Epson 3800 Inkjet Printer
Epson have been the market leaders in pigment ink inkjet printing for a decade now. They were first to market with the technology with the Epson 2000P and have been through several iterations since then. There's no doubt that both Canon and HP now also have interesting pigment ink options, but it's fair to say Epson remain the clear leaders in this field with a minimum of about 70%, through to over 95% market penetration in major markets across the world. This means pretty much all new inkjet products are designed and extensively tested with (and indeed optimised for) the Epson K3 line of inkjet printers.
Their current line up of printers use the Ultrachrome K3 inks (K3 indicating 3 blacks). These inks have been thoroughly independently tested (see Wilhelm Imaging in particular), and offer archival life spans averaging more than 75 years for colour prints (before visible fading occurs, if properly stored) - through to several centuries for black and white images. This makes this technology about the most stable colour printing technology available on the market today.
The K3 inks (and new drivers) were particularly improved in several areas. The most noticeable area was the new Advanced Black and White mode - which made it easy to achieve high quality, neutral, metamerism free black and white prints, for the first time. Combined with quality materials like Crane Silver Rag and Hahnemuhle's legendary Photo Rag, the results are nothing short of fantastic - and archivally sound, if stored properly, for centuries - life spans now clearly exceeding those of traditional chemistry prints. Not surprising, really, as the process is essentially black carbon based ink on cotton rag papers - the same process as Rembrandt's etchings, in a nutshell.
The other big noticeable improvement was at the edges of colour - much better behaviour with deep, saturated tones (as well as bright saturated tones!), meaning it was easier than ever to achieve superb quality colour prints with rich, accurate colour.
In late 2006, Epson introduced easily the best value fine art printer available on the market today in the form of the Epson 3800 A2 sized printer. This printer has 9 ink tanks, 8 of which are used on any particular print (the photo black ink is used when printing on gloss and semi-gloss papers, the matte black ink for all matte papers). All the tanks are loaded at the same time, meaning no swapping of cartridges is required when switching between materials.
The other key advantage of the Epson 3800 is sheer value - because you get a full set of ink tanks with the printer, each containing 80ml of ink, the printer includes some $873 dollars worth of ink! This means the printer itself is in fact really cheaper than the smaller models like the R1800 and R2400.
Some people worry that an A2 printer will be too big for them - but the physical dimensions are surprisingly petite given the size of print the machine can produce:
- IN STORAGE 684mm(W) x 376mm(D) x 257mm(H)
- WHEN PRINTING (with trays out) 684mm(W) x 1042mm(D) x 550mm(H)
Epson 3800 Key Features:
- A2 sized printer can handle sheets up to 17" by 22" without trouble!
- Newly designed paper feed (much better than previous models with thick fine art papers!)
- Economical 80ml tanks (means each and every print is cheaper than with the smaller printers)
- All 9 inks are loaded simultaneously (no changing cartridges when you change media)
- Fantastic, very well tested, Epson K3 ink print quality
- K3 prints are now widely accepted by galleries, museums etc, often in preference to traditional C-type and silver gelatin prints
- 1 year Epson on-site warranty (next business day, metro areas)
- Once you factor in the ink you get with the printer, it's actually cheaper than an R1800 or an R2400!
Jump to:
- Pricing
- Why buy from Image Science?
- Extended Warranty
- Ink tank prices (separate page)
Epson 3800 Pricing
Special Online Offer : Buy an Epson 3800 printer and bundle with it a monitor calibrator of your choice and/or two custom ICC printer profiles - all at a discount!
Why buy from Image Science?
Epson inkjet printers are often sold by computing stores and the like, at cut-throat prices. The 3800 is a Pro series printer (and built like one!), and is thus only available through outlets that actually understand a little about inkjet printing.
While it may be still possible that you can find a cheaper price somewhere by a few dollars, you'll notice that these companies aren't specialists in fine art products like Image Science. We use these sorts of materials in a production environment day in day out and have extensive experience and knowledge you're welcome to draw upon to achieve the very best results possible.
Our level of service is very well known and appreciated and we believe quite simply second to none in the industry. We can help you with all aspects of Fine Art Printmaking - from colour management, through to the best materials to use, as well as training in Photoshop/digital image training.
We aim to sell and support the complete package (indeed the whole fine art printing experience) - not just a box.
Extended Warranty
The extended warranty is handled by Epson and is simply an extension to the on-site (metro areas), next business day standard warranty.
You can buy the extra warranty with you printer using the box above.