Epson - EcoTank Photo ET-8500 Wireless Color All-in-One Supertank Printer

I have the ET8500 A4 printer and wish I had bought the A3 version for a £100 or so more.. I have just sold my Canon Pro 300 A3 plus printer. Basically the Epson printers are expensive and the ink is cheap. Epson make most of their money from the printer not the ink. For Canon the printers are quite expensive and the ink is VERY expensive. (see below) The prints from the Epson are very good especially as I do not use the top quality photo papers. Just Kolas Satin 250 g from Amazon that costs about £0.22 (UK) per sheet. Chat GPT estimates the ink cost of printing an A4 full colour photo as about £0.08 for the Epson and £2.00for the Canon. So I pay about £0.30 for each A4 print. I have a calibrated monitor and print from Photoshop. I have a action that adds brightness and a small colour correction to the file before printing. The results are usually a good match for the image on the screen. Occasionally I have to tweak the colour a bit and print another copy but at about £0.30 I do not mind. People at my camera club are impressed with the quality of the prints I produce and say they compare well against those from a top end printer like the Canon.

I should have also have said that the scanner in the ET 8500 is very good

I personally am an inkjet guy, but if you go with a thermal type laser you get access to Koehler black cored paper that replicates a real card snap. I can't help on a best recommendation for laser though. If your family will occasionally do photo prints as well you might consider an epson 8500 or its larger brother the 8550. I use the 8550 for my proxies but my gf uses it for her photography as well. Its a very capable printer, and having the black document ink in addition to pigment black really helps on refills if you are doing a fair amount of plain document prints. Ink is very affordable and my proxies run $0.015USD per single face cards or roughly $0.135 per page of epson brand ink. It may matter or it may not to you but the 8500/8550 is also capable of printing on 1.3mm foam board from the rear slot. Here is a [post](https://www.reddit.com/r/magicproxies/comments/1ij7pip/paper_test_summary_list_with_links_epson_8550/) with various papers I have tested with my 8550 in addition to several links to other posts by fellow proxy makers. Edit: For the record I was unable to get successful prints on my 8550 using an inkjet on black core card stock to justify the price, furthermore what is widely sold as "cardstock" from most manufacturers is not a true cored playing card stock. I have been told that swapping over to a full pigment based ink on my 8550 would allow me to print, or alternatively if I prepped with a product called "inkaid" I could get reasonable prints. However I have never seen a post with photos about either of them in use.

Most manufacturers websites have comparison settings so you can put in your requirements. So you want A4, borderless, maybe six colour rather than 4, straight through paper path for thicker media. ET-8500 is six colour, great paper handling ET-1410 is four colour but A3 which makes a very impressive print if you are selling them

When Epson ET 8550 & 8500 first came out, I couldn't find one for months. I finally was able to get the smaller 8500, and I jumped on it. I'm still able to print amazing 8.5 x11 photo printers. They look amazing. I kind of wish I would have waited for the 8550, to be able to print 13x19 photos, but I haven't needed to, outside of two projects Refillable ink is amazing. And the pictures truly come out better than anything I've been able to have printed at office max, office depot, or some of the local shops near me

I got an absolute lemon of an Epon 8500 years ago. It was so tempermentsl and fussy. I frequently wanted to go full on Office Space on it. ink and good paper gets expensive fast too.

Or 8500, if you have no desire to print 13”x19”. But yeah I love mine.

I own his little brother , the 8500 which can print up to Size A4 and i love it too. Best printer i have ever used

If it’s living on your desk then a standard photo printer would give you the best results. The Epson ET-8500/8550 is very popular for the low ink costs. Pigment printers like the Epson P700/900 and Canon imageprograph series are considered a step up in quality but the running costs will also be higher, If you’re only ever going to be printing 4x6 then the Epson 8500 Wild be my recommendation.

If it’s living on your desk then a standard photo printer would give you the best results. The Epson ET-8500/8550 is very popular for the low ink costs. Pigment printers like the Epson P700/900 and Canon imageprograph series are considered a step up in quality but the running costs will also be higher, If you’re only ever going to be printing 4x6 then the Epson 8500 Wild be my recommendation.

You can't really have auto duplex and photos with entry level printer. Brother does not have good offering for photos printers. Double sided printing is usually not a thing that comes with printers focused on photos like the canon G5XX/G6XX series (3 digits not 4). However, if you are printing something just good enough and not almost pro level. I would recommend canon G6XXX Series. However if you want to print for something to sell and has some sale value, with printing media that does not accept pigmented ink, with double-sided printing. There is only the Epson 8500/8550(with ink tank)(but you should not be using it for printing documents, only photos/stickers, because it's ink cost is a lot higher, because it is a pro level ink). Anyway what i really recommend is. Canon G6XXX series for general use. Canon G6XX Series for photos only. You can't have both worlds in the same printer. Edit: If you don't need automatic duplex printing, then epson ET 2800 is perfect for both entry level photos, and documents, it's ink is cheaper... However, it can leave deeper roller marks on some types of photo papers, as it is not designed as a photo printer(same as the G6XXX series). But the type of ink that it uses, can work in all types of papers (unless is paper for laser printer).

Roller marks problem how to fix: Get better quality paper (also some printers if you select thick paper on configurations, also make it leave less roller marks, don't know if this is the case). Or Get a printer that is more focused for photos. (right now the cheapest are the canon G5/6XX series). If you don't find them, then the Epson ET8500/8550 (they do still leave some roller marks but with better quality paper they are fine). Or the epson ET 8100/18100 (it's ink does not have lightfastness). I only recommend ink tank printers for most uses cases. If you are going for pro level printing and going to sell them for high price then there are the Canon Pixma Pro Line, and Epson Surecolor p700/900. About your brother, well i don't recommend because it's a cartridge printer(seriously this black that you used could easily be like 3-5% of all of it's black ink). I would return if still possible. And purchase any ink tank.(If you won't print like 40+ documents pages or 5+ photos a month then it's a fine printer, more than this only if you convert it for ciss or use somekind of compatible cartridge). Edit: Ohh and about consumer level printer that you want mostly for documents, and then some photos. Canon Megatank GXXXX series. And Epson ET 2/4XXX series, then you will compare price and what they offer, like duplex, in case of epson a4 borderless as well. IF you want fewer features but better photos, some epson have 4 dye ink that are better for printing on cheaper glossy ink (you can check if their black tank is the same size as the colored tanks, if it is the same size then it's ink is dye).

Epson ET 4800 or Canon G 6XXX/7XXX series. If you ever go to glossy sticker paper, it will not use blacks, but mix the CMY to from a somewhat black color so it's not great. In this case there is four choices. Get only a ET 2800 and don't have resources like auto duplex and a4/latter borderless, and is slower, but can print in almost any media. Get a ET 4800 but fill the black ink with a dye ink and maybe lose warranty (but it does not have any type of risk for the print if you get a good quality black/use even the original one from the et 2800, you will need just to fill it using a syringe, just remember to never use both type of inks together, you will need to have dye ink from the start at the system, and leave the pigmented ink aside) Get a cheaper ET 2800 for these type of papers and G6XXX if you need auto duplex for documents. Get an ET 8550/8500 for great quality photos/stickers and a G6XXX for the documents. However, with the ET8550 you can offer a lot more of products and printing media, as it is almost a great almost pro level photo printer. EDIT: with the et 8550/8500 you can print on media with up to 0.7mm thickness or 500gsm, so it's a beast.

The only way to do this job is with ink tank printers. The only thing that you need to do is to print a page with all colors one time a week. (WHY IS THIS SO HARD?). Anyway the downside is so small (priting one page a week). For all the cost and perfomance that there is no way that laser is a better solution. And again no laser printer for less than $2000 usd will do a job close to an entry level ink jet printer with the right paper. About printers. You will need a photographic printer/good paper so it does not get lines (if you are talking about lines from the rollers that pull the paper). If it's lines from priting quality then this don't happen even with entry level if you have the right configuration. About printers i can only recommend, ET 8550/ET 8500 or Canon G5XX G6XX lines (with only 3 digits these are photographic printers). If you want less lines from rollers, but again need good quality paper aswell. Their ink are more expensive, but have the same quality of pro level printers that has ink that can last for 20 years+. Edit: If lines that you are talking about is not roller marks, but lines from “missing ink”. Then the fault lies on you, and even g5020 is almost perfect for what you are doing.

Seconding the ET-8500 / 8550. I have an 8500 and it looks really good imo.  Easy to use and versatile. I opted out of the 8550 as I have no need for the larger format and it was another $150 or so at the time, but if it’s semi close I’d get the 8550.