howardm :
For Ilford Smooth Pearl, Relative is recommended, but I've tried also Perceptual, which is indeed worse, i.e. lacks contrast. Color wise, though, it's about the same.
k bennet :
Yes, I was (naively ?) expecting the profiles to eat a big part of the paper color. What you're saying is that my expectation was unreasonable, wasn't it ? Fine. I'm ready to live with that ;-) as it would at least mean there's nothing wrong with my setup, and that I just have to learn to live with the nuances (and pick warm papers, as I seem to dislike blue-ish papers)