Printer Shopping?

[Steve Rotset]

Im looking for a good printer for us at home. Not looking for anything to specific just a all around good printer that wont really break the bank. Ive been looking at an Epson r1800 and 1900 and have seen lots of good reviews. Just curious to hear other peoples comments on printers before i actually make a purchase.

[Songman45]

Originally Posted by Steve Rotset

Im looking for a good printer for us at home. Not looking for anything to specific just a all around good printer that wont really break the bank. Ive been looking at an Epson r1800 and 1900 and have seen lots of good reviews. Just curious to hear other peoples comments on printers before i actually make a purchase.

The R1800 is a wide body printer and has been discontinued for quite some time. The R1900 is its nearest replacement. The R1800 is a fine printer and its fairly durable. We hauled two around in a trailer based operation for a couple of years. They do have a built in life expectancy, you'll even get a notice in its software that it has reached the end of its service life and it will die.

The R1900 uses a different ink set with fewer and slightly smaller ink tanks. I worked for almost a month with one in a similar trailer opeation with no issues. The printer runs slightly faster than the R1800 and the prints were suitable for on-site action sports customers. I cannot say it would make gallery prints as we did not do any printing that was that crucial.

If I were about to buy a printer I'd get a R1900.

Steve

[iconoclast]

Steve,

You didn't mention what your budget actually is; 'the bank' is vastly different for some people.

Also do you need/want medium sized printing ability? Roll paper? Do you care about dye ink vs pigment? Do you want to do any archival printing? Will you be only doing color or perhaps lots of B&W? Are you just going to use it to printer off some 4x6 snap shots for the photo album, text and the occasion googlemap?

The R1400 can be had cheaply brand new. The R1900 can be had refurb from Epson for not too much (in my opinion). However the initial cost of a printer is usually the cheap part, remember the ink and paper! To get proper colors you're supposed to use epson ink with epson paper (or other papers that have been profiled with your specific printer).

This business about the built in life expectancy is a little overblown. It's true that such a message may be displayed by the R1800, but its the printers way of saying it needs some servicing, specifically that the ink pads are full (and this may or may not be actually true). The cool thing about printers that have been around for a while is that people know them inside out, there's lots of knoweldge out there. There are plenty of instructions on how to mod the R1800 waste ink pads to drain into a reservoir. There is a utility that allows you to reset the R1800 when you get this warning. More details can be found in this link and at youtube.com/watch?v=FwylF5dHgY4

If you're thinking about getting a used printer there are quite a few good ones to be had, like the R1800, I've seen them anywhere from 80$-200$.
I recently bought a malfunctionning Epson 2200 for 30$, a bit old but the prints that it does are as good as when it was released.
The printer's timing strip was dirty and I had to clean it. Once I figured out the problem it was easy. I got lots of help here.
I also had to do some printer head cleaning, which is something everyone does over time. a 10$ bottle of printer head cleaning fluid works wonders; or many people just use a little windex.
I was also able to score lots of cheap Epson ink because people are trying to sell their old setups.

Before you make a decision you should determine what exactly your budget is and what do you want to do with your printer.

Songman45,

Hello! If you're all done with your R1800s I'd be happy to give them a new home

[Brenda Read]

I love my Canon Pro 9000

Here's my review of the Canon Pro 9000 $100 rebate Available until Sept. 30th.

[JDArt]

Originally Posted by Steve Rotset

Im looking for a good printer for us at home. Not looking for anything to specific just a all around good printer that wont really break the bank. Ive been looking at an Epson r1800 and 1900 and have seen lots of good reviews. Just curious to hear other peoples comments on printers before i actually make a purchase.

Key question is how much will you be using it? If you're a photo-aholic, you have to consider not just the cost of the printer but also the ink costs. Printers with a steeper price tag and larger ink tanks may cost more up front, but over time they'll save you money.

[stratcat55]

I replaced an Epson 2400 with a 3800 refurb unit for $800. It's a much more economical printer. The 2400's small ink cartridges were killing me. When I'm selling prints to my clients, it was okay, but to do my personal stuff for exhibition the 2400 was starting to break the bank. Also, I found the 3800 prints to be a bit better than my 2400. The larger print size is a plus too.