Epson Stylus 2200 with Seven Colors and Photos to 13 x 19 Inches!
Written: Jul 13 '03
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Pros: It prints beautiful borderless photos up to 13 x 19 inches!
Cons: The cost of around $600 is a little high for most!
The Bottom Line: If you are looking for a printer to print some large beautiful color photos then this beauty is worth checking out!
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| surferdude7's Full Review: Epson Stylus Photo 2200 Inkjet Printer |
The Epson Stylus 2200 is made for Windows and the Macintosh with the choice of three different connections, an IEEE 1284 bi-directional parallel, a high speed USB 2.0 and an IEEE 1394 FireWire ports. Now you can print borderless prints from 4 x 6 inches to 13 x 19 inches and with cut sheet paper it will print up to a 13 x 44 inch photo.
The Ink
The Stylus Photo 2200 uses seven separate ink cartridges to produce a beautiful color photo. The printer comes with a Photo Black, Light Black, Cyan, Light Cyan, Magenta, Light Magenta and Yellow. The Photo Black can be replaced with an optional Matte Black made for Black & White prints and fine art photography on matte paper only. The Photo Black and other colors can be used on any paper.
Epson uses Intellidge cartridges that counts each ink droplet used so it can accurately let you know when the cartridge it empty. There are electronic chips on each cartridge for counting and measuring the ink.
The great part about this printer is that when a color runs out you only have to replace that color and not throw the other colors away. There is a red light for each cartridge that lights up when the cartridge is empty. The provided software also shows you how low each cartridge is if you want to check them.
The Stylus Photo 2200 uses Ultra-Chrome ink for faster printing and drying times with the printer's resolution up to 2880 x 1440 dpi.
The cost for the ink is about $13.95 each cartridge for a total of $97.65 or some places sell the 7 cartridges together for about $89.00. It is good to have all extra cartridges on hand but more than likely you will be replacing the Photo Black, Cyan and Magenta the most.
Added Features
The Stylus Photo 2200 that I am using came with a roller that mounts in the rear for rolls of paper from 4 inches wide to 13 inches wide. This means if you use this feature you will have to place the printer in an area where the rear of it is easily accessible.
Then it came with a basket that attaches to the front of it that has to be used if the printer can sit at an edge of a desk because the basket hangs down. The basket is also a cutter to trim off the paper to give you perfect borderless prints from a roll photo paper. It works well in the auto position and you can use it manually or in a paper saving mode.
Using the 4 inch roll paper is nice because I could print my borderless prints on one roll instead of several sheets and then cut them as they came out of the printer. The only down fall from this is the photo paper has been rolled up so the picture do not lay flat, they seem to have a little arch to them. Now if you place the photos in a photo album they will then lay flat and look great.
Print Image Matching
Epson use Print Image Matching with the Stylus 2200 so the color matches your digital color photos. Your digital camera also must have Print Image Matching to work right. Print Image Matching means it will print the photo the same colors as your digital camera has taken.
A Print Image Matching plug-in is included for Photoshop.
Printing
Printing times will vary depending on many factors like type of paper, size of paper, resolution used and so on. Here are some sample times that I took. All printing speeds below were on semi-gloss paper at 1440 dpi (Dots Per Inch) and using the borderless printing.
Epson says an 8 x 10 inch photo using semi-gloss paper takes about 3 minutes and 51 seconds. My own printing time was 5 minutes and 17 seconds to as high as 6 minutes and 3 seconds.
Printing a 13 x 19 inch takes a bit longer, one I done in 10 minutes and 52 seconds and the other in 11 minutes and 46 seconds.
The 4 x 6 inch roll paper prints them out at about two minutes per photo where the 4x 6 single prints ran closer to three minutes each.
I did print one borderless 13 x 19 inch photo in the best resolution of 2880 dpi and it took 28 minutes and 4 seconds from start to finish. This is almost three times slower than the 1440 dpi setting and as far as quality well it isn’t hardly noticeable. I recommend using the 1440 dpi setting.
After printing three 13 x 19 inch prints, ten full page 8.5 x 11 inch prints, five 8 x 10 inch prints and seventy eight 4 x 6 inch prints the first ink cartridge ran out. The magenta was the first to be empty, which is usually the one that always seems to be out first.
Overall
The printer is a high cost item in about the $600 range though the one I used had the paper roller and sheet cutter included which is a nice feature. Anther nice feature is the availability of three different connections to your computer, an IEEE 1284 bi-directional parallel, a high speed USB 2.0 and an IEEE 1394 FireWire port. The FireWire would be the best connection, I used the USB connection.
This printer is perfect for everyday use to the professional photographer and anyone who needs to prints some nice detailed graphics.
The bottom line to this photo printer is it produces some of the most beautiful color photos of all the photo printers. All photos printed turned out nice and no paper jams to talk about.
To compare another 13 x 19 inch photo printer check out my review on the Canon S 9000 Personal Printer. Quality wise on photo printing the Canon S 9000 and the Epson Stylus 2200 are about the same. The Canon S 9000 has a lower price and prints the photos much faster.
Read about some of my other Printer reviews.
Canon i 950 Ink-jet Printer
Epson Stylus Photo 825 Ink-jet Printer
HP PhotosSmart 7550 Photo Printer
HP PhotoSmart 7350 Photo Printer
HP PhotoSmart 1315 Desktop Personal Printer
HP PhotoSmart 1215 Personal Printer
Hewlett-Packard HP PhotoSmart p1000
HP LaserJet 1000 Personal Printer
Hewlett-Packard HP LaserJet 4100n
Sony DPP-SV77 Digital Photo Printer
Sony Digital Photo Printer SV55 Desktop Printer
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 619
Operating System: Windows and Macintosh
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surferdude7
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