Epson 3880: on/off daily or leave on

[ymc226]

Now that my son if off to college, I get to use his room which is next to my bedroom as my digital darkroom instead of the basement which I never ventured during the week.  I'm finding that I turn on my MacMini and the NEC PA 27 and 24 3-4x/week along with my printer instead of on several times a month to adjust and print photos. 

With regard to printer longevity, is there a difference between turning the printer on and off each time (usage only after work and dinner for an hour or two) or just leave everything on with the monitors/Mac Mini programed to go to sleep shortly?

[Mark D Segal]

Turn the printer off when you are not using it to make prints.

[Leszek Piotrowski]

I have left my 3880 off when not printing. No problems thus far.  I output prints every 3 or 4 months. Trust this helps.

[howardm]

I leave mine on and it goes to sleep w/o having to do the entire 'wake from power off' thing.

I, for one, don't really believe the 'you must turn it fully off to get the wiper blade assembly to seal the head correctly' theory
and to my mind, no one has proved it.  If someone has real-world proof, I'd like to see it.

[elliot_n]

My 3880 switches itself off automatically, about 8 hours after I last used it. I can't remember ever setting up this 'auto-off' feature, so I've left it as it is. My previous printer was a 3800, and I left that on all the time.

[Mark D Segal]

I leave mine on and it goes to sleep w/o having to do the entire 'wake from power off' thing.

I, for one, don't really believe the 'you must turn it fully off to get the wiper blade assembly to seal the head correctly' theory
and to my mind, no one has proved it.  If someone has real-world proof, I'd like to see it.

I have no formal proof either - never had any interest in testing it; however, I do recall Epson recommending to shut the printer after use, but that goes some time back so I forget the context and the details. I don't consider it a big deal to fire it up when I need to use it, but each to their own.

[BillK]

Over the last several years I have owned 2 3800's and currently have a 3880.  I have only turned them off when I will be out of town for a few days or longer.
While I haven't kept records, I have the distinct impression that all of them do more frequent cleaning cycles on start up from off, than start up from sleep mode.
For that reason I leave them on and let them go into sleep mode.  I confirmed with Epson tech support that the head is parked and capped in sleep mode.

None of these printers have had serious clogging problems over several years and thousands of prints.

[BradSmith]

I haven't turned my 3800 off in 4 or 5 years and only have to do a couple nozzle cleans per year.  Other than the minor electrical cost, I've seen no downside to my practice.
Brad

[Ken Bennett]

Interesting responses. The worst clog I ever had with my 3800 was after leaving it running for two weeks without making any prints.

[John V.]

fwiw, the 11880 likes to stay on all the time. Rarely a bad nozzle check (daily). The 4900 likes to be off when not in use. Leaving it on seems to result in more bad nozzle checks. It's fairly humid here.