Epson Ecotank Printers

For those that print their own album pages, you may want to have a look at the Epson EcoTank printers.

They don't use ink cartridges. They use ink bottles. Epson is claiming that the printer comes with 2 years worth of ink.

One set of genuine refill ink bottles costs $44.00 on Amazon. It looks like 3rd party ones are going for around $17-$20.

Looks like the days of chipped ink cartridges are over now.

Of course the printers cost a lot more now, since Epson needs to make money off the printer than the ink. The $50 introductory model everyone has become used to is gone, and replaced by a $250 model.

Overall, if you print a moderate amount, this may well be worth upgrading. And I think these may be cheaper to print per page that a color laser.

But I think color laser is the better way to go if you print infrequently, since inkjet print nozzles tend to dry out if you don't print.

Excellent update as I am in need of computer/printer.

'Tank' inkjets have been around for a few years so there are several manufacturers (like Canon) who also make them; the initial cost tends to be a bit higher but the total cost of ownership is lower due to the saving on the ink.
Don

Good info. I believe I will get tanked!

I expect HP to be one of the last to make a tanked inkjet printer. They were the first ones to chip both their ink AND their toner.

Looks like consumers are liking this option. Every single Canon MegaTank model is sold out on their website.

Australia $399 ($294 US)

In the US, the 2500 has been replaced by the 2550. Quite a price difference between Australia and the US.

It's just nice that you don't have to deal with refilled cartridges that the printer is going to warn you aren't genuine.

I remember back when I had an HP printer, I had to get warranty service on it and I had to mail it back WITH THE CARTRIDGES INSIDE in order to prove that I used genuine cartridges. So I put in a set of old spent cartridges When they sent the new one back, I pulled out the starter cartridges that came with the printer and put them aside, and put my original cartridges back in.

About a month later it's 10 PM at night and my son is printing out a paper for school and I run out of one of the colors. So, I pull out the starter ink and pop one of the cartridges in. The printer goes through it's usual new cartridge cycle and then a dialog pops up on my computer telling me that I am no longer eligible to use starter ink, because I had used regular cartridges in the printer.

I found a 24 hour Walmart, bought an Epson printer and threw that one out. Haven't bought a single HP product since then.

The 2600, which I assume is an update of the 2500, is around £150 from Amazon in the UK - quite a bewildering range for the techno-stupid like me.

Unlike most I'm not jumping with joy over tank printers. The issue with them is printhead. Printhead is basically a small gizmo that sits between the ink cartridge and paper on your machine, and it is pretty much the most essential part when it comes to print quality. But the more you print, the more the printhead gathers paper particles, dust, excess ink etc. Usually printheads last 6-24 months before they clog up or need cleaning other than the the software approach.

With cartridge based printers the printheads change with every new cartridge you buy, or there's a very easy to remove internal printhead (which can be cleaned easily).

With tank printers the printheads are just about always fixed - making cleanup operation significantly more difficult.. And above all, once the printhead dies, any device with fixed printhead will be dead as dodo. I would not be surprised if the total cost of ownership went up because of this .

just my 5 cents worth of 'doomsday prophecy', LOL.

-k-

PS.... Those not following news might not know, that Epson (and few other big printer companies such as HP and Canon) were caught for artificial manipulation of ink cartridge levels (ie. the ink cartridges claimed they were empty and had to be replaced though in reality they still were 20-50% full). Trials in Europe are ahead this/next year.

I'll never again let an inkjet printer darken my door; but I understand that some folks use them. The tank ink jets are trying to overcome the reputation that other inkjets have as 'consumable' printers. The 'we will give the printer way and make money on the cartridges' approach saw consumers throwing entire inkjet printers away every year and replacing them. Other times, as scb notes, consumer got frustrated with the printhead issues. As a geek who gets a lot of support calls every week; a large percentgae of them go like this, "I haven't used my inkjet in a few weeks and when I turned it on it is not working".

A few of top-of-the-line inkjets are good for someone who needs to print photgraphic quality images on specialty paper, but most business envrioments use laser printers for very good reasons.
Don

For years, I had an HP Deskjet 932C printer. I would buy cheap refilled cartridges for it and it just ran and ran. The thing was heavy as hell and the entire bottom was one giant metal plate. It was a slow printer, but with 3rd party cartridges. it was very cheap to operate.

Then one day, I bought a used duplexer for it. I smacked it on the back and was blissfully printing double sided. Of course the printer was now sticking out much farther from the shelf than it used to. My wife was doing something around the computer and managed to knock it down off the shelf. No sure what broke specifically, but it simply would not feed paper any more. I took the whole thing apart and was unable to fix it.

I really think Inkjet printers from the 90s were built like tanks.

As for print heads. A lot of higher end inkjet printers used to have print heads that were removable and could be replaced.

In a perfect world, I would love to have an innkjet printer with removable print heads, ink tanks, and pigment based ink.

True. But there is something to be said for quality. I think something printed on good archival paper using an inkjet printer with pigmented ink will outlast toner put down on the same paper. Toner, for all intents and purposes is a powdered dye mixed with plastic polymer dust. When this product is applied to a piece of paper, the toner essentially melts and glues itself on to the paper. Over time, it can flake off, and extreme heat can cause it to get damaged.

Toner also sticks to vinyl binders, which is a complete PITA sometimes.

For everyday printing, toner is fine. But I would not print photos out with it and stick it in an album.

The biggest plus with me when it comes to laser is that I can not print something for MONTHS and it will still print the next time I try.

Our printing needs would go down to almost zero in the summer, when the kids were off from school. Come September, on the second day of school, we'd have to print a ton of stuff out, and I always had clogged heads and would end up going through a set of cartridges just doing print head cleaning.

But that's a more recent thing. My old 932C, the print heads would NEVER clog, as long as I left it on. I could go months without printing and it would always print first time.

I can't even begin to tell you how many inkjets I have tossed out over the years because of clogged print heads that I could not clean out. Very frustrating.

Epson used to be the very worst: I had one that was an ink-hog, and then would not print in black if it had run out of yellow ink. I switched to HP printers, which were comparatively better but break down too easily.

I have had both, and agree with Don and Kirk, Laser (Brother) has been a delight to use, above the Inkjet.
I have only owned the cheap and nasty Black and White Laser ($58 IIRC)
Non Genuine Toner costs $14 and at a rough guess, I get 2000 pages before it starts to fade print.