Customer Reviews

Epson Stylus Pro 4000 Inkjet Printer

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

The wait to get this printer was well worth it! I love the speed and quality of the prints. I not all that happy about how hard it is to find paper in the 17" x 22" or 17" roll sizes. The other thing was finding ink cartridges and the maintain tank replacements. These items seem to be out of stock just as much as the printer. There is a little bit of a learning curve but in the end the pictures are outstanding and worth every bit of the current problems in getting ink and the maintain tank. I was surprise by the size and it does need heavy duty desk or stand. But again it works great out of the box and better once you learn how to use all the settings. I suggest if you get this printer that you plan ahead in ordering extra ink and other maintain tank if you going to do a lot of printing. Everyone that has seen the pictures are very impress and I had one person wanting buy a picture I was just showing off. This is a great printer!!

There has hardly been a day without trouble on my Epson Stylus Pro 4000. Invalid media, wrong feed location, misaligned paper, clogged nozzles etc my log book is full of the problems I have with this printer. It takes considerable time to persuade the printer to do a print job. I have the latest firmware v1.01564 yet it does not recognise my media "Epson Photo Paper SO41857". After being away on holiday for several weeks I wanted to print with the 4000 - but I get message "nozzles clogged" and after many cleaning cycles the printer closed down because the maintenance tank was full. I hurriedly obtained a new tank only to get message "No maintenance tank" then I find that one of the 7 small spring contacts on the Ink Eject Board which registers with the chip on the side of the tank was bent. I managed to get a new part after weeks of wrangling with Epson before I was given a supplier of parts - the part only cost me £10 and it was delivered quickly and I fitted it in maybe 30 minutes. However I still have the problem that the nozzles are still clogged and the printer refuses to do anything in the meantime. So it looks as tho I will have to manually clean the nozzles myself since the printer is unable to do this. If you do not use the printer every few days DO NOT BUY THE 4000 - it is not meant for modest or light commercial or home use. The printer will be unusable after being idle for a couple of months - and it seems that the ink has a use by date of 6 months. Not very useful if you buy the large ink refills. I do have other printers Canon BJC 5500, Epson Stylus Photo R200, HP Laserjet 2420, Samsung Laser ML1755, Canon Pixma MP600R which collectively give me very little trouble.

FACTS
When the ink jets are not clogged in works great.
I spend more money on head cleanings that I do prints.
Buy a few extra maintence tanks, you'll need them.
Eight of the the big cartrages will cost you only 800 dollers !
The printer cloggs overnight so If you dont print every day you will have to clean the heads at least five times. and as you know cleaning uses lots of ink.

For conveince just send Epson the # to your bank account.

On the good side, initial prints are very, very good, and the printer is very versatile as to media. You will love it, except for hand feeding media from the top, since it must be perfectly aligned without having effective paper guides to help. At some point though, the nozzles will clog, and eventually will clog so badly that you will not be able to clear them. Along the path to this, you will spend large amounts of time and money burning through color cartridges trying to clear them. You'll try all kinds of tricks, but at least one cart will defy everything you do.

The more general caveat is that Epson is not updating drivers for this printer, which means that if you upgrade or replace your PC or Mac to the latest and greatest, you will no longer be able to run prints. I got my 4000 in 2004 (for $2,000) and Epson orphaned it in 2008. Should you have a newer computer and want to get a refurb 4000 to run big, glorious prints, you are SOL. Be sure to check Epson's website in detail about which drivers are available for what operating system, and the level of functionality they have. If you do not see yours, do not buy the 4000. OS X 10.5 is there, but is crippled and nearly useless, and 10.6 is ignored. Personally, the nozzles are a serious nuisance, but this last support decision by Epson ensures that I can't justify replacing it with another more current model. A $70 printer is one thing, but to cut off OS support for large format units after such a short time? Doesn't make me want to buy another one!

I don't know about newer model print quality, but you will find that online print labs actually produce better prints than the Epson 4000 can. I've done comparos of the same images, side by side, glossy. Matte may be a different story. If you combine shipping of multiple prints, you'll also find that even quality labs are less expensive per print than doing it yourself. If you like to run on oddball media, or need immediate results, or need to tweak the print to get EXACTLY what you want, an inkjet is fine. I'd research a lesser model if I was going to stick with Epson, though. Something not in the 4000 family, or sharing its ink delivery/nozzle system. The 4000 will too quickly become an eighty-pound boat anchor.

The Epson Stylus Pro has been out since late 2003, early 2004. The printer is the first of the 4xxx line from Epson, and surprisingly comes with both matte black and photo black on-board. This means no ink is wasted when you switch between matte paper and photo papers (glossy and semi-gloss products). If you are looking for a great printer for the home or small office, and have enough room for it, find one of these, and buy it! We have both an Epson SP4000 and an Epson SP4800. Even though the SP4800 came out after the SP4000, it's main difference is the addition of another tone of black. Unfortunately, this meant that you now had to waste ink (Thanks, Epson!) in order to switch between matte black and photo black. Unless you are REALLY picky with your black gradations, and can actually see it in a print, you do not need this upgrade. This printer can print a 16x20 at 1440x720dpi in less than three minutes, and the quality is superb. There are built-in functions on this printer for auto-cleaning the nozzles as well as auto-alignment. You may need to use these, but only when print quality is noticeably affected, in other words, not often. On the downside, the mechanics of the flush station on the Epson SP4xxx line of printers makes it likely that your flush station will eventually clog and cause quite a mess, without proper maintenance. The way around this is to gently remove the flush station and wash it in warm water with a drop of dish soap to get rid of any build-up. After a good round of use, you may also place about 10ml of warm water, using a needle-less syringe or eye dropper, on the flush pad to rinse it of any dried ink. We do this at Digital Eyes on a weekly basis. Also make sure to keep an eye on the waste ink tank to make sure it is replaced or emptied and reset before it overflows (very unlikely). Refillable ink cartridges, chip resetters, and bulk ink make this printer very inexpensive to use, and with proper maintenance, it will last for a very long time.

This printer delivers a Giclee quality print that makes it impossible to distinguish the original from the print. With it's ability to print on Canvas, Water color paper and Heavier materials in widths up to 17 inches wide by up to 100 feet long, it's archival inks estimated to resist fading for 200 years and it's ease of use. This printer puts printing into the hands of the artist. It also does Photos in a quality that rivals the photolab. I highly recommend this printer.