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Author Topic: epson 3800 not printing anymore  (Read 5819 times)

zobeleye

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epson 3800 not printing anymore
« on: April 10, 2013, 09:43:37 pm »

hi there,
another interesting thing after lots of printing issues with snow leopard and Epson a couple of years ago.
i am on 10.6.8 and my printer used to work just fine the last 3 years.
now i am on LR 4.4 and all of a sudden i can't get deep blacks anymore and the overall colour reproduction is way off.
now i haven't updated anything except LR.
first thought it's the printer but service just confirmed that it is working just fine at their place.
so before i sent it in, I reinstalled the driver, deleted the printer and set it up again in the print and fax dialog.
but to no avail.
any suggestions what else i could try?
cheers
stephan
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howardm

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #1 on: April 11, 2013, 07:48:33 am »

just changing to LR4.4 should not have caused that :( 

Is it possible that you're double profiling?

I think the next thing would be to 'reset' the printing system.  Usually, that can be done in the Printing Pref by right-clicking on the printer list (although I think on some versions of OSX, it may require an Alt/Option/Cmd too (it changes ;) ) and then re-add the printer.

zobeleye

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #2 on: April 12, 2013, 05:43:04 am »

got the printer back and it printed.
one picture. perfect picture.
but only that one . after that same old sxxx .
done everything now there ever was recommended.
reset, reinstalled, changed cable, changed usb bus, no clue anymore.
maybe it was apple's last security update...
should i get a canon printer, or HP ?
cheers
stephan

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howardm

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #3 on: April 12, 2013, 09:33:10 am »

if the unit printed out even 1 good print, then that tells me that the unit is probably fine as-is and buying a new one is a great way to drop several hundred $$$ and may solve the problem only by going around it.

zobeleye

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #4 on: April 12, 2013, 05:33:01 pm »

i am totally aware of that.
it's just that i had a lot of software issues with epson printers, when migrating to snow leopard.
and i'm sick of epson and apple playing ball...
maybe i should just update to mountain lion ?
but then i'd have other issues with other software.
so i'm kind of stuck
but thanks for the comments anyway
stephan

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Wayne Fox

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #5 on: April 13, 2013, 12:25:27 am »

i am totally aware of that.
it's just that i had a lot of software issues with epson printers, when migrating to snow leopard.
and i'm sick of epson and apple playing ball...
maybe i should just update to mountain lion ?
but then i'd have other issues with other software.
so i'm kind of stuck
but thanks for the comments anyway
stephan


I have many customers on Epson printers including 3800's with Lion and Mountain Lion printing just fine (not sure but probably a few still running Snow leopard although I wouldn't recommend that with CS6 or LR 4 even though Adobe says it's OK).  the symptom you describe does not sound like normal problems with Epson/Mac printing, even back to the snow leopard problem, and there really wasn't anything about LR 4.4 that should have broken printing based on the pipeline..  Not saying that it isn't, just doesn't sound like anything I've seen or heard on forums before.

If you've fixed the issues going from Leopard to Snow leopard, and have installed the correct drivers, things should work, but upgrading the OS is certainly something that you might want to consider. Currently epson and Macs play together just fine.  Even with Snow leopard, once Epson updated the drivers things were fine, and most solved these problems a few years ago, but who knows what current software like LR is expecting.

You may want to take a look at this, and do a complete clean out of the printer system.  If you do decide to upgrade to mountain lion, I would recommend a fresh install then migrate your data and resintall your apps.  This will get a lot of stuff cleaned out (much which has nothing to do with this but good to get rid of it).

Make sure to never install Apples Epson driver updates, they are designed for the consumer printers, you will lose many of the options that are needed for their better printers.
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zobeleye

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #6 on: April 13, 2013, 04:14:46 am »

Just located the problem.
Everything is just fine with LR4.1.
When i use 4.4 i get the communication errors.
I'll check 4.3 now and see what happens.
Would like to use 4.4 though since i do a lot with fuji rafs and they are better converted in 4.4
Will keep you posted
Cheers
Stephan
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zobeleye

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #7 on: May 16, 2013, 06:26:42 pm »

OK...
updated to 10.8.3.
no communication errors anymore.
BUT...
i am printing a lot to epson archival matte paper and have created a profile for that paper, which used to be very colouraccurate.
now when i print i am getting a weird magenta colour cast with that paper.
same with my profile as with the other profiles epson offers for matte paper in the printing dialogue.
the new printerdriver offers 3 different matte option, each with a different profile associated to it.
now i'm aware that when i choose a paper profile in LR, the epson colour management should be deactivated and it is greyed out indeed.
but when i look at preset dialogue i see that it changes profiles according to the sort of matte paper i choose in the printing dialogue.
this could be normal and not affecting the output since the epson CM is deactivated anyway, but i noticed when i tried to find out what's going on.
so why does my profile not produce the colours anymore that it did 3 months ago?
i checked the file and it's in prophoto, same as always.
any ideas?
cheers
stephan
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zobeleye

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #8 on: May 16, 2013, 07:47:21 pm »

just printed another file on epson archival matte.
orig. looks like this(colour)
print looks like this(pic of print)
not kidding
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Sal Baker

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #9 on: May 16, 2013, 10:52:14 pm »

It looks like your black channel/head is completely clogged.  Have you done a nozzle check?

Sal
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zobeleye

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #10 on: May 16, 2013, 11:38:01 pm »

2 weeks ago, yes and the printer was in service 4 weeks ago.
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Sal Baker

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Re: epson 3800 not printing anymore
« Reply #11 on: May 17, 2013, 07:03:58 am »

The print head can clog suddenly and at any time.  You should run a new nozzle check and see if all the nozzles are functional.

Sal
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