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Author Topic: Epson 2200 - still a good printer?  (Read 7829 times)

Eridium

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« on: May 23, 2010, 06:27:20 am »

I'm interested in buying a used Epson 2200 printer as a starter for learning the nuances of printing.

This printer was highly regarded and reviewed on Luminous Landscape when it was released ... eight years ago in 2002!

2 Questions:
1. Is the print quality still considered good, or is there better value in newer printers / technology?
(This printer comes with extra paper, inks, and a professional custom icc profile.  The price offered to me is $200)

2. Is the Epson 2200 still well supported?  I have a Mac running Snow Leopard and I use Lightroom + Photoshop.

Are there other printers you'd recommend over a 2200 that's used/discontinued/good value?
Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
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Steve Weldon

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #1 on: May 23, 2010, 10:05:21 am »

I've had up to four 2200's at any one time, all set up differently and all running prints full time for neigh on 3 years.  I still have one but I haven't used it in quite some time.  Actually, I haven't used any printer in a long time.  I moved to Thailand and quality prints are way cheaper than I can make them myself.

However;

1.  The 2200 is still as good a printer today as it was when it first came out.  Obviously right?  In many ways it's better because now you have a host of better RIP's and profiles and different ink systems and papers..

2.  I can't think of another 13" printer today, as the 2200 still is.

3.  At $200 with the extras.. you really can't go wrong assuming everything is working.
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dchew

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #2 on: May 23, 2010, 12:56:47 pm »

I still have my 2200, purchased about 5 years ago.  I've since upgraded to a larger Epson, but I still use it occasionally for small jobs and it is somewhat portable for workshops, etc.  I think the 2200 is a great printer for your goals.  It was tough for me to get good, neutral B&W prints, so if that is your main focus then you might not be happy; the next generation had better B&W capabilities.  However, my guess is that others have been more successful than me getting neutral prints (I never used a RIP with that printer).  I simply settled for a warm tone on all my B&W prints.

Dave
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KenBabcock

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #3 on: May 23, 2010, 01:35:03 pm »

I still have a 2200 that I purchased about 7 years ago.  I haven't used it in quite some time simply because I upgraded to larger printers.  

The 2200 produced very good results, but was too small for my gallery wraps.
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Eridium

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #4 on: May 23, 2010, 06:01:07 pm »

Thanks everyone for taking the time to reply.

I've read frightening discussions about how the 2200 didn't work with Mac OS X.6 Snow Leopard.  Though a driver was later released, I'm not sure if the issue has been resolved.

Have you been able to use the Epson 2200 successfully with:

1. Mac OS X.6   (This is my main concern)
2. Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop?

The seller says she had a professional custom icc profile made: is this universally portable?  I must have different monitors/settings than she has at home.

Concerns arise from:
http://photo.net/digital-darkroom-forum/00UOjF
Not sure if it's completely solved by this release:
http://photo.net/digital-darkroom-forum/00VAEs

Thank you for your answers.
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KenBabcock

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #5 on: May 23, 2010, 11:00:03 pm »

I've never used the 2200 on a Mac platform, only PC.

I printed from Photoshop all the time when I used my 2200.

Do you plan on using the same media as the seller?  Otherwise the custom ICC profile is useless to you.  I wouldn't worry about that at this point though.  You can get pretty accurate results with RGB 1998.  When you become more experienced and upgrade to a LF printer, then you can worry about custom profiles.

For now, have fun with it and learn.
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Eridium

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #6 on: May 24, 2010, 01:28:24 am »

Quote from: KenBabcock
Do you plan on using the same media as the seller?  Otherwise the custom ICC profile is useless to you.

Thanks Ken, but what do you mean by "using the same media as the seller?"

Does that mean the same paper?

Would my monitors also have to be the same as the seller's?  Are ICC profiles portable once they've been generated for a unique printer, so that they can be used on any computer?

I'm new to printing so am not familiar with these issues.  Thanks again.
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KenBabcock

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #7 on: May 24, 2010, 01:52:19 am »

You would need to use the same paper and ink to be able to effectively use that custom profile.

If you decide to use a 3rd party ink, or different paper, then the profile is useless.  You can use the same profile on multiple 2200 printers, but that profile was created using ink and paper that the previous owner used.  If you change paper or ink manufacturers you would then need another custom profile to suit your media and/or ink changes.

That's why I said to just use the RGB 1998 profile for now until you get the hang of it.  It is not 100% accurate, but it is pretty close (as in most of the general population would never know the difference).  You will still get very good results.

I can't remember if Bill Atkinson ever made profiles for the 2200.  I think he did, but I could be wrong.  If so, Google him and download his free ICC profiles.  They're very good and he shares them for no cost at all.

Your monitor does not have to be the same as the seller's, however, it does have to be calibrated so that what you see is what you print.  Otherwise you're going to have fits trying to print what you are seeing.
« Last Edit: May 24, 2010, 01:53:43 am by KenBabcock »
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tongelsing

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #8 on: May 24, 2010, 03:37:15 am »

I own a 2100 which is the european version of the 2200. With my Mac OS10.6 and CS4 my prints were almost two stops too dark (despite profiling). There is no printerdriver-update for the 2100 so I installed the latest  driver for the 2200. The 2100 works fine with  the 2200 driver.  I made a printerprofile with the Datacolor Spider and since then since then everything is working perfectly.

So I guess that with  this driver installed on a 2200 with OS10.6 and CS4  you will no have dark print issues.

Ton
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Mike Bailey

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #9 on: May 24, 2010, 06:18:35 am »

One thing to find out is the volume of use the 2200 has had.  When a status check and/or nozzle alignment check is done, a row of numbers is printed on the top of the sheet.  The last four numbers, in hex, is a measure of how full the waste ink pads are.  Somewhere around hex D6B6, the print driver for the Epson 2200 will start issuing a warning.  Once hex FFFF is reached, the printer will no longer work since it will claim that the waste ink pads are full.  This can either be reset by a combination of hidden button combinations on the printer, OR the priinter would need to be serviced to replace the printer pads - which makes it no longer a bargin used.  Typically you can get a second cycle of use out of the printer waste ink pads as they are generally far from full, but just having this status would indicate the printer has been very heavily used for a long period of time.

Of the two Epson 2200 printers I used for many years, one finally began to have head clogs routinely after sitting for only a day or so without use.  The other is still working, but I had to reset the waste ink counter.  Regardless, due to the age and use, it is harder to keep the printer in alignment.

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Anthony R

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #10 on: May 24, 2010, 11:45:29 am »

The 2200 still makes fine prints, but as a purchase, I'd shy away. It's old tech and the ink cartridges will kill you as an expense vs just buying a new, more efficient printer with larger cartridges like the 3800 or 3880. It was great in the day and like I said, makes nice prints still but I'm replacing mine for this reason and the potential issues with a new computer and OS.
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Eridium

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #11 on: May 25, 2010, 01:46:40 am »

Quote from: Anthony R
The 2200 still makes fine prints, but as a purchase, I'd shy away. It's old tech and the ink cartridges will kill you as an expense vs just buying a new, more efficient printer with larger cartridges like the 3800 or 3880.

The seller is offering it with its present (being used) set of inks and one set of new inks.
Will I be blasting through those inks in a matter of weeks?

And the 38x0s use a lot less ink for the same size photo?  If anyone knows of a review site that compares new vs old Epsons, I'd love to see a URL.
I might have unrealistic expectations that a printer with 1.5 sets of ink will last me a while.

http://jimdoty.com/Digital/Epson_2200/2200.../2200_ink2.html

The 3880 looks great, but is $1200.
It seems like a lot of original 2200 owners are dumping their printers for upgrades now that the 3880 has been released.

By the way, I only print color photos, so the 2200's poor B&W performance is a non-issue.
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dchew

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #12 on: May 25, 2010, 06:15:54 am »

I have Snow Leopard and the 2200 works fine with Lightroom and Photoshop as long as you download the newest driver.  I could not get it to work with a wireless print server; needs to be connected directly via USB.

Dave

Quote from: Eridium
Thanks everyone for taking the time to reply.

I've read frightening discussions about how the 2200 didn't work with Mac OS X.6 Snow Leopard.  Though a driver was later released, I'm not sure if the issue has been resolved.

Have you been able to use the Epson 2200 successfully with:

1. Mac OS X.6   (This is my main concern)
2. Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop?
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Desmond

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #13 on: May 25, 2010, 11:53:34 am »

Try looking at the lyson CIS for 2200.
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Regards,

Desmond

ChuckLoftis

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Epson 2200 - still a good printer?
« Reply #14 on: May 25, 2010, 11:18:47 pm »

Quote from: Eridium
Thanks everyone for taking the time to reply.

I've read frightening discussions about how the 2200 didn't work with Mac OS X.6 Snow Leopard.  Though a driver was later released, I'm not sure if the issue has been resolved.

Have you been able to use the Epson 2200 successfully with:

1. Mac OS X.6   (This is my main concern)
2. Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop?

The seller says she had a professional custom icc profile made: is this universally portable?  I must have different monitors/settings than she has at home.

Concerns arise from:
http://photo.net/digital-darkroom-forum/00UOjF
Not sure if it's completely solved by this release:
http://photo.net/digital-darkroom-forum/00VAEs

Thank you for your answers.

Dear Eridium:
I have recently dusted off my 2200 and began to print under 10.6.3 OSX on a 4 core intel machine. With the latest drivers from EPSON and Apple (May 2010) I still have issues using the legacy ICC printer profiles.  

However I updated my Datacolor print profiler to Spyder3Print and was able to develop good profiles that are working better than the available Ilford profiles for Semigloss (Smooth Pearl) paper. The issues with the present OS/DRIVERS and OLDER PROFILES was that I was seeing green-cyan in the prints. (Problem disappears under OS 10.5.8)

If I printed a small test patch (say 4x4" image at the bottom of 8.5x 11 paper from Photoshop), the printer would not scroll directly to the image, but would print a light tone over the entire page! This happened with Epson (2003) profiles and Ilford profiles (2004,2008) available on the web. With my new CUSTOM profile, the printer scrolled directly to the test image, and did not overspray the page. My new profile is quite acceptable. If the drivers change, I may have to regenerate the profile - something non linear is going on here.

BOTTOM LINE: EPSON provided no useful web based help to this issue and does not appear to recognize the problem. (There are also other issues with the driver.) I have found nothing on the Apple Forum that directly addresses this issue.

My custom profile DOES WORK (obviously if I let Photoshop control the color).

A custom PRINTER profile is transportable from computer to computer (technically), but there could be license issues with some profiling equipment with respect to sharing of profiles. The computer/display would need its own unique display profile, not related to the printer profile.

Im holding off buying a 2880 or 3880, until I see more data that show these devises work well under 10.6.x. It is speculative to say that the 3800 is better supported by Epson, being a "professional" printer. Possible, but not guaranteed. My first post on the LL Forum - hope this helps
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