Review: Epson Stylus Photo 890

Dec 17, '01 12:37:02AM

Contributed by: robg

This is actually more of a mini-review, given that it's only a few paragraphs long!

I've held off on getting a new color inkjet printer for quite a while. Until yesterday, I used an Epson Stylus 800, which I purchased nearly five years ago. Inkjets have improved greatly in that time, and the combination of its serial port interface and Epson's lack of drivers for OS X doomed the machine. It served me well, but it was time for replacement ... and it was time to remove another reason for booting into OS 9!

After doing a little research, I picked the Epson Stylus Photo 890. This was based primarily on website research and instore demos of both Epson and HP models.

**NOTE: That link will not go to the correct page, due to Epson's use of session cookies. Click on InkJets link and then find the 890 in the list (near the bottom) for more info on the printer.

If you're considering a new inkjet printer for OS X, read the rest of the article for my impressisons of the Epson Stylus Photo 890.

Installation
I was hoping to find an AppleTalk-capable Epson printer (and they are avaialble), but the combination of features in this printer outweighed the lack of AppleTalk support. So I connected it via a USB cable, and the driver installation was quick and easy, except for the required restart at the end of the install. When I opened PrintCenter, I now had "Epson USB" and "Epson AppleTalk" pop-ups, and the 890 was listed in the USB section, as hoped.

Performance
The driver works well, and seems reasonably full-featured. You can pick from eight types of paper, and a mix of resolutions up to 2880dpi. I selected a photo printer, as most of my color printing is images; we use a Brother 1270N for black and white text. The test images I printed (none on glossy stock; just inkjet paper) all looked great, and the printer is extremely quiet and quick. My Epson 800 seemed incredibly noisy by comparison; this one makes more of a 'whoosh' sound than anything else.

It handled some relatively complex images (the cover of my Guidebook, for example) with ease, and the output looked good even at the 'rough draft' 360dpi setting. Text looks reasonably good, although there's just no comparison to the laser printer, at least at the lower resolutions I was using. I had no issues with background printing; the printer continued to output smoothly even while I kept the machine busy with other tasks.

Waiting five years between upgrades really makes the improvements in technology noticeable. I can't wait to try some glossy paper images!

Gotchas
I've only run into one gotcha, and it's very repeatable. Every time I submit a job, it fails to print on the first try. I can then enter PrintCenter and tell it to retry the job, and everything comes out fine. I haven't spent much time debugging this, and it's more of an annoyance than anything else.

At $299, this is not Epson's cheapest printer, but Epson is currently offering a $50 rebate, and the consumables are much cheaper than they were for my Stylus 800. A color ink pack is $18; the last time I bought one for the 800 (earlier this year), it was around $25.

Overall Impression
I'm very happy with this printer, although I suspect almost any new printer would have seems amazing given how long I had the previous model! To be honest, I'm still not certain I can enunciate all the differences between the various Epson models, but when we tested in the store, the 890 seemed to have the best combination of speed, image quality, and noise level. If it only had AppleTalk support (so that I could print from the wireless iBook), it would be perfect for my needs.

I'm not sure how well the 890 would work in a higher-volume environment, but for our occasional needs at home, the 890 looks to be a winner. I'll update this article as I get more experience with the printer ... especially if I manage to resolve the one 'gotcha' on initial print job submittal.

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Mac OS X Hints
http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=2001121700370223