I have had the same problem with my 3800. After 3 months of total frustration, and two attempts to replace the printer with refurbished units (one arrived smashed, the other performed badly, also printing too dark, and it coughed and wheezed the whole time). I reached the conclusion that the two working printers might both be overinking, so I sent the replacements back and kept my original one.
Prior to coming to that conclusion I couldn't even make a decent profile with PrintFix Pro. The target was too dark for the profiler to work. It couldn't figure out the colors of the patches that were just some version of black. The resulting prints were still muddy. The overinking occurred whether I was using CS2 or CS3 from windows XP.
Once I started experimenting with the ink settings in the Epson driver (color/advanced page), I was able to print targets that were closer to the screen versions, and then the profiler was able to do its job. Now, I get very clean results with the profiles I make, but canned profiles don't work at all. The method I use is to print the profile target with the following settings: Cyan (-)10, Magenta (-)5, Yellow 0, Saturation +10, Epson gamut 2.2. High speed is off. I convert the image to the resultant profile in Photoshop and print it from Qimage, always with the same adjustments as above. (I don't assign the profile in Qimage as the results are not the same). Qimage gives me a fairly good indication of how the print will look on the page preview. I know you aren't supposed to print targets with adjustments like this, but this was the only way that worked for me. The Atkinson test print is now a dead-on match for the screen.
This method is not ideal, but I was getting tired of lugging printers back and forth in hopes of finding a good one. I think a bunch of machines left the factory uncalibrated. Read their claim carefully, and you'll wonder if they calibrate individual machines or just one or two out of a batch. Nothing is clear about it, and you certainly have not received a certificate of calibration for that specific serial number, have you?
I attempted to recalibrate the machine with Epson Europe's ColorBase. No go. Again, it was too far off, and the program reported that there was too much error, and that it would not be able to calibrate the printer.
That said, Epson was kind enough to let me keep the ink it sent with the two "replacement" machines for my troubles. Now, with the rather quirky workaround method outlined above, the original 3800 gives me beautiful prints.
Meanwhile, the ImagePrint salesman claims that I should not have the same problems if I use their RIP, as it controls the printer directly. They don't have a demo that will print, but they do offer a 30 day return if you don't like it. I don't know whether they are up to date with their profiles for all the newer, and much improved papers, so I haven't sprung for it yet. However, that may be an option for you.
Good luck and Mele Kalikimaka,
Aaron
