Canon or Epson? Surprising agreement.

[Paul Verizzo]

Freestyle Photo, if you don't know them, has been around since WWII. They have moved rapidly into digital photography and inkjet printers right along. They supply from amateurs to high end graphics houses.

So when I saw a page asking which is better, I figured, "OK, here it comes. All the pro's stick by Epson no matter what."

Sure was surprised. Totally pro-Canon and anti-Epson. I knew some of these points, had no idea about the others. Plus, unless something has changed, there is the matter of ink consumption.

http://www.freestylephoto.biz/canon-printers-versus-epson-printers

 

[Smile]

1. I Agree
2. Wasn't that last gen heads like 1500W do not clog that often?
3. Since when printers a so clean to use optical densitometers in them? If printer contains densitometer / spectrophotomer like EPSON spectroproofer that only means the company trying to milk money from the customer. The optics get's dirty in no time. Besides good profiles are not made by clicking single button. If you don't believe me buy X-Rite get crap software and see for yourself. The question is why are we paying thousands of $$$$ for this crap?
4. True, plugin is great, but you last time I checked it requires to use Win 32bit so that you can choose the CMM clalled "Adobe CMM", you do know adobe has released the color engine in 2008, and since then refuses to upgrade it to 64bit. So be prepared to get some old PC with max 4GB ram to use this plugin with colors you see in adobe products.
5.True.
6.If this is custom paper presets in driver, EPSON has got this also.

 

[Paul Verizzo]

1. I Agree
2. Wasn't that last gen heads like 1500W do not clog that often?
3. Since when printers a so clean to use optical densitometers in them? If printer contains densitometer / spectrophotomer like EPSON spectroproofer that only means the company trying to milk money from the customer. The optics get's dirty in no time. Besides good profiles are not made by clicking single button. If you don't believe me buy X-Rite get crap software and see for yourself. The question is why are we paying thousands of $$$$ for this crap?
4. True, plugin is great, but you last time I checked it requires to use Win 32bit so that you can choose the CMM clalled "Adobe CMM", you do know adobe has released the color engine in 2008, and since then refuses to upgrade it to 64bit. So be prepared to get some old PC with max 4GB ram to use this plugin with colors you see in adobe products.
5.True.
6.If this is custom paper presets in driver, EPSON has got this also.

Pretty defensive, friend!

Most users will never have these concerns that you mention. And compared to the clogging, the cost of service, and the consumption of inks, these fall into the "So what?" category.

I've had to buy a few Canon heads over the years. Online, $50-80. Ten minutes to change, five minutes to realign the heads. Done. If those were Epson printers, especially pigment printers, they would have been headed into the e-recycling pile. Total loss. Reason enough right there.

I can't remember the year or the printer models, but say 15 years ago Epson made an incredible mistake in in their ink formulations. The images were turning orange, IIRC, after only a few months. Their reputation went into the tank. Now, I'm open to correction, but its my perception that it was only a short while later that they started with pigment inks as their solution to their own incompetence.

Sure, essentially fade proof. And along with it, metamerism, coppery blacks, lots of clogged heads, and a push to microporous and matte papers because the sins aren't so apparent.

I owned a small Epson once............for about a month. Just the banging as the head hit each end was enough to hate it. It sucked ink like a dehydrated sailor. All done.

It absolutely baffles me how they have fooled so many people for so long.

 

[Smile]

Pretty defensive, friend!

I don't have epson myself so I don't have to defend anything.

Most users will never have these concerns that you mention. And compared to the clogging, the cost of service, and the consumption of inks, these fall into the "So what?" category.

What problems they will not see? I did not say anything is a problem, I gave my experience only.

I've had to buy a few Canon heads over the years. Online, $50-80. Ten minutes to change, five minutes to realign the heads. Done. If those were Epson printers, especially pigment printers, they would have been headed into the e-recycling pile. Total loss. Reason enough right there.

If a regular user can't fix a problem this why they invented service for anything not just printers. DIY can fix anything (make a printer to DTG etc.) except the printhead. But in either printer the heads are expensive if we a talking wide format printers. Like canon IPF 500$ x 2 is not cheap in my book.

I can't remember the year or the printer models, but say 15 years ago Epson made an incredible mistake in in their ink formulations. The images were turning orange, IIRC, after only a few months. Their reputation went into the tank. Now, I'm open to correction, but its my perception that it was only a short while later that they started with pigment inks as their solution to their own incompetence.

Sure, essentially fade proof. And along with it, metamerism, coppery blacks, lots of clogged heads, and a push to microporous and matte papers because the sins aren't so apparent.

It is sure incompetence to put crap inks for EPSON L800, and it's stupid to put EPSON logo on the inks IMO. But now I can tell everyone that you never know what you get in ink bottle from EPSON. WIR test clearly shows this.

I owned a small Epson once............for about a month. Just the banging as the head hit each end was enough to hate it. It sucked ink like a dehydrated sailor. All done.

It absolutely baffles me how they have fooled so many people for so long.

I salvaged 2x EPSON 1520, both were bad enough to be not repairable. That said I love Epson for ability to print various inks like UV, Sublimation, and to be able to use white ink in regular printer with some hacking and gutenprint / chinese RIP.

 

[Paul Verizzo]

As long as you're happy..............

 

[Smile]

As long as you're happy..............

Both printers have cons and pros, so it really depends of one need the printer for. The article defends EPSON printers. I don't defend anything, I choose and recommend printers by task they are needed to solve. I can say good / bad about many of them, but that is from my experience with them.

 

[Tudor]

Thank you, @Paul Verizzo ! I got a good laugh reading that "article". It isn't signed, has no beginning, no end, no context, no nothing. At least it's impartial...

 

[Paul Verizzo]

@Tudor: Not sure what you are implying or saying. It's an online page from one of the oldest photo retailers in the world expressing an opinion.

 

[ghwellsjr]

I used to favor Canon printers, mainly because their line that used the unchipped cartridges were very easy to refill. But now that printers like that are no longer available and all my old printers began burning out print heads, I made a switch to Epson because they offer printers with very large capacity cartridges at a reasonable price that makes refilling no longer a significant issue. Since I was happy with 4-color printouts from Canon printers, I am equally happy with Epson's 4-color WP-4530 printer (which is no longer available). The fact that Epson uses a pigment ink in that printer that can also print on any photo paper is a big plus. There are additional factors that would cause someone to favor Canon over Epson.

Here are my point-by-point comments:

1. Canon has user-replaceable printhead. Users can replace the printhead in about 10 minutes. Epson requires a technician to schedule an onsite visit and costs about $ 1,200. The Epson head is very durable - but won't last forever.

Canon's printheads can die in such a manner as they also take out the printer and will kill any replacement printhead that is put into the printer. The comment about the cost of replacing an Epson printhead would only make sense for a printer that costs thousands of dollars. Just buy another printer, or buy more than one originally so that you have a replacement when you need it.

2. Canon thermal head tends not to clog. Epson printer heads tends TO clog. Canon heads will self-clean if it does clog. Epson's heads do not. Canon's thermal technology (heat) tends to keep the nozzles cleaner than the piezo-electric design Epson uses.

Really? If this were true, there would be far fewer posts on this forum. Canon's nozzles are extremely small because they can deliver only a single droplet size and they need thousands of them whereas Epson's are much larger because they can control the droplet size and they only have hundreds (at least with the printers I'm familiar with).

3. Canon has built-in densitometer; the printer relinearizes itself when the environment changes or if you replace the printhead. The Epson requires a tech to visit to relinearize the printer with external electronic tools. The process usually takes a couple of hours and is expensive. The Canon does the relinearization itself and takes 10 minutes.

Never heard of this.

4. Canon offers a PhotoShop Plug-in that allows you to print in true 16-bit.

Never heard of this.

5. The Canon is faster.

Really? Not with the printers I'm familiar with.

6. Canon has a media configuration tool that allows you to import custom profiles for any third party media right into the print driver and the printer firmware. AND you can name the media anything you like in the driver and on the printer console. Epson allows NONE of this.

I don't care about this.

 

[Paul Verizzo]

@ghwells: Each to their own, ya know? I'll never convince you and vice versa. Granted, my opinion of Epsons in general took place say, 10 years ago. As mentioned owned one once and could dump it fast enough. Over the years I still have run across many of the same issues online and with friends: noisy, sucks ink, clogs with non-use, and essentially non-servicable. If things have changed, great.

I, for one, do not consider throwing a printer into the e-waste stream a viable alternative, to say nothing of new printers costing many times that of a replacement head. And being invested in a whole lot of supplies also now wasted.

I think you have your ink type/paper choices backwards. It's pigment that does poorly on swellable polymer emulsions, the original inkjet emulsion. Dye inks are fine on either that or microporous papers as hugely evidenced by the fact that Canon never made a pigment printer until a few years ago and all their papers have been microporous for many, may years. And that as HP got into pigment, they brought out a new line of "Advanced" microporous papers.

As long as we are both happy!