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| Inkjet Printer Selection - Can be difficult. There are many choices. Many customers call and ask, "Which printer should I get?". Our response is, "What do you want to do with it?" Based on the answer and the specifications requested by the customer we are usually able to make a recommendation. Although, many times there is not a clear cut first choice. There are so many printers available that the answer is that there are 3 or more to choose for your application. Below, we take you through some of the common recommendations. |
| Printer Recommendations | |
| I want to make Fine Art Prints - |
Epson is the general answer. Epson image quality is the best. The piezo-electric print
head gives them the ability to control the ink delivery in a more precise manner than all the
other manufacturers. All the others use thermal or bubble jet print heads.
The Epson desktop printers are split into those that print letter size only and those that print wider than letter size, up to 17 inches wide. The best of the wide desktop printers from Epson are the 2200, 1280 and 1160. The 2200 is more expensive and uses the Epson UltraChrome pigmented inks. The 1160 was the best, but is no longer in production. The 1280 dominates in the desktop line. For the "letter size" desktop printers, Epson has several; C86, R200, R300 and R800. The C86 is a good value. The R series printers have more function and cost a little more. In the "wide format" (more expensive) line, the 3000 (17"), 4000 (17"), 7600 (24" wide) and the 9600 (44" wide) are excellent printers. Top of the line is the Epson 10000 and 10600. The older 1200 printer is also a popular choice, because it does not have chips on the cartridges. They don't make the 1200 any longer, so the supply is short. Print quality is very near that of the 1280. MIS Archival cartridges are available for the 1200 and 1280 as well as the Continuous Flow System. Click on Epson above to see the available selections and prices. |
| I want to make Black and White Prints - |
Our best kept secret for printing black and white are the C82, C84, C86 printers. We offer the EZ Black
and white inks, that do not require any special software or complicated workflow. Photoshop software
is not required. They are an excellent way for any one new to digital black and white printing to get
started. They print fixed tone inks (warm or neutral) on letter size or smaller papers.
The Epson 1160 was the printer of choice among the Black and White artist and photographers for a long time. They are very scarce now, buying a used one is risky. The 1160 will take a 13" wide piece of paper. It uses only 4 colors or shades. The cartridges are not chipped. The 1160 cannot print the variable tone black and white inks, only the fixed or monotone inks. The Epson 3000 printer has been a work horse in the black and white area. It is very reliable and has large capacity cartridges (10 times that of the 1160). The only draw back is that the print head has not been updated and the droplet size is about 5 times that of the 1160. However at 3 feet, no one will see the dots. The 3000 is out of production, but are available on the used or refurbished market. Recently, Epson introduced the 4000 printer to take the place of the older 3000, and production of the 3000 was finally stopped. The 4000 is a great color printer for the price (about $1700). It has 8 individual cartridges and can print matte or glossy Ultrachrome prints without changing cartridges. We are still (Nov 04) working on developing black and white for this printer. A more expensive ($2500) alternate to the above printers is the Epson 7000 or 7500. They print 24 inches wide, and have a good, low picoliter print head and can be used for black and white. Epson has stopped making these printers and now offers the 7600 as the replacment printer. It is an excellent printer and does a good job printing the MIS Ultratone black and white inks on a variety of papers. The 9600 is basically identical to the 7600 only it prints 44 inches wide instead of 24. Click on Epson above to see the available selections and prices. |
| I want to print color photographs - |
The Epson 890 or 1280 is great for making photo prints. Using Epson's Premium Glossy Photo
paper and their dyebased ink, or the MIS dyebase equivalent ink, you can produce photos from
your digital camera or from scans, that are equal or better than commercially produced
photos.
Recently Epson introduced the R200 and R300 dyebase printers. These are replacments for the older 890 and 895 printers. They both use the same individual carts. The R300 can read digital camera memory sticks for direct printing without a computer. Both are letter size or smaller, and both make beautiful dye base prints using Epson inks and papers. Along with the R200 and R300, Epson introduced the R800 printer. It is an Ultrachrome pigment printer with 8 cartridges. It has 5 colors, 2 blacks, and gloss coat optimizer. Because the pigment in the ink can pile up on glossy paper, blocking the gloss reflection, they added the gloss coat optimizer. We think the dyebase printers make a better looking print than the Ultrachrome printers, but Epson is going for much higher fade resistance with this approach. This is their first printer with gloss coat, so we think it will either dissapear or they will add gloss coat to all the printers. Only time will tell, the R800 is an Epson experiment. It means more cartridges will be sold, but also more expense for the consumer. All of these printers have chipped cartridges that make refilling much more difficult. However, we have replacment chips, empty cartridges and chip resetters in stock to overcome this roadblock. Click on Epson above to see the available selections and prices. |
| I want a fast printer for production work |
The Epson 900 or 980 is the fastest printer Epson makes. It only prints on 8 1/2 inch
wide paper, but it is fast. It puts the ink down a little thin for fine art prints. But,
with minor adjustments to the printer driver setting it will equal the 870 or 890. It also
can be purchased with a network ready card, for use as a network printer. Unfortunately the
900 and 980 were short lived and have become hard to find.
Click on Epson above to see the available selections and prices. |
| I want a reliable printer for my office and school work |
HP is the answer. There are many HP printers that will meet this requirement. The 995 and
5550 models are good. They make reasonable images, they are fast and the cartridges hold
quite a lot of ink. We have an HP 5500 in the office and it works great. HP is famous
for putting out a lot of different model numbers that all use the same cartridges. The
cartridges determine the print quality, not the printer model number.
One nice thing about HP printers is that the cartridge contains the print head, and if you need a new print head, your cost of replacment is no more than the cost of a new cartridge. The 5500 type cartridge is easily refilled and we stock the inks. It is a dyebase printer with fade resistance that is much better than the Epson dyebase fading. Click on HP above to see the available selections and prices. |
| I want a low cost good all around printer |
Lexmark has the edge here. Get a Lexmark Z45 or Z65 printer. Excellent text and images.
Prints fast and the price is under $200. Only drawback is the cost of the cartridges is
somewhat high, but they are easily refilled using the MIS refill kits.
Click on Lexmark above to see the available selections and prices. |
| New Canon Printers |
Canon has revamped its printer line and introduced new inks. The Canon i950 and i9100
have been given new cartridge numbers and new ink. The new ink makes a print that is much
closer to an Epson print. Price is reasonable, a little less than the Equivalent Epson 890
or 1280. Our customers say they are as good or better than an Epson's and quite a bit
faster. One drawback, is that there are no pigmented or B&W inks available.
Click on Canon above to see the available selections and prices. |
