Epson 7800 or 4900?

[perreault]

Hello! I need advice on a printer choice.

I am an amateur photographer, I now print my images on an Epson 2880 and I want to make bigger prints so I am looking for a 17 or 24 inches printer. My mind was set on a 4900 but I found a lightly used 7800 for a reasonable price. I print exclusively with photoblack ink. My preferred paper is Ilford Gold Fibre silk. I can make my own icc profiles. I have enough room for either printer. I know they are big.

Anyone have experience with these two printers? How does the print quality compare? Is it a problem to find ink cartridges, maintenance tank or cutter blade for the "old" 7800? If the 7800 fails, will it be difficult to have it serviced? To find parts?

Any advice to help me make the choice will be greatly appreciated.

Yves

[tmphoto]

Anyone have experience with these two printers? How does the print quality compare? Is it a problem to find ink cartridges, maintenance tank or cutter blade for the "old" 7800? If the 7800 fails, will it be difficult to have it serviced? To find parts?

I received a 4900 brochure with a color and a B&W prints on luster paper. I scanned the prints and reprinted with a 7800 on Epson PPG. Without any major edits the 7800 prints were very close to the 7900 prints on my first try and I probably could have tweaked the files and print again for a closer match. Actually, my brother preferred the 7800 prints.

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1003&message=41542746

[Peter Le]

    If you are not going to be printing constantly I would stay away from both of them......I mean almost daily. Even printing weekly will cause clogging problems with both of the printers you mention and you will use most of your ink cleaning.
     If you can get away with 17in I would go with a 3880....although it has no roll feeder you can still cut from a roll and get longer prints that way. I have a 6 year old 3800 and it has sat for over 3 months with no use. Start it up and have a perfect nozzle check almost every time. I had a 7800 that ran pretty well .....but constantly was clogging and used a lot of ink getting it clear. I have a new 7890 that is used almost daily most of the time (every now and then it sets for a few days....but always run something through once a week). It has started dropping whole color channels and constantly needs cleaning....it is not even a year old. Epson can't figure out what is up with it and the techs from Decision One are.....a little lacking. If I were looking for a large format printer (which will probably be sooner then later) I would seriously be looking at Canon. Of course this is just my experiance....but if you look around you will find endless info on Epson clogging.....seems the new ones are almost worse....
    PS: I monitor humidity....keep it very clean....monitor and clean wiper blade and flush box....the works and still have these problems. Some don't...but it really seems to be an expensive crap shoot....

[aduke]

I, too, am an amateur. About eighteen months ago, I purchased a 4880 because I wanted bigger prints. The printer really does prefer to work every day. A few days off and there is work necessary to get it to print properly again.

One thing that I noticed immediately was that, even though I have several walls available for prints, the 16 x 24 prints produced reduce the number of prints that can be displayed significantly. If I were producing 22 x 33, I would have room for eight or nine instead of the 14 to 16 that can be hung now, and the 22 or 23 12 x 18 prints that were hung before the 4880 arrived.

Alan

[bill t.]

You will always wish you had a printer that is one size up from the one you got.  Until you get to 44".  Or maybe 60".

Wow, I had a 7800 and then a 9880 and my everyday relationship with those printers was as emotional and up and down as anything you read about in the National Enquirer.  I am sure that will come as a surprise to so many people here.

Bottom line, I could make those printers do what I wanted, but sometimes I had to get rough.  The bottles of Windex and distilled water were never far away, as was the roll of lint-free blue Scott towels.  And I knew how to use them.

I honestly don't think down times in the range of 1 or 2 weeks had much effect, but don't stretch it out too far without a narrow tray of water tucked up in the head parking area, which you must remember to replenish.  And keep your docking station and wiper blade in good order.  But as the memories start to return, I just realized that if I needed to replace my printer I would rather take out a mortgage on the house and buy a new Canon iPF than save some dough on a used 7800.  It was all too S&M.

However, the prints that crept out of that 7800 could not be faulted, except for pilot error.  Their only offence was that sometimes they weren't as big as I would have liked.

[petermfiore]

I have a 7800 and have been using it since it was introduced. At times it will sit unused for a months. Never had a clog.
After writing this post I hesitated to hit post for fear my 7800 will...............

You get the idea?



Peter

[perreault]

Thank you for your input!
I decided to go with the 7800. It is now installed and working in my basement.
Now I have to order some paper. Based on many reviews, and Michael's opinion in Camera to Print and Screen, i am inclined to try Canson Baryta Photographique.

Yves