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Post by oldschooldm on Jun 16, 2016 12:46:38 GMT -9
Happy to answer any questions here...
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Post by mproteau (Paper Realms) on Jun 17, 2016 4:29:55 GMT -9
I had gone the route of installing a continuous ink system in my Canon MX870 printer years ago. My experience was very positive, and I produced a LOT of prints. Eventually, things wore out - some of the connection points loosened up, air was getting in the system, print head clogged once... But, I got a couple years of use out of it, and went through a LOT of cheap ink.
With any luck, having a printer designed with the continuous ink system in mind will be even more robust than having someone hack one in!
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Post by vwilliams32407 on Jul 3, 2016 7:33:19 GMT -9
Oldschool, do you have any updates on your new printer. Like it, love it, learning curve, 1st impressions?
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Post by oldschooldm on Jul 3, 2016 21:43:14 GMT -9
Oldschool, do you have any updates on your new printer. Like it, love it, learning curve, 1st impressions? I've printed some documents, playing-card-sized-tokens, Dave buildings, and bravesirkevin's minis/character tents. First, I was happy to have a near-infinite supply of ink to run through various print-settings tests - as the Epson print drivers work differently on my non-Epson papers. Please see this thread over on Fat Dragon for a discussion of that: fatdragongames.proboards.com/thread/3696/unboxing-epson-ecotank-cis-printerSo - for now I use default page settings and tend to print on the "fast" settings to get less ink, especially on glossy papers. More good news: It prints fine on my super-thick Magazine Backing Board (this was key to deciding to completely retire my previous printer). I think I'll look into alternate printer drivers just because I'd like a little more control over things like brightness, contrast, and saturation at print time than comes with the standard driver - but for most purposes, default settings are fine. Super-fine detail (as in bravesirkevin's latest minis) requires a bit of attention when printing on non-epson glossy cardstock - default glossy settings can come out a bit muddy...) BTW, this kind of thing has always been true for any printer I've owned - theres' always certain assumptions in the printer drivers that have side effects depending on the paper and detail/color/darkness of the source material. All in all - I'm very happy so far.
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Post by vwilliams32407 on Jan 21, 2017 6:47:19 GMT -9
So it's been about half a year since you acquired your new printer. What are your thoughts on it now?
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Post by oldschooldm on Jan 21, 2017 23:05:08 GMT -9
So it's been about half a year since you acquired your new printer. What are your thoughts on it now? I like it fine. The print quality for the default windows drivers is Good with Epson paper, Fair-to-Poor on other papers (cheap cardstock, and other off-the-wall things I print on like sticker/label paper and magazine backing board.) What I love about the printer is that I've printed TONS of stuff and not run out of ink yet. WAY cheaper on that score. The latter outweighs the former, and I have access to large format, high quality printer if I need something to look Excellent (like my big backdrops and play mats.) All in all, it's good enough.
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Post by rattokan on Jan 23, 2017 1:29:59 GMT -9
I also got an Ecotank two months ago and I am very satisfied with the result after I had a custom icc profile made for my two favorite cheap cardstock brands
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Post by oldschooldm on Jan 23, 2017 8:03:00 GMT -9
I also got an Ecotank two months ago and I am very satisfied with the result after I had a custom icc profile made for my two favorite cheap cardstock brands Is there any way you could share that with the community?
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Post by vwilliams32407 on Jan 24, 2017 8:31:34 GMT -9
So it's been about half a year since you acquired your new printer. What are your thoughts on it now? I like it fine. The print quality for the default windows drivers is Good with Epson paper, Fair-to-Poor on other papers (cheap cardstock, and other off-the-wall things I print on like sticker/label paper and magazine backing board.) What I love about the printer is that I've printed TONS of stuff and not run out of ink yet. WAY cheaper on that score. The latter outweighs the former, and I have access to large format, high quality printer if I need something to look Excellent (like my big backdrops and play mats.) All in all, it's good enough. Thanks for the update.
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Post by radoslawkamil on Jan 25, 2017 8:11:34 GMT -9
I use ink printer Canon Pixma MG5150 and ink is crazy expensive lol. It use 5 colour cardridges and they cost more than new printer. But it serve my well for 5 years now and no problem. I think with printer you just have to be lucky:)
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Post by mproteau (Paper Realms) on Jan 25, 2017 9:48:21 GMT -9
I've been using this ink with my Canon MX922 printer (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00UWC4PI4). There was one ink cart that wasn't recognized, but it's been OK for me. Inexpensive compared to buying Canon ink from Staples, for example. It's been cheap and convenient enough that I haven't looked for an ink system solution like I've used in the past.
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Post by radoslawkamil on Jan 25, 2017 10:09:16 GMT -9
yes I find some cheap ink for my model too. Some people say it worst quality etc. but it is almost 3x cheaper than oryginals so the hell with it lol. And I am happy with my prints. All my models was print on this Canon. I use this produckts www.expression.pl not sure they avaliable in other country than Poland. But they very cheap compare to oryginals and they bigger so I can print more pages with them. Already print more than 200 pages in colour and I still have ink what was not possible with oryginals. Bad news is Canon printer clean itself every time I turn it on and that procedure use ink so I just dont turn off my printer and have it on stand by.
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Post by jeffgeorge on Mar 7, 2017 14:36:10 GMT -9
Hey, oldschooldm, does that 2550 do duplex printing (printing on both sides of the paper, that is)? From the Epson website, it looks like the 25XX and 26XX models don't do two-sided prints automatically--you'd have to print one side, and then flip the paper by hand to print the other. From what I read, it looks like the 36XX models do do duplex printing...but they cost $100 more. (Admittedly, the 3600 has other added features and improved capacity, but not stuff that matter all that much to me.) Flipping a page by hand to print a single two-sided page is bearable, but lately, I've gotten very into printing and binding books from PDFs. You can, theoretically print a book in two passes--odd pages and then even pages, for example. But that almost always gets screwed up somehow, with the wrong pages being printed back to back, especially if you are not printing every single page in the book. So, duplex printing has become a pretty essential printer feature for me in the past few months.
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Post by oldschooldm on Mar 7, 2017 16:53:42 GMT -9
My printer does NOT do duplex printing.
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Post by jeffgeorge on Mar 8, 2017 14:50:35 GMT -9
Thanks for the info. Something I'll definitely have to consider, if I decide to make a change.
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Post by rattokan on Mar 9, 2017 9:33:37 GMT -9
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Post by rattokan on Mar 15, 2017 10:51:03 GMT -9
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Post by jeffgeorge on Apr 13, 2017 13:42:19 GMT -9
I just had to retire my current (now old) printer, and I've ordered an Epson Eco-Tank 4550. It's currently on sale on Costco's website for $379, with double the normal amount of ink (that's what makes it a "Special Edition" Costco exclusive version). The sale lasts through April 15, if anyone is interested. 1-3 day shipping is free, but NY sales tax brought my total to $420.
I went with the 4550 because I do need auto-duplex printing (printing both sides). The 3600 and the 4550 are basically the same price through Amazon ($399), but the 4550 is an office version with a few more features and slightly better performance. And Costco saved me $20 over Amazon because of the special.
I'll share my unboxing and early printing experience when it gets here.
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Post by oldschooldm on Apr 13, 2017 13:59:03 GMT -9
I went with the 4550 because I do need auto-duplex printing I'm very interested in what you learn from the autoduplexing tests (specifically, alignment.) Good luck!
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Post by jeffgeorge on Apr 13, 2017 15:58:24 GMT -9
I'm very interested in what you learn from the autoduplexing tests (specifically, alignment.) Good luck! My main purpose for printing two-sided is for making physical books from PDFs, so I don't need a tremendously high degree of precision in alignment. Basically, if it's within a couple of millimeters, it's good enough, and that's pretty easy for any printer. Printing double-sided for smaller pieces--say, cards or tokens, or papercraft model parts--is not something I've fiddled with much. I'll do some experiments when I get the printer.
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Post by jeffgeorge on Apr 17, 2017 14:07:53 GMT -9
I literally just set up my Epson Eco-Tank 4550, and I've made a few prints. So far, so good. Just using the basic settings and cheap cardstock, I'm getting better-looking minis than I did with my previous printer, an HP OfficeJet Pro 8600, and I thought those were pretty good. I haven't tried two-sided printing for bookbinding yet--that will have to wait until after my taxes are mailed off!
Watch this space...
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Post by jeffgeorge on Apr 26, 2017 12:44:21 GMT -9
Update, a week later... I took still photos of the unboxing and loading of the ink tanks, though I haven't done anything with them yet. The process was super simple anyway. I was briefly confused during the wifi set-up process, but I backed up and started over, and it worked fine the second time; I never had to connect the printer to a computer with a USB or Ethernet cable to get it working, though the printer does have both available. The entire set up process was less than an hour, from slicing the box open to printing a PDF, and I was stopping to set up still photos along the way, which naturally slowed things down a bit. General impressions after printing several sheets of minis and a few relatively thin books for perfect binding: - Front to back registration in two-sided printing is at least as good as my old HP, at least for books. Still haven't done specific tests for duplex printing for items to be trimmed close, like cards, papercraft parts, or tokens, but my expectation is that the registration will be quite good, assuming the original files are properly registered.
- It's not too fast. This isn't a problem for me, because I am the only user of the printer 99% of the time. My wife and daughter rarely print, and when they do, it's just a page or two, so there is never any queuing of print jobs. Again, I haven't done specific tests to compare actual performance to advertised performance, but my sense is that it's not quite as fast as the HP was, a difference which probably scales as jobs grow in page count.
- It's lightweight, and smaller than expected. Despite what I assume is more complex internal machinery, the printer as a whole is surprisingly light when you pick it up. Its footprint is very similar to the HP--not nearly as big as I anticipated it would be--and it's actually not as tall. I hope that this won't mean that it's not able to stand up to heavy use--it is marketed as suitable for business use, and I do make a lot of prints for one person.
- It's loud. The HP was definitely quieter while printing. This probably connects to the previous point--the HP was, overall, a heavier machine, which probably meant that it had a heavier and more enclosed case that did a better job of holding in its running noise. Once again, this doesn't bother me much, because I'm the only one printing to it most of the time, but in an office situation, it would probably become annoying to the person nearest the printer when everyone else's print jobs run.
- Print quality is excellent on the Staples brand copy paper and 110lb. cardstock that I use for most of my printing. The colors are brighter and truer than I was getting on my HP using third-party inks; I can't say if it's better than the HP did with HP inks, because I stopped using HP inks at least 6 months ago. What the Eco-Tank system lets me do is use name-brand inks, forever, without ever having to worry about the cost. Even if third-party inks are available for the Eco-Tank printers, the name-brand inks are so cheap that the actual saving in using off-brand inks is negligible. That means I can count on my printer to print consistent, high-quality output, and not have to worry about whether I should toss out off-brand cartridges I paid for but am unsatisfied with. As I mentioned previously, I bought mine as the Costco-exclusive "Special Edition," which means it came with a second full set of ink bottles, so I won't be buying ink for a long, long time.
- I haven't actually tried scanning anything yet, but I did make a couple of color photocopies as a test when I first set the machine up, and they came out beautifully--bright, vivid, and crisp--so I anticipate that the scanner will work fine. I've used Epson scanners in the past, and was very happy with them. Also, I haven't tried the fax functionality (we don't have a dedicated fax line, so we send and receive faxes very, very infrequently), but I can't imagine there would be any problems with such a pedestrian feature.
In the past week, I've printed out and finished at least 5 sheets of minis from multiple artists, as well as three small books (24-60 pages) that I perfect bound by hand. Everything has come out beautifully. It does have some shortcomings that don't affect me much, but might be more bothersome to other users, particularly if the printer were being shared by several people in an office setting. If I were doing an Amazon review, I'd give it four stars in general, though for my specific application, it's a five-star product...assuming it stands up to heavy use over the long haul.
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Post by jeffgeorge on Jun 13, 2017 21:48:02 GMT -9
Update, two months later: Not all flowers and chocolates
I've now printed many books for both saddle-stitching and perfect-binding, and they've come out great. Double-sided printing on 20 lb. or 24 lb. paper works very well. I've also printed and assembled dozens of figures and at least a couple of Dave Graffam buildings, again, all of which came out great.
The only thing that's come up that bothers me is that this printer doesn't handle cardstock very well. Amazingly, there are no options for cardstock or other heavyweight paper stock in the paper options in the printer software; I'm printing my book covers, minis, and models on 110 lb. cardstock using the Plain Paper setting. They come out looking great...when they come out. The real problem is that frequently, the paper feeder doesn't pick up cardstock reliably. Most commonly, it struggles to load a sheet of cardstock for several seconds, then gives up, claiming a paper jam, whether the paper is actually jammed or not. Sometimes a cardstock sheet moves halfway through the printer before it gets stuck, needing to be removed from the back of the printer. More often, it never leaves the paper tray, or only comes out a half inch or less, when it gives up. After several repeated attempts, it eventually will load and print the cardstock sheet, but needing several attempts and requiring human intervention with each attempt is really not acceptable.
The main strength of this printer for me--consistent, high-quality color printing at a very low cost per page--is still operative. But the amount of babying it requires in order to print cardstock is inconvenient, annoying, and worrisome for the future. For generic home-office or small business usage, I still give it 4 stars, but for papercrafting, I've got to knock it back from 5 stars to 3+1 stars--3 stars overall, with an asterisked bonus star for the low cost per page. Some aspects of this printer I still really like, but others, I am pretty disappointed with.
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Post by sunraven01 on Jun 15, 2017 4:18:11 GMT -9
My XP-810 could not reliably feed card from the main tray, but happily took it one sheet at the time from the rear feed. Annoying, to say the least!
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Post by jeffgeorge on Jun 15, 2017 6:40:32 GMT -9
OK, this has turned into a pretty expensive lesson. A close read of the technical specifications for the Epson 4550--the model I purchased--reveals that it is rated only for plain or premium paper up to 24lbs. So it's not feeding cardstock well because it was never intended to handle cardstock at all. That certainly explains why there is no setting in the printing utility software for anything heavier than plain paper. Grrr... And I can find no reference whatsoever for a manual feed function in the manual or the software, nor can I see any way to insert paper into the back of the machine. (The paper tray in this machine is below the printer, accessed from the front, so paper has to navigate a 180-degree turn as it feeds into the machinery. If it loaded from the back, vertically, cardstock might pass through more easily, and single-sheet feeding would be an option.) So that's a no-go, too. The machine is great for printing long, muli-page, two-sided documents, like game book PDFs. It's not so great at printing their covers on cardstock, though... This leaves me with a few sub-optimal options for papercrafting: - Continue to try to ram cardstock through the machine from the paper tray, which will probably wear the machine out prematurely.
- Print all sheets for papercrafting on plain paper, and spray-mount them onto cardstock, which adds an inconvenient, weather- and daylight-dependent step to all projects.
- Buy a second printer just for printing on cardstock, and use the Eco-Tank printer for printing pdf books only. Adds expense, takes up deskspace in a cramped work area.
The disadvantages of each are obvious, so I won't belabor them. I'll probably use 1 & 2 for the next several months, worrying about breaking or wearing out the machine all the while, and eventually break down and buy another printer for cardstock. If I do that, I may look at a color laser printer; I've had color laser printers in the past, and liked them. Though laser printer cartridges are expensive, laser printer output is waterproof in a way that inkjet pages aren't, which is a plus. In fairness, I've printed a LOT of books from pdf since getting this printer. If I'd bought them as POD books, I'd probably have spent more than the printer cost already...but if I were paying $10 to $40 per book, I just wouldn't have bought more than a couple of them. And if I were paying for ink at traditional ink-cartridge prices, I'm sure I'd have blown through $100 worth of cartridges by now, even at refill rates...but again, if that were the case, I just wouldn't have printed out so many books. So I've "saved" money over what my recent activities would have cost without the Eco-Tank printer, but it's money I probably wouldn't have spent in the first place under other circumstances, so the savings is dubious at best. No matter what, it really bugs me that I didn't realize how cardstock-hostile this printer was going to turn out to be, since I was buying it specifically for and because of papercrafting. I've owned a lot of printers in the past 20+ years, and I haven't had one that didn't handle cardstock at all since the days of dot-matrix, pin-fed printers. It simply never occurred to me to check the paper specifications before buying the printer. Lesson learned. So the final review on the Epson Eco-Tank 4550 Printer, on a five-point scale:General home-office use: 4 (High initial cost, low cost per page; noisy) Amateur book-binding: 4 (Low cost per page, accurate double-sided printing; may need alternative printer for covers) Papercrafting: 1 (Low cost per page; very difficult to print on cardstock)
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Post by oldschooldm on Jun 15, 2017 8:28:19 GMT -9
I use the Epson Eco-Tank 2550 and feed in 110lb cardstock all the time. Works fine for me. Misfeeds about 1-2% of the time (slightly higher rate than with 20lb paper.) NOTE: I've tried feeding magazine backing board through it, that is like 3x thickness of 110lb, and that doesn't go well. Misfeeds 95% of the time. But that's true for most printers. :-) Perhaps the 2-sided feature has a more finicky paper-feeding mechanism? Does it refeed the paper? (The 2550 does not do 2-sided automatically.) In this case the advanced/pricey model may not be the right one for cardstock mini use. Thanks for giving this a go for us jeffgeorge!
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Post by jeffgeorge on Jun 15, 2017 22:24:38 GMT -9
Thanks for the info, oldschooldm. After re-reading your posts at the top of this thread, I downloaded the manual for the ET-2550, and saw that it does indeed load the paper vertically, from the back of the machine. This means that the paper makes less than a 90-degree turn to go through the printer machinery, whereas the paper in my ET-4550 has to move up from below, doing a 180-degree turn on the way. That's most likely to facilitate the double-sided printing feature that I thought was so important when I was shopping for the machine, as you suggest. The failure rate for the 4550 to feed 110 lb. cardstock is well over 50%. I haven't done a careful count, but it may be closer to 75%, which gets very frustrating. And I haven't found a workaround, aside from just reloading the cardstock over and over until the machine finally picks it up properly. So, yeah, if you're a papercrafter who's going to be running cardstock through your printer, you will definitely be better served by the less expensive ET-2550.
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Post by nolabert on Jun 16, 2017 5:00:45 GMT -9
Weird that your Epson has problems with cardstock when other printers that feed the same way have no problems. My Canon 6821 feeds from the bottom and does a 180-degree turn and it has no problems with cardstock. What it won't do, as my wife found out, is print double-sided on cardstock, but that's not surprising.
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Post by senkosmos on Jun 16, 2017 9:55:43 GMT -9
I have 2 eco-tank printers: a L220 and a L1300 (An A3+ printer) both take cardboard pretty well (some are somewhat problematic sometimes, thats all) have excellent print quality and the ink really lasts an eternity. I abuse them (I have a print shop and I use them for some works) yet, I seem to buy ink 2 or 3 times a year.
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Post by jeffgeorge on Jul 13, 2017 16:38:28 GMT -9
Weird that your Epson has problems with cardstock when other printers that feed the same way have no problems. My Canon 6821 feeds from the bottom and does a 180-degree turn and it has no problems with cardstock. What it won't do, as my wife found out, is print double-sided on cardstock, but that's not surprising. In fairness, there is no option for cardstock on the Paper Type menu, so Epson never promised that it would do cardstock...if I'd thought to check for that omission. Interestingly, when it manages to pick up a sheet of cardstock at all, it does a fantastic job of printing double-sided. Once it gets the cardstock out of the tray, it has no problem flipping it to print neatly and with excellent registration front-to-back.
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