Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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227 of 229 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Great archival printer for black and white & color, July 29, 2005
This printer is much better than the one it replaced (the Epson 2200) in that it doesn't give weird color tones for black and white prints. The black and white prints out of the Epson r2400 are wonderfully neutral, plus there are options for warm, cool and sepia toning that all look great.
The color output is also tops. Although this printer is more optimized to print on matte papers, it can print both color and black and white perfectly fine on glossy papers (if you swap in the photo black ink instead of the matte black) and in fact, to my eye even on glossy paper, the prints look better than the photo lab! And on matte paper (my preference), the prints are pure fine art-just lovely.
As a professional photographer, I'm concerned about the archivability/lastibility of prints. Epson has this covered with the Ultrachrome K3 inks that the r2400 uses. Prints are rated to last approximately 200 years. I'm sure my clients will approve.
The ink cartrdiges seem to print out for a surprisingly large number of pages, certainly no worse than the previous model Epson. And since there are 8 different color cartridges, at least you only have to replace the one that is low, not all of them at once.
In terms of price, it does seem a bit expensive, but consider that the next larger printer, the Epson 4800 model is over $1,000. more and it uses the same archival Ultrachrome K3 inks (just in bigger cartridges). With the 4800 you pretty much only gain being able to print 16x20 prints-it prints up to 17" wide whereas the r2400 prints up to 13" wide. The 4800 also has larger and more expensive ink cartridges and when you swap out the photo black (glossy) ink for the matte black ink, you have to waste about $100. worth of ink. When you do the same process on the r2400, you waste only about $10. worth of ink because it doesn't have to purge as much ink out of the system.
The r2400 seems like a real bargain next to the next higher model.
With both output and lastibility that rival the photo lab, this printer is a no brainer. Buy it and take the control of how your prints look away from the lab, and put it back in your own hands.
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143 of 146 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent printer--expensive to operate, July 5, 2005
As per the reviews on other sites, this printer works like a charm providing excellent quality on both glossy and matte media. Rather than prolong that discussion, I would like to compare it to the printer it is replacing, my five year old Epson 1270. In terms of image quality, I do not see much difference in color pictures, perhaps more detail in shadow areas. Not quite the wow I was expecting. But then wow would have been difficult since my 1270 produced excellent color prints. Rather I see two improvements: (1) Superior B&W, and (2) really good profiles. In addition, the prints should last my lifetime. Unlike another reviewer, the printer software installed easily with no problems.
The major problem is ink useage. To switch between glossy and matte media you have to change the black ink cartridge. The whole system seems to go through a purge resulting in the wasting a lot of precious ink. At over $14.00 a pop per cartridge, the care and feeding of this thing could be quite expensive.
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126 of 128 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Epson Stylus R2400 Photo Printer, March 5, 2006
Summary:
I had been using the Epson 2200 for about a year, and it has given me great prints and reliablity. The only drawbacks were it's print speed and it's use of only two black inks which made printing in b&w less than ideal, but still acceptable.
Well, here comes the 2400 to finally replace the old industry workhorse. It sits in the same tight spot on my desk as the 2200, so the footprint is close to the same, however the 2400 looks to be a bit taller. The machine is a rugged looking, handsome unit, silver and black in color. It has a new paper catch tray that slides out with the touch of a finger similiar to a giant CD player tray. This new unit does not come with the paper cutter and fabric paper catch bin that the 2200 shipped with. I never used those accessories and found most people did not, and so I guess Epson figured it was not worht equipping with any longer.
After firing it up and using it now for a couple of months, I can say that this latest entry into the world of fine art printing is everything it should and needed to be to improve upon the already great 2200. Everything from the software , hardware, and inkset has been improved upon.
First off, and most importantly, the inkset has improved by the addition of a third black ink called "light, light black. ( thus giving the name of the inkset K3) What this does is allows the printer to reproduce the nuetral grays without having to use color inks to do so. This virtually eliminates metermerism, which is the shifting of color tints when viewing a print under different light sources. The b&w prints take on a nuetral tone and resemble traditional b&w prints. And in addition to this third black ink it seems Epson has improved the dmax of the black set. The black from the 2400 is noticeably deeper than that of the 2200, and i can only guess that Epson has added some more dye to the black ink ( Dye ink obtains deeper dmax than pigment) as black ink is less vulnerable to fading and therefore will not hurt the archival abilities that the Epson pigment inksets are so famous for.
Secondly, the hardware has been improved upon in many ways. The 2400 printer is almost twice as fast as the older 2200, and I have printed full 12x18 at highest resolution in about 6 minutes. A 5x7 or 4x6 in under a minute. And very quiet at that. The resolution of this printer has been brought up to an astouding 5760x1440 dpi. However, it is almost impossible it seems for the human eye to tell the difference between 2880 and 5760 dpi. But more is more, and who should complain. Next, the printer now has three paper paths. I print quite often on heavy fine art paper and with the 2200 I had to feed it through a straight paper path at the rear of the printer, which was a bit awkward to do. The 2400 allows you to feed heavy art paper through the top like a regular sheet, except it uses a different path located just behind the normal, or sheet path, as Epson calls it. Also is the ability to now print on heavy board type media, which I do not think i will ever use, but the option is there. It feeds through a feed path at the very front of the machine which is revealed by opening a cover at the front. The media feeds in through the front and the printer prints it in reverse sending it out the rear. Quite convenient and versatile.
Finally, there is the improved software. Similiar to the older software is the user-friendly look and set-up as well as all the options for paper sizes and printing enhancements and features. It seems Epson is very aware and ok with the fact that many users of the 2200 liked using different media from different manufacturers, even though Epson offers a wide variety of quality papers. I myself, have found the line of Moab papers, especially the Entrada fine art and the Kayenta matte, to be what I prefer to use. After much experimenting I have found these papers to produce excellent results with Epson inks and they are acid and lignin free as well. However, the Kayenta matte, which is not a heavy fine art paper and therefore should feed through the sheet path, uses the "Watercolor-Radiant white" epson paper setting for best results. however, Epsons "Watercolor-Radiant white" paper is a heavy stock and needs to go through the heavy paper path. When I set the software for "Watercolor-Radiant white" Epson software tells me that I am using the wrong path. however, it gives me the option to ignore the warning. This is great because what that tells me is Epson is aware that we will be using third party papers at times and they require different settings than what Epson suggests for their own and thus allows it's software settings to be side-stepped. Big thumbs up for them on that note alone.
Next is their b&w printing option in the software. I had truly underestimated this feature as I like to do evrything as far as editing in my PhotoShop software and do not touch a photo in any other way. I convert to b&w,ready my image and then send to the printer to print as it is, with the appropriate profile for the paper I use. Well, b&w prints look very good this way, but I soon found out that by using the b&w setting on my already converted b&w images , I get far beter results. It seems to be that this is a sort of built in RIP software which actually throws down a different combination of inks when using the b&w mode. It also enables one to easliy adjust the tonal range and to tint a b&w photo to give warmer or cooler, and of course, nuetral tonal quality I have printed the same b&w image in both ways and the b&w mode setting in the software gave me very noticeable benefits.And lastly, the bronzing condition when making glossy prints on the older 2200 has been tackled by an adjustment that can be made before printing which eliminates any pure white areas and covers them with a fine light gray ( I would guess) which supposedly greatly reduces the effect. Bronzing is when you would look at a glossy print from a side angle and it would seem to shimmer or glisten like a holographic effect. I have not tried a glossy print yet, as i print almost exclusively on matte and fine art paper so I cannot confirm this situation has been remedied. As for reliability, I cannot give any opinions as I have only owned this machine a few months, but
I can say the 2200 never gave me a single problem and I never even found the need to run any of the maintenance utilities. I would be willing to bet that this machine will fare very good in that respect as Epson has proven to be the best in the business, and for good reason. Ink consumption actually seems to be a little better, but I'm guessing this is because of the additional ink cartridge putting less of a drain on some of the other colors. I would guess overall it comes out to be the same as the 2200 in the end. So there you have it. I'm sure there are other additional benefits and improvements that I have not uncovered yet, but I am enjoying this remarkable machine and am always eager to print on it.
Strengths:
Speed Improved inkset with third black ink and deeper Dmax ( Archival) 5760x1440dpi resolution Three convenient and easliy accessible paper paths Improved software Beautiful styling and rugged build. firewire cable included
Weaknesses:
None that I have come upon at this time, other than no USB cable provided. I use USB 2.0, not firewire. Relatively steep price
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