Why EPSON is stuck with ink switching and inferior tech in their printers

[traderjay]

Some of the most hated quirks of Epson printers are probably their PB/MBK ink switching and clogging and after asking some semiconductor professional, we theorized the following:

- Epson cannot control the individual color channels of the Piezo print head which means one of the black ink cannot be "parked" in the dampers and be applied when the appropriate paper is loaded
- The piezo element vibrates globally and if there are "parked" ink in one of the heads, it will be applied to the paper.
- This also explains why Epson cannot build redundant nozzles in their printhead. Unlike the more advanced thermal printhead of HP and Canon, there are sensors that monitors each and every nozzle that detect clogs and activates the backup nozzles.
- For Epson, the only time you find out about a clogged nozzle is through a bad print or a a nozzle check print.
- With inferior Piezo technology, the maximum print head length is reduced and are typically shorter than that of Canon or HP, therefore Epson have to resort to gimmicks such as bloated DPI ratings to attract attention.
- Last but not least, Epson still pulls wool over the users with their "starter" capacity ink. The P800 for example is bundled with the 60ml "Starter ink" while Canon provides the full 80 ml retail capacity. This alone says alot of a company.

Epson did invent the fine art inkjet market that got alot of people into high-end photo printing but their technology certainly haven't kept up. The Pro 1000 which is a lowly desktop printer is brimmed with sensors and technology such as anti-skew, vacuum feed, spectrophotometer, nozzle firing monitoring, auto remapping for blocked nozzle that makes the price look like a complete bargain. I can tell the engineers put their heart and mind towards this machine despite being a low cost model.

[Paul Roark]

From my perspective of making and using custom black and white, carbon-based inksets, I am a major fan of Epson over the alternatives.  That piezo head can, from what I've been able to determine, pump higher viscosity inks that can hold larger, less warm carbon particles in suspension better.  Can HP or Canon print 100% carbon pigment based B&W prints that have only a 3 unit Lab *b rise from the paper base to the maximum warmth?  I don't think so.  Epson's piezo heads can (on some good matte papers).  This results in the most lightfast prints reasonably available to photographers -- at extremely low prices.  We benefit from having competing technologies out there.  Each has its strong and weak points.  (Now if Epson would only stop trying to eliminate competition from third party ink suppliers ...)

Paul
www.PaulRoark.com
http://www.paulroark.com/BW-Info/

[rdonson]

- Last but not least, Epson still pulls wool over the users with their "starter" capacity ink. The P800 for example is bundled with the 60ml "Starter ink" while Canon provides the full 80 ml retail capacity. This alone says a lot of a company.

I don't think they hide the "starter" ink capacity from anyone.  The ink capacity is available information, isn't it?  I suspect it's is also driven by marketing and sales departments to lower the initial cost.

From my perspective we have HP, Epson and Canon all making printers that can produce excellent prints.  Each has its strengths and weaknesses and we choose which one suits out needs best.  If you don't like Epson you have options. 

[Royce Howland]

I work in an all-Epson shop (though we are considering evaluating Canon when/if they decide to ship a 60" carriage model). Although my experience means I know full well the annoying design considerations of Epson printers and I love to bash them when they deserve it, some of your theorizing misses the mark.

Epson can control individual channel firing at the head if they want to. The venerable 11880, the new top end P10000 and P20000, plus probably a number of older models that I'm forgetting about, have both PK and MK inks live to their own individual channels on the head at all times. There is no black switching valve, purging the lines, etc. Choice of media type selects which black ink is laid onto the paper, and the other black channel is not fired.

If Epson can do this for the K channels on their highest end printers, they could do it on the other printer models if they so chose. The reasons they don't are not to do with "inferior Piezo technology", but more likely marketing choices followed by economic choices. Controlling the K ink at the head makes the head more complex. Since the head is already the highest complexity, highest precision, highest cost single physical component of the entire printer, it probably makes sense to somebody in Epson to eliminate complexity of dual K ink support at the head and push that complexity downstream in the ink supply chain. They may reason that this is sensible since they don't expect people to be switching K inks that much. Whether that's a false understanding of their customers' printing behavior is a different story.

Undoubtedly there are design constraints with Epson's piezo head technology that influence their ability to do things like individually remap nozzles. However, their need to do this is, by design, not as extreme as the case of Canon / HP heads because the thermal heads are a much shorter-life consumable component in those printers. If remappable nozzles were not supported on Canon & HP heads, the customer push-back from having to replace heads every few months (weeks even?) would be extreme, as nozzles burned out or became uncleanably clogged. So you can say that remappable nozzles is an innovation, or you can say it's a necessity that must be dealt with to avoid market failure of the thermal head design.

Now, Epson heads in comparison are supposed to be designed to last for the useful life of the printer. Generally speaking we have very old Epson models (mostly from the x880 series) that are still producing prints on their original print heads with the full quality they delivered when they were brand new. (Including printers adapted for use with Jon Cone's excellent Piezography carbon ink set, which is not supported on any thermal head printers.) We had much older x600 and x800 printers that we disposed of over time because they were too slow or too small, not because their heads failed. The one exception to this is the x900 series which has been widely, widely bashed (including by me) due to major head design problems with that generation of Epson heads. I will beat up Epson all day, every day, for the design failure of the x900 heads... but I'd also argue that has nothing do with "inferior Piezo technology" but rather a fatally flawed update of a technology base that had been stable and proven out for many years.

Regarding your comment "with inferior Piezo technology, the maximum print head length is reduced", have a look at the dimensions of the head in the P10000 and P20000. These heads are monstrous in size. I haven't tried to directly compare them to the heads in the latest gen Canons, but I feel no need for "head envy" with the size of our latest Epson heads. And I'm not sure it's all that useful a concept anyway. What matters to us are qualities such as print speed, quality of ink, reliability of the printer, consistency from printer-to-printer and ink-to-ink, etc. I have never and will never buy or discard a printer because of the size of its head.

Epson clog detection is not great, but it's also not strictly true that "the only time you find out about a clogged nozzle is through a bad print or a nozzle check print". The P10000 and P20000 auto clog detect runs more often than we would like even when the settings are all changed to the minimum automatic behavior, but it does seem to be much improved over past generations of Epsons. These new printers do still clog, but the automatic detection often fixes it. But not always... we do run manual nozzle check prints and rarely will have a print wrecked by undetected clogs. So your criticism here is accurate in part; it is a cost of doing business on Epson.

Finally, your criticism of Espon starter ink cartridges is valid, and it annoys most people. When we get a new Epson, we always order an entire ink cartridge set along with it, because there's no point waiting to do that for the 2 - 3 days it takes to exhaust the starter carts. It seems clear that Epson is not in business to sell printers as such, they are more in business to sell ink. So in a way this brings me to circle back around to why they still have the black ink switching approach in many of their printer models -- perhaps one has to look no further for an explanation beyond the fact that K switching wastes more ink, therefore customers have to buy more ink. If even partially true, this still makes Epson a company of poor customer service, but that's mostly for marketing and economic reasons, not as much for head engineering reasons.

When we hopefully conduct our Canon evaluations later this year, I'm sure we'll find things to be annoyed about with their latest models as well. I have a fair amount of experience on the older Canon x300 and x400 series, and certainly with them I found plenty of imperfections in their operation.

[deanwork]

Royce is correct in that piezo electric print head technology is not necessarily an inferior design.

The original Epson pigment printer that I had for 6 six years with Epson inks and 4 more years with piezography ink never ever clogged. It didn't waste ink either with this convoluted pressurized cart design they have now . And as Royce also mentioned many people are still running 9800s and 9880s with original heads. ( now the ink switching mechanism is primitive and retarded but that is another story ) . And of course the Roland systems with Di Vinci rips also used Seiko piezo heads and the never had all this pressurized crap to waste your time and money.

So how are your two new expensive Epsons working for you now. I believe your last comments about trying to get the P20k fixed was what you called a gong show nightmare of a situation from day one. And your P 10 k was spewing ink like a fountain inside the printer, ug.

I'm not sure why you didn't buy the Canon 9400 their 60 inch model that has been out awhile. This is the same printer that Ed Burtinsky uses for his 50x80 inch prints . Have you ever seen those? I've never seen better sharper  prints at that scale and he does a giant volume of them. The new just released Canon inks I don't know about . They just created a new inkset that apparently has gone backward in longevity. I still run the 8300 daily and just bought another HP, the z3200 and I'll never go back to Epson. I live pain free when It comes to printers and I want to keep it that way. The Z series is too slow for you but not the Canons.

[Chris Kern]

It seems clear that Epson is not in business to sell printers as such, they are more in business to sell ink.

Isn't that true of all printer manufacturers?  Given the amount of technology packed into each machine, the price-point of everything from the high-volume large format printers to the low-volume desktop units strikes me as remarkably modest.  (Even more so for the consumer "all-in-ones," which these days are almost giveaways.)

Years ago, an enterprise contract manager for a copier manufacturer told me his goal was to "break even on the boxes, make money on the consumables."  It's my impression that's the printer business business model, as well.

[traderjay]

Royce - Great feedback and sharing your experience. The models you mentioned are Epson's top of the line models and therefore have the latest and greatest in terms of printhead, anti-clog and the rest of the higher end features. The piezo printhead on that unit is almost double the length of the Canon Pro 1000, 2000, and 4000. However, Canon packed the lowly Pro 1000 with all the features and technology from their higher end units which truly reflect on the company's engineering, design and marketing philosophy which is completely opposite of Epson.

Even from a mechanical engineering standpoint, the Canon's 60 inch equivalent Pro 6000 is far better engineered than the P2000 and you can tell by looking at the difference in the print head carriage assembly.

[DeanChriss]

I'm not a high volume printer, making a couple prints each week and sometimes having the printer powered off for a month or more when I'm not around. I had an Epson 7900 that worked for nearly 8 years without a head replacement or service call, but it did clog enough to get me pretty upset on occasion. I use the word "clog" to mean no ink firing from a nozzle, which I believe meant no ink available to the nozzle more often than it meant a physically clogged nozzle. Sometimes it would go 3 months without a clog and sometimes there would be clogs a day apart. Sometimes a single channel pair cleaning would fix everything and sometimes multiple cleaning were needed. The only consistency I ever saw was that there were far fewer clogs in winter, when the printer's environment was very roughly 10 degrees (Fahrenheit) colder and up to 30% RH dryer than in summer. That may be odd, but the summer / winter difference was dramatic and the same thing happened every year I had the printer. Finally the 7900's head died with a majority of the yellow nozzles dead, but in almost 8 years I'd have spent nearly enough on Canon heads to buy a new printer, especially given my erratic use pattern.

I replaced the 7900 with an Epson P7000, which I've had for just over 1 year. 1 year and 10 days to be exact. I saw the first ever imperfect nozzle check from this printer two days ago after swapping PK to MK. No nozzles were missing but two "steps" on the MK pattern were positioned oddly - deflected upward. One normal channel pair cleaning, the first I've ever had to do manually, fixed that. I was so in the habit of doing manual nozzle checks with the 7900 that I kept doing them for quite a while after getting the P7000. After about 6 months of perfect nozzle checks I stopped doing them. Now I do manual nozzle checks only after swapping black inks or after the printer sits unused for a long time. The latter happens a few times each year when I'm away. The P7000 has sat unused twice for about 5 weeks and once for about three weeks without a single clogged nozzle. To be fair the 7900 did that a couple of times too, but that was pretty rare. Also to be fair, I know the P7000 does some automatic nozzle checking (I'm not sure about cleaning) even though I have all of the ANC features turned off. But whatever it does it has always been clog free when I send it a print job. Thus far I'm very happy with the printer.

I think the "best" printer truly depends on your priorities. Any of the HP, Canon, and Epson brands can be "best" depending on how one prioritizes archival ink characteristics, color gamut, print speed, straight through paper path for poster board and other heavy media, minimum maintenance, cost of ownership, and so on. No printer brand is best in every way. IMO the bottom line is that any of these printers can spit out exceptionally good prints that are hard to distinguish from one another. How that's accomplished doesn't matter much unless it impacts something like reliability or the cost of ownership.

[deanwork]

Yes absolutely. I've been told directly by a Canon tech that they make their profits on consumables. Ink, media, and print heads. But they make more selling the small printers than the big ones though but the real profits are consumables. Epson has spent most of their r & d budget trying to keep inexpensive Chinese inks out of their machines in the North American market. In Asia they can't legally do that with the ink cart software so the are being used there with all kinds of inks successfully.

Epson makes a lot more cash on media than the other two and big money on ink usage and print head replacement since you need a very expensive service call to do that and hope it solves your problem. By the way they make a lot of money selling warranties cause your crazy not to keep them in warranty as long as possible. Their papers sell quite well and have for a long time. They were however getting killed in the high end media area by Hahnemühle and  Canson for a long long time. That is why they made a big deal in marketing the Canson Platine and Rag Photographique with their name on it. I don't blame them for doing that. It was a smart move but they better watch their quality control because something is screwy with the coating on the "Legacy" Fiber right now and it ain't cheap.

Isn't that true of all printer manufacturers?  Given the amount of technology packed into each machine, the price-point of everything from the high-volume large format printers to the low-volume desktop units strikes me as remarkably modest.  (Even more so for the consumer "all-in-ones," which these days are almost giveaways.)

Years ago, an enterprise contract manager for a copier manufacturer told me his goal was to "break even on the boxes, make money on the consumables."  It's my impression that's the printer business business model, as well.

[Paul Roark]

... "break even on the boxes, make money on the consumables."  It's my impression that's the printer business business model ...

I've always called it the "Gillette Model" -- Give away the razor and nick them on the blades.

That's why they put so much effort into keeping third party inks out of the machines.  Note the price of the EcoTank printers, on the other hand, where the ink prices are competitive with the non-EOM ink sellers.

Frankly, for those of us who are low volume printers, it's not a bad deal, particularly if you use an ink that is very cost effective.

Paul
www.PaulRoark.com

[Royce Howland]

Isn't that true of all printer manufacturers?  Given the amount of technology packed into each machine, the price-point of everything from the high-volume large format printers to the low-volume desktop units strikes me as remarkably modest.  (Even more so for the consumer "all-in-ones," which these days are almost giveaways.)

Years ago, an enterprise contract manager for a copier manufacturer told me his goal was to "break even on the boxes, make money on the consumables."  It's my impression that's the printer business business model, as well.

Yes, of course. The question often open to speculation about Epson in particular is whether their awareness of where the profitability comes from -- specifically ink sales -- might lead them to intentionally favour certain printer or head design approaches that bias towards unproductively consuming more ink.

The K switching issue brought up in this thread is one such example. On the face of it, the K ink wasted through purging & switching lines to a single K channel on the head has a direct customer cost with no apparent benefit. I suspect there is a hidden benefit through reducing the complexity (therefore cost) of a piezo head with live PK and MK channels, the way it's done with the 11880 and P10K / P20K. But still, assuming the head should last for the useful life of the printer, the cost of wasted K inks could end up being pretty large in comparison to the extra cost of a dual-K head, for somebody who switches media types a lot. It would be interesting to find out the decision factors within Epson for this design choice, but likely we'll never really know.

[Royce Howland]

Royce - Great feedback and sharing your experience. The models you mentioned are Epson's top of the line models and therefore have the latest and greatest in terms of printhead, anti-clog and the rest of the higher end features. The piezo printhead on that unit is almost double the length of the Canon Pro 1000, 2000, and 4000. However, Canon packed the lowly Pro 1000 with all the features and technology from their higher end units which truly reflect on the company's engineering, design and marketing philosophy which is completely opposite of Epson.

I won't disagree that Canon and Epson have quite different philosophies. But your core argument seemed to be that Epson piezo head technology is inherently inferior and that's why some of the things are the way they are with Epson printers. I'm simply pointing out that it's more a case of "different" rather than "inferior". Several weaknesses you cited of the Epson approach are not in fact present on the top end printer models; Epson could provide those same capabilities with the lower end models as well. The 11880 had some features in its much older design, that never made it into any of the x900 series and still aren't present in the new SureColor 6000/7000/8000/9000. Live dual-K channels on the head being one big example.

The reasons why Epson still hasn't implemented some of these features are less likely to be engineering (i.e. head technology) reasons, but rather product management, marketing and perhaps economic reasons. That's a different kettle of fish than saying the Epson piezo heads are inherently inferior.

Not trying to be argumentative, just going for clarity.

Even from a mechanical engineering standpoint, the Canon's 60 inch equivalent Pro 6000 is far better engineered than the P2000 and you can tell by looking at the difference in the print head carriage assembly.

The Canon Pro-6000 is the one we will be most interested in. If the 60" class can't work for us, we're not interested introducing a new line of machines with new inks, different interactions with our favourite stocks of media, new servicing requirements, etc. I'm quite open to having Canon printers come on board if the new models are as good in operation as they look on paper. I'm still waiting for longevity info on the inks, and that could influence our decision. But otherwise I'm looking forward the chance to trial the new Canons. Our local rep knows this.

[Royce Howland]

So how are your two new expensive Epsons working for you now. I believe your last comments about trying to get the P20k fixed was what you called a gong show nightmare of a situation from day one. And your P 10 k was spewing ink like a fountain inside the printer, ug.

They're doing well for us, finally. We had a 2nd service call for our P20K to correct a lingering "clogging" issue with it. I'm convinced it was not clogging, but an improper seal on the capping station. Disassembly, thorough cleaning, and some replaced parts appear to have 100% corrected that problem. Many printer firmware and driver updates appear to have corrected most of the other operational issues we had, such as the printers spraying ink because they thought media was loaded when in fact it wasn't, or getting really confused during cut sheet loading.

(Though I will say the Mac OS X Epson drivers are still flaky. I decreasingly trust the Macs in our production pipeline because of another series of incidents we've had with the combination of Mac OS X / Adobe / Epson producing bad prints for no reason we can figure out, other than those 3 players continuing to have a race to out-stupid each other. We'll be moving our print production line entirely to Windows this year. I'm done fighting with Mac OS X. But that's a whole other topic.)

There are still some irritating operational quirks about the P10K / P20K printers; we seem to spend a lot of time waiting on them while they say "waking up", "preparing", "please wait", etc. They have more of a mind of their own than the older models, and it's a bit of a recalcitrant mind at that. But fundamentally now we can get them to do what we need them to do. As I've noted before, I'm liking the ink and the print quality leaves nothing wanting. When they're printing (as opposed to thinking about printing), they work a treat. No regrets, now, on having got them.

I'm not sure why you didn't buy the Canon 9400 their 60 inch model that has been out awhile. This is the same printer that Ed Burtinsky uses for his 50x80 inch prints . Have you ever seen those? I've never seen better sharper  prints at that scale and he does a giant volume of them. The new just released Canon inks I don't know about . They just created a new inkset that apparently has gone backward in longevity. I still run the 8300 daily and just bought another HP, the z3200 and I'll never go back to Epson. I live pain free when It comes to printers and I want to keep it that way. The Z series is too slow for you but not the Canons.

Yes, I've seen Burtynsky prints in person. People certainly are doing serious work with Canons, at the scale at which we'd want to operate with them as well. The reason we never went with the x400's is perhaps more circumstantial than anything. We're a major Epson-platformed shop, and we wouldn't casually just introduce another platform. Expanding our stable of 11880's was a driving priority for a couple of years. There was a window of time when bringing Canon on board could have happened, but the Canon organization in Western Canada was, shall we say, not overly able to win our confidence and move on the opportunity. I still think the Canon x400 models are competent machines.

The new Canon models seem very interesting for our needs, at least on paper. But when we needed to make a decision to bring on board the next generation of printers, Canon's Pro-6000 wasn't even rumoured with a ship date whereas the Epson P20K and sibling P10K were shipping -- it's fairly important for us to have matched 44" and 60" class machines, and our acquisition plans are actually driven by the 60" class. Though, like you, I see the unanswered questions on the new Canon ink set and I wonder about it. Hopefully Aardenburg's initial info will be able to provide some clarity on that when it gets published; I'm looking forward to that.

[dchew]

The K switching issue brought up in this thread is one such example. On the face of it, the K ink wasted through purging & switching lines to a single K channel on the head has a direct customer cost with no apparent benefit. I suspect there is a hidden benefit through reducing the complexity (therefore cost) of a piezo head with live PK and MK channels, the way it's done with the 11880 and P10K / P20K. But still, assuming the head should last for the useful life of the printer, the cost of wasted K inks could end up being pretty large in comparison to the extra cost of a dual-K head, for somebody who switches media types a lot. It would be interesting to find out the decision factors within Epson for this design choice, but likely we'll never really know.

One other possible reason: We know Epson's printers are sensitive to head clogs. Well, apparently everyone's except my 8-year old 7900 - knock on wood. If they provide separate live PK and MK channels on say the 24" models, what happens to the MK head when it isn't used for 6-12 months because the photographer is on a photo paper printing streak? If I ever replace my 7900, I think I'd still prefer a single black head that swaps!

The big printers (11880, P10k and P20k) are presumed to be used more frequently on both mat and photo papers.

Dave

[Farmer]

I wasn't going to play in this thread, but there are just so many out and out pieces of nonsense (sorry, it's true), that some comment seems appropriate.

Some of the most hated quirks of Epson printers are probably their PB/MBK ink switching and clogging and after asking some semiconductor professional, we theorized the following:

Which semiconductor professional?  This is basically an appeal to authority. It's like an ad that puts an actor in a white coat to suggest that what's being said must be true.  Unless you provide details of the experience and expertise of the authority, it's just a magic trick.

- Epson cannot control the individual color channels of the Piezo print head which means one of the black ink cannot be "parked" in the dampers and be applied when the appropriate paper is loaded

So by "theorized" you really mean "made up some stuff", right?

In what way can't they control individual channels?  You can print or not from each individual channel.  You can clean in channel pairs (and if they wanted to, clearly it could be done by individual channel but it would just require more hardware).  Also, they already have printers that either switch late in the path (3800/3880/P800) or have all channels available at all times (11880), amongst others.  So what on earth are you theorising here?

One customer wants both channels available all the time.  Another customer doesn't ever want the other channel.  Some customers are in the middle.  Whether you provide it permanently, on demand, or never, some customers are happy and others aren't.  There is no perfect solution for the entire customer base (most of whom are not photographers by the way).

- The piezo element vibrates globally and if there are "parked" ink in one of the heads, it will be applied to the paper.

Demonstrably untrue.  The very nature of piezo is that individual elements activate at controllable levels to produce variable-sized dots of ink on demand.  If every channel had to fire at once, you couldn't make any prints.  Really, were these semiconductor professionals 6 years old?

- This also explains why Epson cannot build redundant nozzles in their printhead.

No, it doesn't.  Firstly, because it's nonsense so it doesn't explain anything.  Secondly, the individual piezo elements already can fire or not fire, or fire at different rates and volumes (producing variable dot sizes) on demand, so remapping wouldn't be an issue other than the general principle of not needing to do it because of how they work (and there would obviously be a cost element).

Unlike the more advanced thermal printhead of HP and Canon, there are sensors that monitors each and every nozzle that detect clogs and activates the backup nozzles.

Monitoring individual piezo elements is not only possible, it's already done.  The thermal heads available now are indeed very advanced and high-performing.  Thermal heads, though, basically only work with aqueous (water-based) inks.  They are limited in application and they don't translate to variable drop technology very well.  Piezo and thermal are two different methods and the results from each demonstrably show that both are valid and advanced solutions to the problem of "how to put ink on paper".

- For Epson, the only time you find out about a clogged nozzle is through a bad print or a a nozzle check print.

Clearly wrong.  The systems can detect and warn you about it before you print.  Indeed, one of the real complaints is that the system can be overly sensitive and detect issues that, whilst they exist, they don't translate into print quality issues and so they're annoying for some users.

- With inferior Piezo technology, the maximum print head length is reduced and are typically shorter than that of Canon or HP, therefore Epson have to resort to gimmicks such as bloated DPI ratings to attract attention.

It's already been demonstrated to you that this is nonsense.  Print head width is not limited by either technology.  Check out https://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/article/616494/epson-launches-new-high-speed-enterprise-inkjet-printer/ and have a look at the new print heads being launched - it's the 6th photo down in the article.  How is that width limited?

Regarding DPI ratings - they're not gimmicks.  They're statements of functionality. The printers lay down dots at a density that is great than the simple density of the channels on the print head.  Both technologies do this.  With variable dot sizes, there are even more options available.

- Last but not least, Epson still pulls wool over the users with their "starter" capacity ink. The P800 for example is bundled with the 60ml "Starter ink" while Canon provides the full 80 ml retail capacity. This alone says alot of a company.

With the 3800 and 3880 they were 80ml.  How exactly does this pull the wool over anyone's eyes?  Obviously there are increased production costs to make two sizes of carts, but there must have been some cost or marketing advantage in doing so.  In the larger format printers, this is quite normal to get a smaller set with the printer and then the customer can choose what size they want to run for production, ensuring their ink is turned over at an appropriate rate and balancing their costs against that.  It's the same for either technology.

Epson did invent the fine art inkjet market that got alot of people into high-end photo printing but their technology certainly haven't kept up.

You've yet to actually provide any evidence at all to support this premise.

The Pro 1000 which is a lowly desktop printer is brimmed with sensors and technology such as anti-skew, vacuum feed, spectrophotometer, nozzle firing monitoring, auto remapping for blocked nozzle that makes the price look like a complete bargain.

It's an excellent printer.  If this was an ad for Canon, you could have just used that one line.

I can tell the engineers put their heart and mind towards this machine despite being a low cost model.

Really?  I'm sure they put all their energies into everything they do - from every company.

I've seen a LOT of people post about pros and cons about their printers and the others in the market, but this, honestly, is the most unfounded load of codswallop that I think I have ever seen here.  It's as if a day-one intern at Canon, with no marketing training, decided to write a FUD piece.

It is important that people talk about their experiences and preferences and likes and dislikes with printers, cameras, lenses, and so on.  It really is.  But even most fanbois don't make such a long list of demonstrably incorrect or unfounded statements (and claim some level of authority due to "professionals").

Tell us all the great things you are finding with your Canon 1000 and how it's meeting your needs. Other people considering it or already using it will benefit.  You don't need to convince people (or yourself) by writing nonsense about other technologies - that is not helpful, because the vast majority of people here know that what you've written is nonsense and so will discount what you have to say on other topics.

[traderjay]

Farmer - no need to be all defensive about a post merely speculating on Epson's shortcoming. I spent a few years in the CPU world and had the chance be a acquainted with a few semiconductor engineers that does silicon level design and wafer manufacturing. They might not be the authority of Piezo inkjet technology but it doesn't mean they cannot informally discuss the pros and cons of various technologies used in the print head.

You can also compare Epson's mechanical design vs Canon, which is far inferior to that of Canon in both paper handling, chassis rigidity and printhead carriage system. 

[GrahamBy]

- The piezo element vibrates globally and if there are "parked" ink in one of the heads, it will be applied to the paper.

Then how do they print, for eg yellow, when there is black "parked" in the head? By this reasoning, Epson would only be able to use 1 ink.
It seems more likely that they have  head design with a fixed number of channels, which is 1 less than they would need to have separate PK and MK without switching.

- Last but not least, Epson still pulls wool over the users with their "starter" capacity ink. The P800 for example is bundled with the 60ml "Starter ink" while Canon provides the full 80 ml retail capacity. This alone says alot of a company.

I have a Canon, which duly arrived with full 80ml cartridges. It emptied more than half of them at initial set-up. Given that the waste-ink cartridge filled halfway at the same time, this was not just moving ink into the machine, it was purging and flushing. After 4 months use I had a full waste-tank with several hundred euros of ink in it.
This is not a behaviour that Canon goes out of its way to publicise, whereas the size of the starter cartridges is clearly stated on all Epson product descriptions.

[Schewe]

Some of the most hated quirks of Epson printers are probably their PB/MBK ink switching and clogging and after asking some semiconductor professional, we theorized the following:

Hum...well, not for nothing it sure seems you have a personal agenda that your anonymous screen name may be hiding? Just saying that from somebody whose first post on the forum said:

Hey All - This is my first time posting here and look forward to actively participating in this great community. Most importantly, I am looking forward to learning from all the pros here who have years of experience with fine art photo printing such as Mark and the rest of the crew

It sure seems like you came to LuLa to teach all the pros a little something...or am I misreading one of your two diametrically apposed positions? You might want to lean the ability to ease the clutch out instead of popping the clutch if you want to have a smooth ride here at LuLa.

[traderjay]

I don't have a personal agenda against anything, but rather against the company, the engineers and designers that seems to deliberately skimp on features and functionalities to stiff the end user.

No need to make this personal as my post is targeted directly to a printer company, and the various flaws that the company failed to address over the years.

[rdonson]

You can also compare Epson's mechanical design vs Canon, which is far inferior to that of Canon in both paper handling, chassis rigidity and printhead carriage system.

Nobody is going to see your comments with regards to Epson as an attack if you can be specific about your statements.  In the snippet above you say that Epson's designs are far inferior but fail to make specific comparisons in which Epson is inferior to Canon.   For example, how is Canon paper handling, chassis rigidity and printhead carriage system superior?  What in the designs and implementations stand out to you in favor of Canon? 

The good news in my mind is that both are great printers and that we have a choice in which we buy.