Epson 7890 Origins

[BobDavid]

Are the 7890s manufactured in China?  I used to own a 9900. I bought it over four years ago. Seems to me it was made in Japan. Any thoughts?

[Pat O'Connor]

Mine was according to the labels. Bought 2 years ago and still have parts of the cardboard crate, used as temporary flat surfaces for drying canvases on.

[Christoph C. Feldhaim]

Mine was made in China. Bought ~1.5 years ago.

[enduser]

I remember my sigh of relief when I unpacked our iPF6100 5 years ago and seeing the "Made in Japan" sticker.  We buy Canon SLRs and always buy the "Kiss" model because it too is made in  Japan for their very picky consumers.

Just a thought - what if clogging Epsons have Chinese heads and the non cloggers are Japanese made.   

[BobDavid]

There is an Epson marketing guy lurking about this forum (I forgot his name). I wonder if he may answer our questions about where the 7890 printers and print heads are manufactured. I wonder if there credence to a higher incidence of head clogging and failure with those manufactured in Japan versus China. I had always assumed that the heads were made in Japan.

[Farmer]

The sticker on the printer refers to where the printer was assembled and not necessarily where individual components are manufactured.

Also bear in mind that Epson actually owns production facilities in China, unlike some vendors (of various things, not just printers) who outsource to third party Chinese firms for manufacturing:

http://global.epson.com/company/global_network/index.html#anchor4

[Wayne Fox]

Not sure as why it matters. We all know Chinese manufacturing runs the full gauntlet of quality from as cheap as it gets to world class.

As far as Epson, according to this map published by them, Epson owns 23 manufacturing facilities spread around the far east as well as a few in the U.S.  It doesn’t show any located in Japan itself, which is surprising. Who knows what is made at each, and certainly some parts are out sourced.  But it appears they have full control of the process.

As far as clogging, it’s pretty much an end user issue, printers in dirty/dry environments that aren’t used much require a lot more attention and can be more problematic.  Canon printers will require head replacements far more often in these circumstances, epsons will required cleaning cycles.  I had an Epson 7800, switched to a ipf6100, and went back to Epson because there is no way I used 600-700 of ink a year to keep it running, and the Canon had heads die in the first 8 months, (fortunately replaced by warranty), then again in another 7 months.  So pick your poison ...

[BobDavid]

Very interesting...I figured Epson conducted its R&D in Japan, not to mention manufacturing printer heads.