Epson Stylus Pro 3800 review
By Simon Eccles
Epson's latest A2 printer may cost almost £1000 but it is claimed to be more economical in use than an A4 model
Epson is pitching its new £995 Stylus Pro 3800 printer at photographers who need something bigger than its popular £599 A3+ R2400 printer, but can't justify the £1495 Stylus Pro 4800.
The Stylus Pro 3800 shares the same 17-inch (A2+) sheet format as the Stylus Pro 4800 (and likewise can print full bleed and edge-to-edge for most sizes), but has a lighter build and unlike the Stylus Pro 4800 there's no roll-feeder for banners and panoramas.
Epson's idea is that the Stylus Pro 3800's combination of a 250-sheet feeder and relatively large ink cassettes means that the printer can be left unattended overnight to work through a stack of prints. Martin Johns, Epson UK's Graphics product manager for large format, says that pro photographers and labs prefer cut sheets because the prints come out flat, while roll-fed materials can curl. However, I've never found curl a particular problem with the Stylus Pro 4800, and roll-fed materials work out cheaper than sheets.
Despite the styling resemblance, the Stylus Pro 3800 isn't a stretched R2400. Its ink feeder arrangement is completely different and the print head is new. There's also a built-in illuminated status display plus control buttons on the top panel, which the R2400 lacks. But it's mainly the ink system that distinguishes the Stylus Pro 3800 from the R2400. The Stylus Pro 3800 ink cartridges fit into fixed slots behind the front cover. With the R2400 the tiny cartridges fit into the print head mechanism.
The 13ml ink cartridges of the R2400 are pathetic. I find that practically every time I have a printing session one or two cartridges report themselves running low. Small cartridges mean high costs per litre - R2400 cartridges officially cost £10 each, adding up to about £770 per litre, though you can pay £8 per cartridge or so if you shop around.
With the Stylus Pro 3800 the cartridges are a much more sensible 80ml capacity, costing £30.41 each. They're pressurised too, which should mean better flows. You have to pay more up front but overall ink costs are half those of the R2400 - roughly £380 per litre.
Epson's K3 ink set has two types of full-strength black: Photo Black, for gloss papers, and Matt Black, for matt. These are needed to prevent a metallic bloom effect on some papers. The Stylus Pro 3800 has slots for nine ink cartridges, so both Photo Black and Matt Black are loaded at once. This is a big advantage over the R2400 and the Stylus Pro 4800, which only have eight slots so you have to swap the black ink cartridges over if you need to switch paper finishes. This wastes a lot of ink as the printer purges the previous ink out of its system before it uses the other.
With the Stylus Pro 3800 there is a three-minute wait as the printer swaps between the two blacks, but it seems that less ink is wasted. Epson's UltraChrome K3 pigment inks are famous for their wide colour gamut and ability to print neutral blacks and whites thanks to two shades of grey ink as well as full-strength black. Epson claim a lifetime of 75 years for a colour print, and 100+ years for monochrome image.
Epson has economised by using a top-loading gravity sheet feeder in the 3800. It can take up to 250 sheets and accepts a full range of sizes from A6 to A2+. Thicker fine-art papers have to be fed manually one at a time through a second rear slot. Rigid card up to 1.5mm is fed manually through a slot at the front (Epson has just released a new Enhanced Display Board media in A2 and A3 sizes).
Straight out of the box, the Stylus Pro 3800 certainly looks smaller than the Stylus Pro 4800, and its 19.5kg weight is definitely easy for one person to carry. The bulkier Stylus Pro 4800 weighs 49kg and needs two people to lift it. With input and output trays fully extended, the front-to-back depth of the Stylus Pro 3800 is pretty much the same as a Stylus Pro 4800 with its paper tray fully extended. However, the Stylus Pro 3800 is collapsible - the feeder and delivery trays both fold and retract into the body of the printer, leaving a compact rectangular block when it's not in use. The catch tray extends in three sections, with the full 44cm extent only being required when printing on A2 sheets.
