When I got my 9900 a couple of weeks ago, I took one of my way-out slammed color images and printed it on each printer.
The image was really optimized for my 9800 with Bill Atkinson profile and is my master from the file. I ran the image on my 7600 using another custom profile from Atkinson on Somerset Velvet. The print on the 9900 was done using the canned profile.
The print is good from the 7600 though not as brilliant as the 9800 print. The 9900 print lost detail in some of the reds when it went to over saturday. I haven't reprinted that image on the 9900 with my custom-created profile using my Colormunki, and I think that's a good idea for me to do.
All in all, the image looks great to me and each printer is close enough that I wouldn't reject any. There isn't a clear stand-out that scream one printer is better than the other since each printer I'm using is simply a better iteration of the former and even going from the 7600 to the 9900 with my image and two different papers, it wasn't dramatically different. Sure, there are visible differences, but the general public viewing would have a hard time in quantifying the differences.
The image is a color-slammed image where I've pushed the siiders in ACR to the pegs. It's full of super saturated primary colors like the days of posterization but with lots of detail. It's in Adobe RGB 1998, so the gamut is limited, but since I do a lot of work in print media, this works well for my workflow.
I'll run a new print today using my custom profile and see how it compares to the other images.
For b&w, I wouldn't really expect a drastic difference since beyond the 7600, my two other printers run three blacks. However, I tone my images toward tones reminiscent of my favorite Agfa Portriga-Rapid selenium toned prints, a tad of brown-purple in the tones. I think it may not be a bad idea to give my 9800 and 9900 the same b&w image to see what I think between the two. My hypothesis is that there will be subtle differences, but both will be similar enough to make the grade.
I can tell you, though, that when I purchased the 9800 several years ago, it had Mk installed and I normally use coated stock, simply ran Premium Luster with that ink.
The prints had a look all their own, a lot like a spot matt varnish on a tri-tone printed litho, what many would call gloss differential on steroids. Useable and a unique look on my test prints.
