Need printer recommendation - leaving Epson

[JM]

I have loved/hated Epson printers for years for at-home photo printing. I
have gotten results on good paper that rival the best lab prints. So good,
in fact, that I've lived with clogging heads far longer than I should.

But I'm tired of it. I'm sick of running cleaning cycles and wasting
perfectly good ink. It's especially bothersome when you have to clean all
the heads when only one head is clogged. And now I read that Epson has been
found guilty of defrauding their customers with inaccurate ink level
readings.

So . . . what +/- $100 inkjet can I go to? I've seen excellent results for
a couple of Canon Pixma printers, one of which was very cheap (can't
remember the exact price).

But I'm open to suggestions. I would love nothing more than to equal the
quality of my Epson R300 (and before that a 820 and 785EPX), while finding a
printer that doesn't clog as much.

Thank you,

JM

 

[Clark W. Griswold, Jr.]

I have loved/hated Epson printers for years for at-home photo printing. I
have gotten results on good paper that rival the best lab prints. So good,
in fact, that I've lived with clogging heads far longer than I should.

But I'm tired of it. I'm sick of running cleaning cycles and wasting
perfectly good ink. It's especially bothersome when you have to clean all
the heads when only one head is clogged. And now I read that Epson has been
found guilty of defrauding their customers with inaccurate ink level
readings.

So . . . what +/- $100 inkjet can I go to? I've seen excellent results for
a couple of Canon Pixma printers, one of which was very cheap (can't
remember the exact price).

Same here. Have replaced a couple of CX5400s, a CX4600 and an older 777i, all
due to head clogs.

My latest replacement printer is a Canon Pixma MP500, which I'm very pleased
with (so far). Although it uses headless ink tanks, the printhead is easily
replaceable, should it be necessary. (Now, if Canon prices the head at the same
cost as a new printer, I'll be really pissed.)

 

[bmoag]

Been there, done that, back to Epson.
The only Canons that for me are worth considering, in that they give results
comparable to Epsons, are the top of the line, and then only if you are
able to generate custom paper printer profiles as Canon provides profiles
only for their pitiful two paper surfaces, and the Canon profiles are not
all that wonderful: kind of dark and lacking clarity.
Also the medium and low end Pixmas are not one whit different than the prior
generation of printers except for a new box. That does not mean they are
necessarily horrible, they are just not what they are marketed as.

 

[Ed Light]

Just recycled my Epson and got an HP Deskjet 5940. Like it alot. Has some
drawbacks. Ink peace of mind so far. Nozzles are in the cartridges. You can
run with just a black cartridge. You can refill the carts
(maxpatchink.com) -- but you musn't run them dry if you do, as it wrecks the
heads and that cart is toast. Prints like the Epson. Colors aren't
waterproof. Purple printed red -- but maybe with a photo cart (extra) and
after running the calibration it wouldn't. I'm satisfied without the photo
cart. You can get big economy size carts. The $30 black is rated for 800
pages. Don't know yet if it does that. Bottom margin for docs is a huge .6".
I love it. It doesn't blow it's nose of pages of ink like the Epson bummer.

Wouldn't recommend cheaper HP's as they only take little carts and may
require manual alignment on changing carts.

Just my experience with it so far.

PS If you refill you lose the ink level display but you can use this:

http://www.pokluda.cz/support/inkmonitor.aspx

Also it doesn't have a utility like Epson's Web to Page, but you can fix
that by priting in Firefox and using preview and tweaking the settings.
However, I bought PrintPunk and use it. Just a right-click on the page to
print.

It just sits there and doesn't clog. But I print all colors once a week to
be safe.
--
Ed Light

Smiley :-/
MS Smiley :-\

Send spam to the FTC at
(e-mail address removed)
Thanks, robots.

Bring the Troops Home:
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http://bluesecurity.com

 

[Bob Headrick]

And now I read that Epson has been found guilty of
defrauding their customers with inaccurate ink level
readings.

You need to carefully check your sources. The above statement is not
correct; there was no trial and no one was found guilty of anything.
Epson chose to settle out of court.

- Bob Headrick, MS MVP Printing/Imaging

 

[Ed Light]

And now I read that Epson has been found guilty of
They may not want to admit that if you were able to run a cart dry the
printhead would burn up. But maybe they were leaving an awful lot of ink in
there. I don't know the details.

--
Ed Light

Smiley :-/
MS Smiley :-\

Send spam to the FTC at
(e-mail address removed)
Thanks, robots.

Bring the Troops Home:
http://bringthemhomenow.org

Fight Spam:
http://bluesecurity.com

 

[measekite]

I have loved/hated Epson printers for years for at-home photo printing. I
have gotten results on good paper that rival the best lab prints. So good,
in fact, that I've lived with clogging heads far longer than I should.

But I'm tired of it. I'm sick of running cleaning cycles and wasting
perfectly good ink. It's especially bothersome when you have to clean all
the heads when only one head is clogged. And now I read that Epson has been
found guilty of defrauding their customers with inaccurate ink level
readings.

So . . . what +/- $100 inkjet can I go to? I've seen excellent results for
a couple of Canon Pixma printers, one of which was very cheap (can't
remember the exact price).

canon ip4200 is good and the canon ip5200 is good and much faster for
photos. be sure to use canon oem ink so you do not have problems like
you have with epson. the canons are somewhat superior to the epson r300
according to tests.

 

[Arthur Entlich]

This is true. Epson decided to accept a settlement offer and pay out
millions of dollars rather than go to trial. However, so did the
lawyers representing the class members, so we won't ever know who might
have been guilty of what. It is a pity. It would have been nice to know.

I suspect documentation and records of the Epson development process
would have made for absolutely fascinating reading.

Art