Why Canon over Epson for high quality printing

[cheapbeer]

I'm pretty new to the world of non-oem cartridge printing.

For about one year I have owned an Epson Workforce 30 with a CISS that was pre-installed for me. I am getting more and more interested in doing higher quality printing than the office applications I have used my printer for and so I've started doing research on what's out there.

I have learned a lot from this forum but there is one thing I don't quite understand. It seems that many of you guys are really interested in Canon printers. I was just wondering why that is. Before discovering CISS I swore by HP but my research a year ago showed Epson was the way to go with CISS because of the way the print head seals (or something like that as I recall.) Now that I've mastered CISS, my next goal is to discover higher quality printing. Are Canons better at producing quality prints, are they cheaper, or are there other things that make Canon so popular around here?

Thanks!

 

[errante]

Canon cartridges were refill-friendly and trouble-free. Now things are changing with chips and opaque cartridges...

In my opinion, canon has developed printers (for home use) with a very good price/quality ratio. These are the reasons for me

 

[qwertydude]

The subject of quality bewteen Canon and Epson is debatable in my opinion. In terms of DPI Canon wins with the FINE printhead technology capable of 1 picoliter drops and a resolution of 2400 dpi, I never count the high side 9600 because that's only in one direction, Epson is close with down to 1.5 picoliter with the newer generation print heads but only 1440 dpi.

This is subjective though because when it comes to sharpness my experience with a Canon IP4600 and IP4700 the grain of the print was pretty even but without a 6 color setup like my Epson Artisan 50 has the Canon had trouble producing darker shades, it would abruptly cut off into dark area instead of fading. Also the dye black and yellow can't print the small 1 pico liter size also leading to less smooth dark gradients with obvious dithering.

Overall when talking about color the photo quality is better with the Epson because of the six color all dye setup and with identical print heads for all colors and the ability to vary dot size on all colors you end up with much smoother color gradients and better dynamic range and coverage of the lab space according to profile prism. The only weakness I see is a lower dpi and on high gloss papers darker shades have a slight striping with the grain which isn't noticeable except under high magnification, I'm talking a 2400 dpi scan on full magnification on your monitor. Canon has a completely uniform grain pattern but again only under magnification is it visible. The biggest difference you'll see is speed. Epson printers are far slower than Canon when printing maximum resolution photographs.

My opinion has now been changed from preferring Canon to now preferring Epson because Canon is destroying their reputation with rapidly releasing new "generations" of printers which only seem to be released to combat refilling not to mention cheaper construction like getting rid of the stainless steel print head guide, it's just folded sheet metal on the Canon's. Epson's construction and print head design are just way better in terms of durability and quality of the print.

This again only refers to my experience with the 5 color Canon's and the 6 color Epsons. The wide format printers with Canon's ridiculous up to 12 color printers is another story entirely that I can't comment on.

 

[wilko]

My preference for Canon over Epson is because Canon printers are better all-rounders. Epson may have a slight edge in photo printing but not in text printing.

Also duplex printing is standard on the IP4xxx series and above and the waste ink counter can be easily reset and the printhead is easily detachable from the printer.

Reviews I have read also give Canon the edge when it comes to speed of printing and I believe that the ink cartridges (up to the IP4500) have a larger capacity than Epson printers.

Epson's are better for CISS and sales exceed those of Canon's.

Most independent reviews give high marks to the IP4xxx series because of their ability to produce both high quality photo and text prints.

However, as qwertydude has stated Canon seem to be producing printers with the sole intention of preventing refilling of their cartridges.

However, unlike qwertydude I am not convinced that Epson is a better buy than Canon at the moment even though I am disillusioned with the way Canon is going.

 

[cheapbeer]

Thanks for the replies guys. As usual for this forum, they are very informative.