Just went "Office Space" on my Epson R300 printer. Suggestions for new?

[The Grim Ninja]

The last month or two, this thing has been horrible for me. The CD/DVD tray refused to work without a large amount of user intervention for every disk. (rectified by ripping the plastic piece off and taking a dremel to it), then it decided that it could no longer draw in paper by itself anymore, requiring the user (me) to force feed it paper every time I needed to print. This got old VERY quick, especially since that was only about 20% successful.

I figured it was probably old rollers so I tried taking it apart to clean them. That resulted in a "General Error" and the only source for manuals to fix that online seemed to require $10 for the manual (WTF is that about?). I decided I would feel better to take out my frustrations and move on, so I did.

(No, it's not regular for me to abuse any hardware. This is just a once-every-three-years type thing and only for hardware that I fight with for more than a month.)



So.....

Now I need a new printer. It needs to print on CD/DVDs as well.

I'm looking at the Epson R260.

Yes, I would like to avoid Epson, but at the price, nothing beats them. I can't currently afford a 'real' CD printer. (Unless they're under $300 and totally kick-ass and I just missed them)

The cheapest R260 I've found is either at the Epson store online or at B&W Photo.

[BigGuynRusty]

XANAX

BGnR

[Carm]

What I use is a Hackified Canon IP3000 and IP4000 pixma.
How much you willing to spend?

Carm

[The Grim Ninja]

Budget depends on the capabilities of the printer. Although I'd like to stay under $100, going up to $300 is possible, I suppose.


The Canons are appealing, but I'm not sure I want to hack a brand new printer. (I don't know all too much about the Canon hack, but doesn't it involve removing a guard or something from the printer, which should void the warranty?)

[Carm]

Very easy "hack", see here. pixma.allhyper.com

Carm

[The Grim Ninja]

The iP3000 seems to be going for $160+ shipping on Ebay. +Time to convert it +cost of the CD tray

I can get two Epson R260's for that, shipped, from Epson.

The canon is tempting because it isn't an Epson, but it's not currently winning.


Any chance anyone has had both and compared them?

[enrico7300]

I was just about to go to CrapUSA to buy a photo printer...is the R220 good?

http://www.compusa.com/products/product_...pfp=SEARCH&Ntt=epson+stylus&N=0&Dx=mode+matchall&Nty=1&D=epson+stylus&Ntk=All&product_code=51610409&Pn=Stylus_R220_Photo_Printer

[The Grim Ninja]

The R220 is generation 2 of the R series.

First was R200, 300, 320.

2nd gen was R220, 340 (maybe 360, I forget)

They're now up to the R260 and R380.

Epson has the R260 for $80 online + $10-ish shipping. http://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/consu...d=63059188 So, unless you're getting the R220 cheaper than listed online, it's probably not worth it when the newer model is already that cheap shipped.


When my Epson worked, it worked great. I've never had a problem with clogging or the ink in general (other than cost). The problems were with the hardware (it picking up the paper, pulling in the CD tray). If it weren't for the hardware issues, the Epson would have been a perfect printer. Seeing that they're now 2 generations revised, I'm having a hard time considering alternatives.

[weapon]

canon only for me. no more epsons.

The reason the 3000, 4000, 5000 series is so expensive is it was the last line that did not have the chipped ink tanks. Easy to refill and or use a CIS systems with.

The hack only takes 5 seconds but the tray is much harder to get ahold of. It cost almost as much as the printer retailed for AR back in the day...

[blusubaru]

http://dealmac.com/deals/Epson-Stylus-Ph...52694.html