@Geofn, pigment inks are ALL prone to clogging in the printhead no matter what the brand, you just have not been aware of your clogged nozzles. HP and Canon printheads simply map to another available nozzle when it detects a clog during it's maintenance cycles and when there are no more nozzles to map to, you must replace the printhead.
@4644, if you choose to go with the 7900, what I have found to be the best scenario is to disable the "auto maintence" feature, leave the printer powered on and do a nozzle check prior to each printing. I simply use a plain piece of 8.5X11 paper and can use it four times to do the nozzle check. The paper feed system on the 7900 is flat out awesome, it's as simple as feed the sheet in push the advance button and it self aligns. If you do see missing nozzles, simply do a nozzle clean on the "pairs" and you are off to printing. I have yet needed to do a second cleaning to clear the occasional missing nozzles shown during the nozzle check and very often even printing once a week or once every two weeks the nozzles are all open.
Thanks for the hands-on experience. I was told by a sales person that you should keep the Epson on all the time and the Canon off. So your experience supports that. I was also told that the operating humidity range for the Epson was 40 - 60% and for Canon was 20 - 80%, this could explain any difference in nozzle clogs also. Anyone have any supporting evidence for that?
Look at LexJet, they have GREAT prices on their printers. I just bought a Canon 8300, and the price compared to the Epson equivalent was about $1500 cheaper...so if you're looking for a 24", take a look at the 6300.
Also, FWIW, the research I did before buying lead me to believe that Canon took the quality and value edge from Epson for a few reasons: ink efficiency, ink & print durability & longevity, no clogging on heads, user replaceable heads
I appreciate the information. I have been lead to believe pretty much the same as far as Canon advantages are concerned. I will take a look at LexJet. I believe the lowest price I have seen, right now, is $2,799 for the iPF 6300, includes a $300 trade-in credit.
$2,399 for the 7900 at Atlex and if you work with them through some emails you can get some extras thrown in like liftgate delivery, media etc. Lexjet absolutely will not throw anything in. Even my Scottish blood wasn't enough to get Lexjet to do anything other than their listed price!
sboerup, the Canon does indeed clog, what they are not telling you is that when they do clog, they map to another nozzle until all are used then you have to replace the printhead. "Canon taking the quality and value edge from Epson" is very much opinion based rather than factual. There are a lot of people in the Epson camp that would say this is not the case.
FWIW. when I purchased, it was between the ipf6300 and the 7900 and the 7900 was $500 less delivered to my door.
I have to laugh at your " Scottish Blood " reference. Anyway, I appreciate the information and I will look into Atlex. So apparently, Canons clog also but remap the nozzle pattern to buy you some time until it cannot remap anymore. Because the Canon print heads are replaceable by the user, apparently they are cheaper to replace than Epson's.
I have to laugh at your " Scottish Blood " reference. Anyway, I appreciate the information and I will look into Atlex. So apparently, Canons clog also but remap the nozzle pattern to buy you some time until it cannot remap anymore. Because the Canon print heads are replaceable by the user, apparently they are cheaper to replace than Epson's.
Thanks,
Jim
Jim,
You are correct regarding the Canon vs. the Epson and clogging nozzles. The Canon printheads are much cheaper to replace and that is their business model to replace them, the difference with Epson's model, is that you don't replace the printhead, you clean it when needed.
Let me ask you the following: If a Canon printer user runs a nozzle check and there is room for remapping the clogged nozzle, does he or she automatically get a clean nozzle printout, even though there was a nozzle clogged? Reason I ask is because if this is true, then that would explain why many Canon users do not report much clogging, because it is taken care of by the printer itself. Following that logic, then they would only see a clogged printout when the unit could no longer remap and at that point, would have to replace that printhead.
I don't want to scare you off Epson because I do like the product and there are a lot of 7900/9900 printers out there that are not and have not seen this problem.
I will be curious as to how you decide to proceed..
Thanks for the link to that thread about clogged LLK nozzles on the 7900. I am not surprised at all about her problem, the lengths she has gone to to try and remedy it and the unprofessional attitude from Epson. In this competitive business environment, you would think companies like Epson would like to keep their customers from jumping ship to one of their competitors, but that does not seem to be a concern for them. It seems that the best advise from that is to buy an extended warranty. From just about everything I have read about extended warranties from Consumer Reports, relative to other products, the warranty just is not worth the additional price. Why would this be any different? Perhaps the unit was just not engineered properly in the first place. Sending over an inexperienced tech to replace parts until they find the one that corrects the problem, at $175/Hr. is absolutely maddening.
At any rate, I know you did not want to scare me into not purchasing a 7900, but I must say, that I am probably not going to buy one now. I do not know if the 7890 has corrected some of these issues, so I may still look into that. However, the Canon looks real good right now. Just the fact that you can replace the printheads yourself, at a reasonable cost is a business model that I like. The only thing that bothers me is that the poll I started relative to Epson 7900 vs Canon iPF 6300. Those results preferred Epson over Canon 3 : 1.
I have no doubt about those that have had more than their share of angst and frustration with Epson clogging. But what I have found (generally) with almost all products is that with the internet, it seems the squeeky wheel of consumers blasting companies is a bit louder than reality. And I'm not saying that the companies should not be blasted for their errors or that consumers should not air their frustrations----because sometimes it does work to get solutions. (I really love how the internet gives consumers a better voice to big companies---and I do think some companies take advantage in a way to build relationships/sales)
The reality is that there are far more satisfied users of Epson printers----but the truth is, no product is free from failure, defect, workmanship issues, etc. I've always heard about the notorious Epson clogging issues, but honestly in my experience, it has been a non-issue. There are for sure many good business/printing practices/tips to follow religiously, but imho it's also learning the ins and outs of printing/using your equipment. Again, I'm not saying that those who are having issues or Epson's lame response to them isn't an issue---for those users it certainly is. I certainly read the LL thread with interest, but it did not stop me from adding a 9900 to my current 9800 and 4800 set-up.
Very well stated. That is why I am still on the fence between Canon and Epson. What I really want to try and avoid, is this new 24 inch printer becoming a doorstop in three years, because that is what my 3800 is right now. I know it was only around $1,200 three years ago and I probably could get around $150 for it for parts and ink remaining. However, that is a hell of a hit. I am thinking at around $3,000 for the Canon, a replacement printhead at three years out would only be about $450, since I can do it myself. Much more palatable than the current situation.
From my research, it appears that both are very close in print quality. So, for me at least, it comes down to ink cost and frequency of clogging. Epson claims on their site that the ink repelling coating virtually eliminates clogging. I wonder if anyone can document this. I would be very interested in that piece of information.
As is the case with adding additional shades of magenta and cyan as printers evolved from 4/C to 8 and more the rationale isn't just to make the overall gamut larger (i.e more saturation). That's one outcome of course but the bigger benefit is that the light magenta and cyan inks give the printer the ability to create smoother gradients in the 1/4 tone and mid-tone ranges of colors with 50-100% coverage in the lighter color vs. what than a scattershot 25- 50% dot pattern of the darker shade would produce 4/C printer.
The same would be true of the green and orange inks. It's not surprising that not much difference is seen on the overall gamut plots and saturation of images but I would expect to see smoother gradients in the rendering of middle tones of orange and green objects where the printer was able to substitute those inks vs trying to render the same colors with CYM pattern of dots.
The first application of 6/C printing was in packaging. This web site of a package printer explains the reasons: http://www.dixiebox.com/hexachrome_printing.html One of the most significant is the first one, the ability to match most Pantone spot colors. If you do any design for CYMK printing you are probably aware that there are many Pantone colors a conventional CYMK press can't physically reproduce. That's a big deal in packaging where specific colors are associated with brand identity such as Coke red and consistent reproduction in packaging and advertising is important.
So in that regard having a printer with OG inks would be more important to a commercial photographer shooting products and needed prints that match the packaging that someone photographing portraits or landscapes, who likely wouldn't notice much difference in the type of photographs they print.
Just adding a little. I have used an Epson 7800 for about 4 years. For the first two of those, it clogged quite frequently, and sometimes resisted cleaning, but never so badly I had to do more than turn off and let the ink recharge during the power up, remove and replace cartridge, and other similar fiddles. One thing that seemed to help was simply turning the printer on an hour before it would be used.
But then, about two years ago, the clogs almost disappeared, as if by magic. What few clogs I now experience go away easier. I assume Epson changed something in the ink.
Just to close this thread, I am going to order a Canon iPF 6300. Reasons: I like the fact that there is no waste when switching between photo and matte black inks. The printheads are replaceable buy the users and are somewhat reasonable in cost. Lastly, I did call Epson yesterday and asked what documentation they had to make the claim that their new coating on their printhead " virtually eliminated nozzle clogs". They could not direct me to any documentation and gave the lame excuse that it was proprietary. I was not asking for the ink formula or anything like that.
