Customer Rating: 
Summary: what went wrong?
Comment: First off: I've had this printer for around 4 months now. I'm on a Mac, running 10.3. I used to have an Epson _80 (can't remember the exact model), which printed great for it's price, but just died on me one day. I have used various other Epsons in the past, all with fine results.
I first tried to print some cds using their seperate printing tray technique. What is needed is their tray, with some arrows that match up with some arrows on the printer. The tray guide, I found, was sloppy, there is a lot of 'play' from left to right, almost 1/4". Why? I have no idea why the tolerances are not stricter. That was a MINOR issue. This is where it got tricky, costing me time and $$ talking to their customer service, which is NOT toll-free. My printer would NOT print on cds (you have to use their no-frills cd printing program in order to print on cds). I kept getting error messages, some saying I needed to talk to the "Chooser", which is a term from previous vesions of OS on Macs. The printer/cd program will not work with a firewire connection. The printer worked fine with all other programs. When I talked with customer service (four times), they had conflicting reports from what I read, word-for-word, out of the manual. They had me deleting support files, retreading steps I had gone over with the previous support rep. Ordering a new cd tray. Nothing worked. The problem was never resolved. I decided I would keep it to see how the normal printing jobs would work.
I started printing some pictures and other, normal stuff. It has worked ok - colors are great, pictures looked warm and detailed. All of a sudden I started seeing big track marks all the way down the page! They are from the rollers. It looks like crap. I can't believe that for $400 a printer works like this. Outrageous, I say. Piece-o-crap.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Disappointed
Comment: I was very disappointed in my new Epson R800. My Epson Color Stylus 900 printed better pictures. This model leaves a film over the pictures even when using the photo glossy paper. The pictures have a dull appearance to them rather than a nice glossy crisp print. Also, it eats ink like candy and each cartridge, (there are 8 of them) costs around $14 - $15 apiece depending on where you purchase them. I wish I had my Stylus 900 back however, it served me well for 7 years. Dixie
Customer Rating:
Summary: Epson Stylus Photo R800 Inkjet Printer Review
Comment: I generally like the Printer. It is very quiet, so much so that I often wonder if it has stopped. The only real noise is the ejecting and auto-feeding of the papers.
It also uses quite a bit of ink but probably no more than any other high quality printer. It is photo quality when printing on the special photo papers... decidedly lower quality when you print photos on plain paper.(text is excelent on either) Plain paper has little difference between photo and draft versions of photos(and they are distinctly fuzzy on plain paper) so I suggest tests be done on plain paper in draft mode. The Gloss cartrige should never be used on plain paper. (I haven't tried matte paper yet) Glossy paper with Gloss selected in options appears like a true photo. (By itself that is, I haven't done a side by side compairison yet. But I expect it will stand up to such a test)
If the price is too high consider getting a referbished machine. Same Warranty but Epson doesn't allow you to return referbished items. I'd go that way if you're sure you want the smallest drop inkjet printer (just 1.5 picoliter per drop) with a lot of options.(roll paper is available to make panarama photo prints)
Some more of those options include five distinct settings in the basic printing menu and many ways to tweek your printout/photo giving hundreds of combinations to choose.It has many options for color adjustment, although it is a bit complicated to tell it to turn off the color adjustments other option have check box style selection/deselection (You can easily print out Iron Ons with the one button "Mirror Image" control)
And it is the most advanced system I have seen... it'll be a long time before the technology becomes obsolete.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Best printer I've had yet
Comment: After my Epson 960 went south on me after less than one year, I called Epson and they talked me into an exchange for this printer (for an additional $150 which I thought was a good bargain) This printer is outstanding. Although the best prints come from Epson papers, I've found equally good prints from Staples brand glossy papers and much less expensive. My two complaints are mediocre quality of prints on printable CDs and the cost of inks. I tried using generic inks on my Epson 960 and I think that's what damaged the printer so now I am sticking to only Epson inks. I've subsequently found out that, that's how Epson makes their money....not by the cost of printers but by the cost of their inks. I have already purchased enough ink for the R800 to buy 3 printers. Such a ripoff!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Fantastic Results - Superb Prints - Solid Printer
Comment: My previous printer was an Epson Stylus Photo 700 (1998). It gave good results, but alas, technology marched on and left me behind. Being a research freak, I read every review I could find and decided to pony up the bucks for the R800. I have several years of darkroom experience and know what it takes to turn out a really good print. Reviews by professionals indicated that I could expect outstanding results. Folks, I'm here to tell you, they didn't lie. Almost all the reviews recommended using Epson's Premium Glossy Photo Paper (Free shipping for $25.00 or more at Amazon, 100 4x6 for 13.69 and 20 8x10 for $14.42 - do the math! Best prices around)and the results are outstanding! I have a supply of various Kodak inkjet photo papers and the results are good, but not great. I use them for proofs now. The results with Epson paper are worth the price of admission. Now do yourself a huge favor, READ THE MANUAL, cover to cover. When your print properties come up, EXPERIMENT - don't hesitate to use the advanced tab. Ignore the warning box that tries to scare you away, the best is yet to come. Have fun, turn off the high speed printing, (wow, what a difference) click on some boxes, make some changes - folks you're gonna be surprised! Click on the drop down arrows and check out what Epson calls vivid. Look at the subtle differences in the finished product. The gloss optimizer cartridge is worth its weight in gold. With a little practice, you'll be turning out Custom Lab results. Epson has been known for making printers that are stingy with ink usage while turning out a quality finished product(anybody out there ever tried to keep an HP inkjet in cartridges without taking out a second mortgage?). That low thirst level is apparent in these cartridges too. The moral of the story is: BUY IT - but don't tell anyone where you got those fabulous prints - your friends will be pestering you to do all their prints too.
Here I am, almost a year later, still a very happy puppy. I'm a bit puzzled by some of the lengthy bad reviews. I still buy only Epson Premium Glossy papers. I've tried some HP samples and get the same results as with the Kodak mentiond above, good, but not great. Never tried making CD labels, I'm just a photo kinda guy. Ya gets what ya pays for. 10/25/05
Summary: what went wrong?
Comment: First off: I've had this printer for around 4 months now. I'm on a Mac, running 10.3. I used to have an Epson _80 (can't remember the exact model), which printed great for it's price, but just died on me one day. I have used various other Epsons in the past, all with fine results.
I first tried to print some cds using their seperate printing tray technique. What is needed is their tray, with some arrows that match up with some arrows on the printer. The tray guide, I found, was sloppy, there is a lot of 'play' from left to right, almost 1/4". Why? I have no idea why the tolerances are not stricter. That was a MINOR issue. This is where it got tricky, costing me time and $$ talking to their customer service, which is NOT toll-free. My printer would NOT print on cds (you have to use their no-frills cd printing program in order to print on cds). I kept getting error messages, some saying I needed to talk to the "Chooser", which is a term from previous vesions of OS on Macs. The printer/cd program will not work with a firewire connection. The printer worked fine with all other programs. When I talked with customer service (four times), they had conflicting reports from what I read, word-for-word, out of the manual. They had me deleting support files, retreading steps I had gone over with the previous support rep. Ordering a new cd tray. Nothing worked. The problem was never resolved. I decided I would keep it to see how the normal printing jobs would work.
I started printing some pictures and other, normal stuff. It has worked ok - colors are great, pictures looked warm and detailed. All of a sudden I started seeing big track marks all the way down the page! They are from the rollers. It looks like crap. I can't believe that for $400 a printer works like this. Outrageous, I say. Piece-o-crap.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Disappointed
Comment: I was very disappointed in my new Epson R800. My Epson Color Stylus 900 printed better pictures. This model leaves a film over the pictures even when using the photo glossy paper. The pictures have a dull appearance to them rather than a nice glossy crisp print. Also, it eats ink like candy and each cartridge, (there are 8 of them) costs around $14 - $15 apiece depending on where you purchase them. I wish I had my Stylus 900 back however, it served me well for 7 years. Dixie
Customer Rating:
Summary: Epson Stylus Photo R800 Inkjet Printer Review
Comment: I generally like the Printer. It is very quiet, so much so that I often wonder if it has stopped. The only real noise is the ejecting and auto-feeding of the papers.
It also uses quite a bit of ink but probably no more than any other high quality printer. It is photo quality when printing on the special photo papers... decidedly lower quality when you print photos on plain paper.(text is excelent on either) Plain paper has little difference between photo and draft versions of photos(and they are distinctly fuzzy on plain paper) so I suggest tests be done on plain paper in draft mode. The Gloss cartrige should never be used on plain paper. (I haven't tried matte paper yet) Glossy paper with Gloss selected in options appears like a true photo. (By itself that is, I haven't done a side by side compairison yet. But I expect it will stand up to such a test)
If the price is too high consider getting a referbished machine. Same Warranty but Epson doesn't allow you to return referbished items. I'd go that way if you're sure you want the smallest drop inkjet printer (just 1.5 picoliter per drop) with a lot of options.(roll paper is available to make panarama photo prints)
Some more of those options include five distinct settings in the basic printing menu and many ways to tweek your printout/photo giving hundreds of combinations to choose.It has many options for color adjustment, although it is a bit complicated to tell it to turn off the color adjustments other option have check box style selection/deselection (You can easily print out Iron Ons with the one button "Mirror Image" control)
And it is the most advanced system I have seen... it'll be a long time before the technology becomes obsolete.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Best printer I've had yet
Comment: After my Epson 960 went south on me after less than one year, I called Epson and they talked me into an exchange for this printer (for an additional $150 which I thought was a good bargain) This printer is outstanding. Although the best prints come from Epson papers, I've found equally good prints from Staples brand glossy papers and much less expensive. My two complaints are mediocre quality of prints on printable CDs and the cost of inks. I tried using generic inks on my Epson 960 and I think that's what damaged the printer so now I am sticking to only Epson inks. I've subsequently found out that, that's how Epson makes their money....not by the cost of printers but by the cost of their inks. I have already purchased enough ink for the R800 to buy 3 printers. Such a ripoff!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Fantastic Results - Superb Prints - Solid Printer
Comment: My previous printer was an Epson Stylus Photo 700 (1998). It gave good results, but alas, technology marched on and left me behind. Being a research freak, I read every review I could find and decided to pony up the bucks for the R800. I have several years of darkroom experience and know what it takes to turn out a really good print. Reviews by professionals indicated that I could expect outstanding results. Folks, I'm here to tell you, they didn't lie. Almost all the reviews recommended using Epson's Premium Glossy Photo Paper (Free shipping for $25.00 or more at Amazon, 100 4x6 for 13.69 and 20 8x10 for $14.42 - do the math! Best prices around)and the results are outstanding! I have a supply of various Kodak inkjet photo papers and the results are good, but not great. I use them for proofs now. The results with Epson paper are worth the price of admission. Now do yourself a huge favor, READ THE MANUAL, cover to cover. When your print properties come up, EXPERIMENT - don't hesitate to use the advanced tab. Ignore the warning box that tries to scare you away, the best is yet to come. Have fun, turn off the high speed printing, (wow, what a difference) click on some boxes, make some changes - folks you're gonna be surprised! Click on the drop down arrows and check out what Epson calls vivid. Look at the subtle differences in the finished product. The gloss optimizer cartridge is worth its weight in gold. With a little practice, you'll be turning out Custom Lab results. Epson has been known for making printers that are stingy with ink usage while turning out a quality finished product(anybody out there ever tried to keep an HP inkjet in cartridges without taking out a second mortgage?). That low thirst level is apparent in these cartridges too. The moral of the story is: BUY IT - but don't tell anyone where you got those fabulous prints - your friends will be pestering you to do all their prints too.
Here I am, almost a year later, still a very happy puppy. I'm a bit puzzled by some of the lengthy bad reviews. I still buy only Epson Premium Glossy papers. I've tried some HP samples and get the same results as with the Kodak mentiond above, good, but not great. Never tried making CD labels, I'm just a photo kinda guy. Ya gets what ya pays for. 10/25/05
Epson Stylus Photo R800 Inkjet Printer Reviews: Page 11 of 14
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