Epson R390 Photo Printer

[Austen]

We have just purchased a new injet printer, officially called an

Epson Stylus Photo R390, commonly known as an Epson R390.

This printer is to replace an Epson C83 which we had for a couple of years, but which reached an early death.

Cut and pasting some basic specifications gives us....................

3.5" color LCD and memory card slots to print PC-free

Borderless 4" x 6" photos in as fast as 13 sec and better than lab quality in as fast as 32 seconds

Clariaâ„¢ ink for photos that stay brilliant

Automatic photo correction with red-eye reduction- like having a lab technician inside

Direct printing onto CDs/DVDs

PC-free photo printing from cameras or phones

Ultra hi-definition prints set a new standard in digital photography

6 individual ink cartridges

Claria Hi-Definition Ink (smudge, scratch, water and fade resistant)

Up to 200 year album storage

DX5 technology produces 5 microscopically small ink droplet sizes, some as small as 1.5 Picoliters, for the smoothest gradations and grain free photos.

Maximum Resolution (dots per inch) 5760 x 1440 optimized dpi

Black text up to 30 ppm

Color text up to 30 ppm

Built-in Memory Card slots CompactFlash® Type I, CompactFlash Type II, Secure Digital (SD®), SDHC®, Microdrive®, xD-Picture Card®, Memory Stick®, Memory StickPRO® and MagicGate® Memory Stick

Front PictBridge port (print from digital cameras and mobile phones, PC-free), DPOF

PC-free Printing

* Select and print photos

* Crop, rotate and enlarge

* Print-by-date

* Photo index sheet

Direct CD/DVD Printing

Supports plain paper, Epson Premium Bright White Paper, Photo Paper Glossy, Premium Photo Paper Glossy, Ultra Premium Photo Paper Glossy,Premium Photo Paper Luster, Premium Photo Paper Semi-gloss, Presentation Paper Matte,Premium Presentation Paper Matte and Matte Scrapbook Paper (letter)

Input Paper Capacity 120 sheets plain paper, 20 sheets Premium Photo Paper Glossy

To take these claims one at a time ...............................

3.5" color LCD and memory card slots to print PC-free

The first "Wow-Factor" occurs when you first power up this baby. (OK, Not a baby, more on this later). The brilliant full-colour screen really stands out as it keeps you informed as it goes through its POST.

Borderless 4" x 6" photos in as fast as 13 sec and better than lab quality in as fast as 32 seconds

I have yet to try the default (13 second) mode, but I cannot fault the claim that the photos are "better than lab quality" in 32 seconds for a 4" x 6" photo. The first time the printer shoots out a full-colour photo of this quality and at this speed, it's jaw-dropping.

Clariaâ„¢ ink for photos that stay brilliant

By all independent reviews, this is a quantum leap in ink technology. See above comments about "better than lab quality".

Automatic photo correction with red-eye reduction- like having a lab technician inside

Have not yet tried this feature, maybe because I photo-shop my image files first, but an "interesting" claim.

Direct printing onto CDs/DVDs

Woo-Hoo !!! At last I can print on CD's and DVD's. First one I tried was a silver-surface printable, it came out looking like water drops on a newly polished car, I passed the disk to boy-child who was able to confirm without any doubt that the ink takes longer then 60 seconds to dry. Epson recommends 24 hours, and who am I to argue ?? Second try was on a white printable DVD. Much better results but not "brilliant" (in the literal sense of the word). Good, very good even, but not brilliant. A product of my particular DVD brand or is this the best that printable DVD's can be done ? More experimentation is going to be needed here....

PC-free photo printing from cameras or phones

If you buy the optional BlueTooth adaptor (see also below regarding memory cards).

Ultra hi-definition prints set a new standard in digital photography

See above regarding quality.

6 individual ink cartridges

So when one runs out you only need replace that one. The seller advised me that Light Magenta and yellow are used more in photo printing. My limited experience is bearing this out.

Claria Hi-Definition Ink (smudge, scratch, water and fade resistant)

The DuraBrite inks in my previous Epson were also promoted as water resistant. A vendor gave me an Epson promotional item, which was a sealed jar of water containing a print printed with the DuraBrite inks. I have no reason to believe these are any less water resistant. Is this important ? I mightn't of thought so, but previously to my other printer, water smudges always seemed to appear as if by magic, a drop of perspiration here, a wet hand there.....

Up to 200 year album storage

This is born out by independent studies, reports indicate that this ink technology may be getting close to actually outlasting some papers that it is printed on, and definitely, by several times, outlasting traditional photographs.

DX5 technology produces 5 microscopically small ink droplet sizes, some as small as 1.5 Picoliters, for the smoothest gradations and grain free photos.

Maximum Resolution (dots per inch) 5760 x 1440 optimized dpi

Really small drops, in five different sizes, leads to high quality prints.

Black text up to 30 ppm

Color text up to 30 ppm

And it's fast. Darn fast.

Built-in Memory Card slots CompactFlash® Type I, CompactFlash Type II, Secure Digital (SD®), SDHC®, Microdrive®, xD-Picture Card®, Memory Stick®, Memory StickPRO® and MagicGate® Memory Stick

This seems to work as advertised. After setting the printer up, the first thing we did was to simply slip girl-childs camera SD Card into it. It recognised the card, we scrolled through the pictures on the colour screen, found one she liked and pressed "Print". 30 seconds later, there was her photo. As easy as that.

Front PictBridge port (print from digital cameras and mobile phones, PC-free), DPOF

You can also plug your camera into the printer, no need to even pull the card out, but is pulling the card out easier than having to find your USB cable every time you want to print ??? Possibly so.

PC-free Printing

* Select and print photos

* Crop, rotate and enlarge

* Print-by-date

* Photo index sheet

Blah blah blah......

Supports plain paper, Epson Premium Bright White Paper, Photo Paper Glossy, Premium Photo Paper Glossy, Ultra Premium Photo Paper Glossy,Premium Photo Paper Luster, Premium Photo Paper Semi-gloss, Presentation Paper Matte,Premium Presentation Paper Matte and Matte Scrapbook Paper (letter)

And you can use lots of different types of paper in it...........

Input Paper Capacity 120 sheets plain paper, 20 sheets Premium Photo Paper Glossy

Up to 120 sheets at a time !!!

What's that you say ???? " OK, So cut to the chase...Tell me what I want to know....."

OK, It's big....453 (W) x 538 (D) x 285 (H) mm and 6.9kg.

The print quality on Premium Glossy Photo Paper is unbelievable. 4" x 6" borderless, and A4 borderless are just a wonder to behold.

As is to be expected on most inkjet printers, the text quality is excellent, but we have a $99 OfficeWorks Special Brother Laser printer for our text and black and white printing.

So, The downsides ? Just the one......It's unbelievably expensive to run. There are no shortage of "compatible" cartridges on E-Bay, but many of them go as far as stating up-front that while their inks are very good, the best after-market inks you can buy, they still are not as good as the genuine Clariaâ„¢ inks. We're still on the supplied set, and the light magenta and yellow ink levels are dropping like a stone, with other colours following not all that far behind. Of course, Epson would point out that the first set of cartridges don't last as long as normal as they are used to prime the brand-new printer.....

I've deliberately avoided giving estimates of page costs as your costs will vary depending on if you buy genuine or compatible cartridges, whether you buy them locally or over the 'Net, and finally whether you use the "standard" or "high capacity" inks. Depending on where you shop, genuine cartridges will set you back somewhere from $10 - $30 each. Be aware however, that no matter where you get your inks from, this baby is gonna cost you plenty to run, but in return she'll deliver stunning A4 borderless photos, better then your local photo lab, and in about two minutes.

Finally, for the brave-at-heart, an after-market CISS is available.....This is a Continuous Ink Supply System, that basically means you have six bottles of ink next to your printer with tubes running into modified cartridges that are kept continuously full. But not with genuine Epson Claria inks.....

Recommendation.......Buy one, buy one now for all your colour photo-printing, and while you're at OfficeWorks pick up a cheap laser printer for your black and white printing.

Austen.

[ton]

You win the award for longest post

[geoffman]

We're still on the supplied set, and the light magenta and yellow ink levels are dropping like a stone, with other colours following not all that far behind. Of course, Epson would point out that the first set of cartridges don't last as long as normal as they are used to prime the brand-new printer.....

You will find this is true with most ink jet printers, as most of them are supplied with "starter" cartridges that do not contain a full ink load out, this is done for various reasons (the obvious one is so the manufacturer can get a bit more money out of you ).

My Epson R310 was did the same as well as the Canon I had before it.

You will find your comment on DVD/CD printing is about normal, none that I have ever printed have been as "bright" as a paper print, I believe this is due to the printable surface of the DVD, when you examine it closely you will find it slightly rough, more so than paper, this allows the ink to adhere to it better without smudging or "pooling" (which you found out when you used a shiny silver one [which are made for a thermal printing process BT]).

Enjoy your purchase as the Epson R series printers are great units, it should give you long and trouble free service

P.S. Was the software/driver provided with it Vista compatible?

[CoNFooZeD]

I'm a bit reluctant to buy another Epson printer after my experience with an older inkjet (Epson 680). The ink cartridges have a chip on them which "estimates" how much ink is left in the tank based on the number of pages you print, and will prevent you from printing when it decides it is time to buy a new cartridge regardless of how much ink is actually left. It will also prevent you from printing in black and white if your colour cartrige has expired even if you have a new black cartridge. When you install a non genuine cartridge it is programed to clean the heads repeatedly when you print so it is slower and doesn't last as long, and it displays warning messages on the screen.

Are the new cartridges chip free?

[geoffman]

No they are not chip free.

However they do not prevent you from printing in black and white if any of the colour cartridges are empty, nor do they estimate ink levels, they measure the ink content in the cartridge somehow.

Can't comment on the non genuiune cartridge behaviour at all, as I have never used a non genuine ink cartridge.

[Austen]

.......You will find this is true with most ink jet printers, as most of them are supplied with "starter" cartridges that do not contain a full ink load out, this is done for various reasons (the obvious one is so the manufacturer can get a bit more money out of you ).

My research for this one shows that for this printer the cartridges supplied are the "standard" size ones. For this printer Epson makes "standard" and "high capacity" cartridges (much harder to find normally).

You will find your comment on DVD/CD printing is about normal, none that I have ever printed have been as "bright" as a paper print..........

I was afraid that might of been the case

P.S. Was the software/driver provided with it Vista compatible?

According to Epson, Yes.......

..........However they do not prevent you from printing in black and white if any of the colour cartridges are empty, nor do they estimate ink levels, they measure the ink content in the cartridge somehow.......

In my experience with Epson printers, once one is empty you need to replace the it before any more printing can happen...According to Epson...............

You cannot continue printing with one ink cartridge expended, even if the other cartridges still contain ink. Before printing, replace the expended cartridge.

Austen.

[geoffman]

[ In my experience with Epson printers, once one is empty you need to replace the it before any more printing can happen...According to Epson...............

You cannot continue printing with one ink cartridge expended, even if the other cartridges still contain ink. Before printing, replace the expended cartridge.

Austen.

Hmmm, I could have sworn that I have printed in black and white on my R310 with an empty colour cartridge by telling the driver only to print in black and white.

[Austen]

[ In my experience with Epson printers, once one is empty you need to replace the it before any more printing can happen...According to Epson...............

You cannot continue printing with one ink cartridge expended, even if the other cartridges still contain ink. Before printing, replace the expended cartridge.

Austen.

Hmmm, I could have sworn that I have printed in black and white on my R310 with an empty colour cartridge by telling the driver only to print in black and white.

Couldn't with my C83 .................But AFAIK the R-Series are a completely different animal ?

Austen.

(Caniffe...Relevant double quoting *peeks from under bridge*)

[Thudd1503560234]

but I cannot fault the claim that the photos are "better than lab quality"

I know that the photo inkjets are pretty good nowadays, but "better than lab quality"? Are we talking "better than a well maintained Fuji Frontier"? Because I take my pictures (as lossless tiffs derived from raw files - 30-40 meg each!) to the local Frontier lab and, well, they're pretty good, especially the blacks. I blew up a night shot I took to A4 matte and the blacks in the print are pretty damn good indeed - no banding, no graduations, totally seamless across the whole picture.

And quality aside, even if the printer is as good as the lab, I wonder what the cost comparison is. Any chance you could estimate how many 4x6's you could get out of a full set of cartridges and how that compares with the 15-30 cents for 4x6's at the local lab? (although I generally do 5x7 anyway)

[Austen]

Thudd,

"Better than lab quality" is a quote from Epson, but in all honesty, I just couldn't fault the 4 x 6" prints, but I'd agree that, in all probability, photographers with a sharp eye would be able to see a difference between my wife's 7 Mp Fuji camera printed on the R390 and your 30 Mb TIFF printed on a $250,000 mini-lab.

I'd be happy to put my hand on my heart and say "Just as good as a lab print for 99% of the population"

As far as cost goes, there's no comparison, even Teds at $0.50c would (I'm guessing) be cheaper, but then again, when monster-in-law is around, wife takes picture, picture comes out pretty good, wife want to print picture.......Taking the Memory Card out of the camera, putting it in the printer and 30 seconds later giving monster-in-law a photograph that she thinks looks like it came from the lab, is a pretty hard act to follow..............

Costs are a hard item to actually quantify, if you work next to Teds the "transport" cost is $0, whereas if you need to drive 10Km to the local print-shop and 10Km back home, then that 20Km worth of petrol has to be factored in...........How much do you discount the "convenience factor" of being able to show wife photo 60 seconds after she took it ?

Notice the subtitle of the thread was "Keeping the rich poor" !!!!

Austen.

P.S..... Google "Claria inks" and see some reviews.....................

[Thudd1503560234]

True enough, true enough, horses for courses I guess. I don't have the monster-in-law factor and the majority of my pictures come from holidays, on return from which I'll dive into the workflow and spit out hundreds of files in a very short period to print out. And the lab is 5 minutes away which works well for me

[Cooksta59]

My research for this one shows that for this printer the cartridges supplied are the "standard" size ones. For this printer Epson makes "standard" and "high capacity" cartridges (much harder to find normally).

Austen.

Hi Austen I have an Epson as well cx4700.

regarding the cartridges I have found the high capacity black cartridges at JB for my model.

I have never seen any high capacity colour cartridges anywhere for my model.Will have to check out wether they are available

[Austen]

.........I have never seen any high capacity colour cartridges anywhere for my model.Will have to check out wether they are available

I have found the high capacity ones both on E-Bay and also here in Adelaide at Inkjetcity.*

They have recently moved due to the South Rd / Anzac Hwy roadworks and are now right opposite Castle Plaza, Edwardstown.

Austen.

*Standard disclaimer

[geoffman]

If high capacity cartridges are listed for your printer and you reeeeeally want them, you can purchase them online through the Epson Australia site. (sure you're going to pay a premium for them this way).

[50mxe20]

Did I miss it in the first epilogue.

Did you list a price?

[Austen]

Did I miss it in the first epilogue.

Did you list a price?

No, I deliberately stayed away from quoting cartridge prices, for one thing, the special Claria ink is exclusive to Epson, even the refillers say that their inks aren't as good as the original inks.

Also, with the "chips" you cannot use USA cartridges, only Asia-Pacific ones.

Austen.

(Brother HL-1430 for black and white )

[LiQuID1503561603]

I Love my Epson R390

Edited September 19, 2007 by LiQuID

[Austen]

It's still going fine, when I was on my last Melbourne trip I stocked up with a few sets of grey-market sets, but we really don't use it all that much, generally we use the wife's Officeworks-special laser............

Austen.

[Darrylp]

Does the printer automatically do a print head clean on start-up?

The Canon Pixma IP8500 appears to but its no longer available and I'm considering a replacement for mine.

On an Epsom I had a few years back, if I didn't use it for a few weeks, I found the nozzles clogged up.

Darryl

[Jliang70]

Does the printer automatically do a print head clean on start-up?

The Canon Pixma IP8500 appears to but its no longer available and I'm considering a replacement for mine.

On an Epsom I had a few years back, if I didn't use it for a few weeks, I found the nozzles clogged up.

Darryl

Canon printers has removable printer head so you can actually remove the printer head and put it in warm water, this can often

clear the clogged printer head. You can't do this with Epson printers because they have fixed printer head assembly. This is also

one reason why I would not buy Epson. One negative with Canon this days is that they are now chipping their cartridge on their new

printers but OEM cartridge can be easily chipped.

[druid01]

Well, I too have a R series printer, mine is a R290. It was purchased in early January as I really wanted to print on CD/DVD's which my old Canon I455 could not do.

The canon is still running fine and the cartridges (non-genuine) are extremely cheap.

I had put of purchasing a new printer in the last few years with chipped ink tanks, hearing some horror stories regarding ink levels as mentioned in previous posts but

finally bit the bullet.

My initial impression was very positive in terms of print quality and speed and even after the below issues were resolved the printer still is in my opinion one of the best overall printers in terms of print quality

(the printer has the same specs as the R390 except for on board display ) everything was great until my 2nd print on a A4 page.

After 2 pages of printing it reported 2 tanks empty and would NOT PRINT AGAIN until replaced !!!!!!

I too priced up genuine high capacity and standard tanks to my pricing horror and decided to try non-genuine tanks.

CAUTION : As I discovered many supposedly compatible tanks for this model and i assume the R390 as well claim to work but after trying at least 2 brands of tank and neither being recognized

by the printer I did more research and it turned out that Epson update the firmware on their R series models every few months and non-genuine 3rd party cartridges generally will no longer work.

If you have a older manufactured model ( prior to September 2007 ) you should be fine, but I was out of luck ( even non-gen tanks mention this issue on Ebay ).

As previously mentioned in a earlier reply you can and I did purchase a continues ink system to solve my problems ( Aussie made unit from Rihac with ink chip reset built in ).

It works brilliantly and to my fairly good eye the prints are as good as the original inks

P.S The software is not fully compatible with Vista as the CD Label program supplied by Epson failed to operate on Vista ( Googled it and it turns out many have the same issue but not all ).

Also a special .DLL file required for the cd labeler program is not installed unless you install several other programs you do not want or need ( There is no mention of this on the disc or manual ).

I had to google that too just to track the .DLL file down.

Summary: One i purchased a CISS system and acoustica dvd labeler the printer is great and operates as expected but I wouldn't buy one again based on my initial setup fee and extra cost to run it satisfactorily.

Just my 2 cents worth

Edited February 18, 2008 by druid01

[Darrylp]

Thanks for the comments.

Based on what you've said plus my own previous experience I'm going to buy the Canon 9000Pro.

I know it's a lot more money and cartridges are not cheap but the print quality is amazing and the software is great too.

Darryl

[druid01]

Thanks for the comments.

Based on what you've said plus my own previous experience I'm going to buy the Canon 9000Pro.

I know it's a lot more money and cartridges are not cheap but the print quality is amazing and the software is great too.

Darryl

Yes I would be looking at alternative models too, but whichever model you buy do yourself a favor and look at a CISS system, the build and ease of installation was a nice surprise (my non Tech wife installed it in under 10 minutes .

You will never have to buy a cartridge ever again and print costs drop to damn near nothing.

Mine, as I said was sourced from Rihac in melbourne and can be purchased on ebay and have no assembly.

My original standard tanks have 13ml max and 10 ml usable before ink chip says no more, these things have a 100ml tank for every colour (so mine has 6 colours) .

I know I sound like a fanatical convert but the bloody thing has really impressed me.

Anyways good luck with your printer purchase

[Darrylp]

Will do thanks very much.

[Jliang70]

Yes I would be looking at alternative models too, but whichever model you buy do yourself a favor and look at a CISS system, the build and ease of installation was a nice surprise (my non Tech wife installed it in under 10 minutes .

You will never have to buy a cartridge ever again and print costs drop to damn near nothing.

Mine, as I said was sourced from Rihac in melbourne and can be purchased on ebay and have no assembly.

My original standard tanks have 13ml max and 10 ml usable before ink chip says no more, these things have a 100ml tank for every colour (so mine has 6 colours) .

I know I sound like a fanatical convert but the bloody thing has really impressed me.

Anyways good luck with your printer purchase

If you do a lot of printing then the it is well worth getting the continuous ink system ( as they call it) but the only problem I see with this system is that if you don't print a lot you will find the colour pigment will eventually settle down the bottom of your ink bottle and can clog the printer head and damage the printer.

Cheaper OEM cartridge is also available at computer swap market or online for about 1/5 the price of original cartridge.