the Rihac appears to fair better. It's an interesting result considering pigment based inks are known for their stronger water resistance.

The last performance test is UV based. The photo paper prints were placed under direct sunlight for several hours on bright sunny days. Dye based ink should degrade long before the pigment does. After a week of testing, there was no distinguishable difference in either print. If the tests were extended to 12 months, the results would almost certainly differ. Nonetheless, waiting 12 months before publishing a review isn't exactly feasible.

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