Epson Ecotank ET-7750

[Ink stained Fingers]

I have the chance to test and use an ET-7750 Epson Eoctank A3 printer for quite a while.
There are various test reports on the internet about this model so I won't repeat details of those
reviews but just comment on a few details.
https://www.pcmag.com/review/357449/epson-expression-premium-et-7750-ecotank-wide-format-all-in
http://www.photoreview.com.au/reviews/printers/epson-ecotank-expression-premium-et-7750-printer

The ET-7750 is a combo with an A3 print mechanism and a simple A4 scanner on top and is equipped with the latest generation of built-in ink tanks - refill is easy and error-free.
The unit as an A3 printer is not wider than a A4 photo printer L800 with the tanks attached to the side.
The body of the printer is somewhat deeper than the L800 because of the attached duplexer , the ET-7750 has about similar proportions like the Canon G1500 and alike.
The ET-7750 uses 5 inks - 4 dye CMYK and a pigment black, the printhead has 6 nozzle rows - 4 CMYK and 2 for the pigment black. The printhead ejects droplets with the min size of 1.5pl which is the same as the L800 and lots of similar photo printers, as well like the A3+ P400 unit and various Canon models.
The inks coming with this printer are labelled as Epson 106 (in Europe) and tests have shown that their fading performance is very good and similar to the Epson Claria inks but much cheaper in bottles than in cartridges. The pigment black is labelled as Epson 105 (in Europe).
The printer hardware is based on the XP-900 which is discontinued as such, it used the same 5 ink inkset and offered an A3 bypass print option.
The ET-7750 comes with a mixed set of options - it is not a real home office printer , and it is not a real
A3 photo printer - the A3 feeder at the back only takes a few sheets, the extendable paper support is very flimsy and lacks any paper guides on the sides. The ET-7750 comes with an easy replaceable waste ink/maintenance tank which is small, very small , about the size of 2x2 match boxes only, and the box carries a chip....so Epson wants to make some money on these maintenance boxes as well.

I compared the gamuts of the L800 and the ET-7750, they are the same within 2%, the print quality is very good, the dithering of half tone colors is very fine (depending on the driver settings), both types of printers deliver very good print quality.

Since I'm testing lots of options with the gloss optimizer, its benefits as reported in other threads, the idea came up whether the pigment ink channel could be used with GO instead of the black ink to have one printer doing the photo prints and the GO application. The only other Epson printer able to do that would be the P400 without modifications or tricks but with very small cartridges.
And here the problems start - the normal paper setting in the driver does not allow the printer to print borderless, all other paper types - matte and glossy - allow borderless printing. This is a limitation
when trying to apply a borderless GO overprint on a borderless print. But there is remedy for this
problem - the alternate Printfab/Turboprint printer driver for the XP-900 supports as well the ET-7750 and offers the borderless option for the normal paper selection.
And there is a 2nd problem - the driver with the normal/Copy paper selection does not just prints with the pigment inks but adds some of the black dye ink as well. When filling the GO into the pigment black tank instead of using the original black ink the driver still prints a medium gray when printing 'black' with GO on normal paper. There is apparently no way around this, no driver settings, and not even with Printfab , will let the printer use the pigment black only. The only way would be to block the ink flow of the black dye ink to the printhead by using a spring loaded clip on the ink tube as long as the printer just should print the GO.

So my feelings for this ET-7750 are quite mixed, the inks are very good, the print quality is very good, but all the other options combined are by far not optimal for this model.

 

[The Hat]

One other plus you failed to mention, if you’d call it that, it does have A3 Duplex and few other printers can boast that, and I for one appreciate the detailed testing and work you put into this non-bios review.

This printer would still work for applying GO if you used all the colours instead of just the pigment black, but you’d want to have quite a lot of prints to justify dedicating the printer just for that...

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

it's one of those limitations - print width up to A3, but the duplexer only handles A4 , and the scanner handles only A4. There are other workforce models handling all functions for A3.
I try to find a way to get away from a dedicated GO unit, it is currently a L382 with GO for A4 and a WF-7110 for A3 in which I swap the black cartridge either with black or GO. It's too much hardware for this and that.
And there is another little funny thing with this printer - I'm used to start a nozzle check or a cleaning via the driver since the turn of the millenium, but suddenly now these functions are not in the driver anymore but only accessible via the front panel.....it's not a killer but needs some adjustment of habits.

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

Let me give you some more comments to the ET-7750, I found a slightly newer driver which now offers the standard maintenance functions - nozzle check and cleaning - via the driver again. There is no risk with an Ecotank printer to block out any cartridges with a driver/firmware update in this case - there are no cartridges.
I'm puzzled about the slow performance of the printer, I'm printing a 70 p document, standard text with image with the typical 'normal paper' and high quality driver setting - the printer starts to slow down significantly after about 15 pages - waiting - feeding the next sheet - waiting - printing some lines - waiting - printing . The printer is connected via USB, no long cable, all that stuff , on a port another printer was running previously.
I swapped the GO for another test from the pigment ink tank to the dye ink tank. This makes it impossible to use any paper selections other than normal paper and envelopes, I can print a full page layer of GO via the glossy paper setting printing a 'black' page, photo prints are only possible via the normal paper setting, high quality which is about as good as prints with a 3.5pl WF-2010W printer, it's o.k., graininess is not visible if you don't look for it specifically. And the Turboprint/Prinfab driver would allow me to
print borderless as well with the normal paper setting which the Epson driver does not support. This combination allows me to print images any size up to A3, and to cover them with a GO overprint with the same printer. It's all experimental, but I have the impression that Epson tries to block my experiments in this direction......

 

[Francesco Longobardi]

Hi, thank you very much for all these information!
I'm new to this forum and I'm actually new to printing. I am a student and an amateur photographer and I want to buy a printer for my photos. The ET 7750 is currently my choice because the low running costs would allow me to print more photos and enjoy it much more, but I still have some doubts because I'm afraid that the quality will not be what I expect.
Would you recommend this printer to someone like me, who wants good quality photos but cannot afford high running costs?
Besides that, do you think I would be able to try different kinds of papers on this printer, and not only Epson paper? It's something I would really love to try.
Thank you very much for your help again!

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

The ET-7750 creates high quality prints, the Epson 106 inks are affordable and give you a very good UV/ozone fading resistance, better than any other 3rd party refill inks. The overall handling is convenient, the printer comes with a user replaceable waste ink container, and the printer does up to A3 paper via the rear paper bin. But this is the weak point of this printer, this rear bin is flimsy and only takes a few - ~ 10 - sheets. A4 paper typically feeds from the bottom which may not work for some stiffer photo paper so you need to switch over to the rear paper bin.
Sure you can use other 3rd party papers, but you would need to get icm profiles created to get the best color output, you can do profiles yourself e.g. with the ColorMunki set, or get profiles made by service providers, companies selling inks and papers typically offer such service.
If you are looking for a comparable A3 dye ink printer you may look as well for a L1800 which gives you a similar quality output. It's a matter of your print output - volume - type of papers etc.

 

[Francesco Longobardi]

Printer handling is not a great concern for me, I will not be printing large amounts of photos, probably a few a week (10-20), thus I can just put the paper in the rear bin.
I've now looked at the L1800, it was not present on the Italian Epson website. It looks like a great printer. What would be the advantage of using the L1800 against the ET-7750? Of course I could print up to A3+. Is the quality significantly better for the 2 extra inks it uses?
As for overall handling, the ink refill system looks better on the ET-7750 and I couldn't find information about waste ink container, what do you think in regards?
Finally, on Epson's website the list of papers that the printer can handle is longer for the L1800. Is that an exhaustive list? For example, for the ET-7750 there is only "Matte paper heavy weight" as matte paper, for the L1800 there is also "Archival matte paper". Does this mean I couldn't use the latter on the ET-7750?
Sorry for all these questions, it's quite an investment for me and I want to have the widest understanding possible of what I'm buying.
Thank you very much!

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

The L1800 would offer a more stable paper handling for A3 type papers - more sheets, rear feeding is the only option with that printer, and it does not have a scanner either, and not a pigment black ink for normal paper on the ET-7750, so that is a more universal model. You wouldn't be able to see differences in printouts, the color space/gamut of both models is very similar. So the L1800 is not better or worse than the ET.7750 - the printer are targeted for slightly different users.
Sure you can use other Epson papers with the ET-7750 than listed, Epson is just not providing colors profiles specifically for all of their papers for all printers. That's the same for 3rd party papers, you should test them and judge whether you like the output, you may be able to make small corrections in the driver if not, or you get an icm-profile made for you if necessary. Don't consider that as a limitation.

 

[The Hat]

I read your introduction and I'd like to say welcome too, but if your going to print your own work from which ever printer you choose, please let the printer handle the colour and you choose the paper type, that is until you know what to expect...

Don’t dive in and change everything at once, learn what the printer can do but above all enjoy your printing..

 

[Francesco Longobardi]

Ink stained Fingers thank you very much, you clarified all my doubts. I'll go for the ET-7750. I'm really looking forward to starting printing. I'll share with you the results of my first print!

The Hat, what do you mean by "let the printer handle the colour"?
Anyway, I'll enjoy it for sure!!