Thank you so much for your video on this Epson ET-3850 Ecotank printer setup. It is now November 29, 2023 and I got the identical deal from Costco too!
It’s 8/28/23 and this printer is still on sale at Costco. I bought one and set it up just as you did. Sadly, I had a problem. The printer would not recognize that I had loaded paper so the setup and calibration failed. When I skipped the calibration and tried to force a print the paper did get go through the machine but the leading edge had a small tear and mark indicating some sort of obstruction. I had to return it to Costco. I like the idea of cheap ink and love the small form factor. I was going to replace it but after watching several videos I decided I wasn’t going to print often enough to keep the ink flowing. If I ever need to print a lot I’ll get this printer. In the mean time I’ve bought a new print head for my HP 8600 and gave it a new lease on life.
I thought about replacing print head on the HP 8600, but the print head is about $140 and still be stuck with using HP over priced inks and constant cleaning. I too thought not print enough to justify the ink tank printers, but in the end realize that I have tons of ink, 2 year warranty, and it has been printing without any hiccups. Even after printing out brochures, owner manuals etc, I still have 7/8 color ink left and around 75% black ink. And it fires up and prints fast. For me, I am glad I made the dive.
@@rossishima yeah. I paid $140 for the new print head but it came with all four new ink cartridges. It works well now so I’m OK with it. I bought the 3850 for my daughter and when she couldn’t get it to work I checked it out. I really like a lot of thing about it but in the end we just don’t think she’ll use it enough. And I don’t think I’ll use it enough to get one for myself. I might but it again if my daughter gets into sublimation ink though.
The most important reason to buy N ET3835 or ET3830 (no ADF) is the replaceable waste ink maintenance tank. Cheaper models don't have it and stop working when the ink used in priming and cleaning the print head fills the unremovable tank.
I enjoyed your video. But I wanted to see you print a few pictures. I’m trying to decide on this printer. I was trying to see one of the smart features used. -Debbie
I have done extensive research and the Epson is best for home/small business use. I do not do photo printing anymore since going to Walgreens is less than doing at home. Anyway, the 4200x1200dpi scanner is great to scan photos and print. There are 400 black and 128 color nozzles for fine detail. It takes 2.5min for 4x6 prints and 7min for 8x10. Max card stock is 24lbs. Epson et8000 series is more geared towards photo printing; but for casual users the et3850 does do acceptable photo printing. The et3850 will produce lighter photos excellent, but darker photos not as good because Epson uses black pigment ink which is not ideal in photos. Epson is able to do sublimation printing, something most Canon and HP printer cannot due because they use thermal printer. That said, Canon produces the best photos and have always been that way...but Canon has many reliablility issues and the Epson is superior in all other areas. Also, I read some people have trouble feeding photo papers into the printer, something I have not verified. YMMV I guess because all of the professional reviews on-line do not mention this being an issue. Now for regular color prints and black/white printing, this does a great job and good enough for presentations. Again, there are better printers where critical print quality is paramount.
I have the cheaper ET-2800 and working OK. I do not do not print daily. With Inkjet printers if idle for some time can get clogging of print heads and the machines do a clean cycle periodically to fight this. The Eco tank printers have longer path for ink to travel to the print head so increased of clogging of this lines as well. They have a storage box for the waste ink that needs to be changed but related to how long one has the printer. When this needs maintenance I will likely recycle and buy another printer. Some reviews talk about the autofeed of documents malfunctioning. How has it worked for you? Thanks for the video!
No issues with clogs. That is why I suggest doing a print head cleaning once a week. I have another video highlighting a deeper cleaning. The 3850 waste ink bin is replaceable. Autofeed works fine, though I do not use it much.
Of all of the electronics out there, printers are the most finicky to get working properly. Unlike other electronic devices, they are not simply plug and play. Printer technology is mature, but the technology using it is ever evolving. Now that they are wireless adds to this equation. Most returned printers are end users dissatisfaction and as such returns are inspected and repackaged as refurbs. How reliable is the network/wifi. How recent is the modem/router. What condition is the computer. How are you using the printer. Who is using the printer. Running 300# paper stock is not going to work. Having unsupervised children jamming computer or sticking p&b sandwich through it. Using wrong type of ink for your application. A ton of variables to be considered. Printer returns are higher than other electronics regardless of mfgr. Printer itself are generally reliable, it is getting to work with your system/network/computer. Personally, I have had no issues with the printer. I print from several computers. Just do the basic maintenance. My wifi is strong, have the latest wifi6 router, and windows 11.
Thank you for doing this video. I just purchased this printer fm Costco n on the fence whether to keep it. I'm planning to print mostly papers that are of 80% color coverage (sometimes) for scrapbooking purposes. I hv not seen anyone do that amount of printing using this machine. My concern is the "streaking" for the coverage of printing. What do u think? Have to just try it? The other question I have is whether this printer can handle 110 lb (heavy card stock) printing - not just reg paper weight. Costco hd the option for the ET-2850 which ws $100 less and will also b on sale (-$80 which brings it dwn to $199) soon. Your thoughts?
Try it as Costco is lenient on returns. Though per Epson paper is up to 24# or 90gms for the 3850 and 50# for the 4850. Now, other people have been using 110lb stock paper successfully by going into printer setting and setting to premium presentation matte. Other work arounds seem to be upping the print density to 5%. Since the Epson is bottom tray loaded, heavy cardstock has a hard time running through the rollers and doing the bend. So in short, not recommended. You will have to move up to the 8550 which can handle 1.5mm paper. Personally, I have not seen any streaking on heavy color concentration prints; but that is just me doing one off printing. Doing this as a normal work flow, ymmv. Black Friday is coming up:) and my preference would be the 3850 or 4850.
Sorry, kind of late at night. The 2850 loses the auto doc feeder, 2 sided printing, ethernet port, lower paper tray for better paper handling. Although the rear paper feed is less desirable, it probably handles heavier paper better since the paper does not have to bend 180 degrees with a bottom load feeder. 110 lb vs 300gms vs paper thickness comes into play as to whether a printer can handle heavy paper vs thick paper. The 2850/3850 may handle heavy paper, but not thick paper. The 4850 will handle both heavy and thick paper. Expect to pay a lot for these like the Canon Pixma Pro 200 which will fit the bill. A cheap laser printer will work. Google the type of paper you are going to use for printer recommendation, check mfg web site, but easier to call/chat Epson, Canon, HP, Brother customer support line as the printer specs are either buried or not shown. So for extended uses get the printer designed for card stock or for a large project have Staples or UPS do the printing for you.
Thank you for ur prompt reply. I will call Epson - that's wil give me the quickest answer. N u r practical: give th 80% coverage to Kinkos or Office Depot instead of draining my own tank. Again, thank you for taking the time to reply n doing the video. BTW: luv ur recipe videos: can't wait to try them!!!!!@@rossishima
Though some sources mentioned 300 g/m2, this site tested to 256 g/m2 www.printer-benchmark.com/Services/machine-fiche-6699-Epson-EcoTank_ET-3850-printer-benchmark-en.html. Ejpson states 64 g/m2 min to 100 g/m2 max 250 g/m2 is thick and the 3850 is front loaded so card stock would have to fold over 180 degrees to print. You would have to play with thickness settings and ink flow. There are better printers more suited for heavy card stock.
I recently purchased a new Epson Eco Tank 3850 printer at Costco for $325.00. The setup was relatively easy and I had it up and running in about 15 minutes after unboxing. However, I am extremely disappointed in the quality of the printing for both documents and photos.The edging in the photos were grainy and the colors were darker then the original photos. I reset the color management and it still produced a low quality image. The scanner is also cheap inefficient. After scanning a simple document I discovered the text had jagged edges and the tops of the fonts in some sentences were chopped off. The only way I could get nice sharp fonts in a document was to scan in Photo Mode. The top automatic feeder which is used to scan multiple documents or make copies, pulls the entire stack of papers into the feeder all at once. I had to physically stagger each page individually to prevent the stack from jamming the feeder. All in all this printer is constructed of poor quality materials and is cheaply made. Thank God I saved the box. I'm packaging it back up and taking it back to Costco first thing tomorrow.
First thing is to go to your computer and add a printer. Make sure you installed the Epson printer software--Scan Smart. Next on the scanner , select scan and follow the prompts. Basically the printer will scan for all connected computer. Choose the computer you want to scan to from the list click ok click send. The scan will go to the documents file on your computer. On the screen where you choose the computer; you can also highlight preview click ok. This will allow you to save as jpeg or pdf file. Also the arrow on the scanner glass is the upper left corner of the document when placed face down. You click the diamond shaped icon on the printer to start scanning.
Canon is the best home use for photos. Epson way of handling black is different than other printers since Epson uses a different style ink. Google search leads to some ways of making colors punchier with the Epson Ecotanks. But overall general use, the Epson is far better than the Canon or HP. As I mentioned, there are other printers that do photos better than the 3850; if you can handle the price the Epson Et8850 is top notch.
Wrong Epson 502 black ink is pigment like Canon. CYM are dye based. You can adjust the brightness, intensity, contrast of color prints. Printing color on regular paper expecting photo paper results is futile. My HP 8610 prints well without adjustments on regular paper. My Canon MB2720 puts too much ink on the page unless I set it to Light and - 10 Intensity. t
We bought this printer at Costco several months ago (also on sale) and are getting ready to set it up, though not with a smartphone app. I do wish you had printed at least one 4" by 6" photo for your RUclips channel, even though you normally use Walgreens. Are you able to tell how much a 4" by 6" photo on photo paper would be on the Epson? We also have a Canon MG 7100 series printer and just printed out a handful of 4" by 6" photos on photo paper and they came out excellent. Absolutely top quality. But it seems like we lost a lot of ink during the process. Here's for your pooch 🦴
Hi, pooch thanks you. I used google ichat bard to search and according to ai, the 4x6 photo ink usage will be .05 cents per page; not including the photo paper. Per bard A 4x6 photo on the Epson ET-3850 printer uses approximately 0.7ml of ink. This means that you can print about 1,428 4x6 photos with a single set of ink bottles....This means that you can print hundreds of 4x6 photos before you need to replace the ink. The cost of replacement ink bottles is also very reasonable. .. This means that the cost of printing a single 4x6 photo is around $0.05 . Per Epson using their creator 6 ink photo printer comes out to around .04 per 4x6 which is close to ai estimate.
Thank you so much for your video on this Epson ET-3850 Ecotank printer setup. It is now November 29, 2023 and I got the identical deal from Costco too!
I made the same printer switch! Brave of you to fill ink on that white carpet!
It’s 8/28/23 and this printer is still on sale at Costco. I bought one and set it up just as you did. Sadly, I had a problem. The printer would not recognize that I had loaded paper so the setup and calibration failed. When I skipped the calibration and tried to force a print the paper did get go through the machine but the leading edge had a small tear and mark indicating some sort of obstruction. I had to return it to Costco.
I like the idea of cheap ink and love the small form factor. I was going to replace it but after watching several videos I decided I wasn’t going to print often enough to keep the ink flowing. If I ever need to print a lot I’ll get this printer. In the mean time I’ve bought a new print head for my HP 8600 and gave it a new lease on life.
I thought about replacing print head on the HP 8600, but the print head is about $140 and still be stuck with using HP over priced inks and constant cleaning. I too thought not print enough to justify the ink tank printers, but in the end realize that I have tons of ink, 2 year warranty, and it has been printing without any hiccups. Even after printing out brochures, owner manuals etc, I still have 7/8 color ink left and around 75% black ink. And it fires up and prints fast. For me, I am glad I made the dive.
@@rossishima yeah. I paid $140 for the new print head but it came with all four new ink cartridges. It works well now so I’m OK with it. I bought the 3850 for my daughter and when she couldn’t get it to work I checked it out. I really like a lot of thing about it but in the end we just don’t think she’ll use it enough. And I don’t think I’ll use it enough to get one for myself. I might but it again if my daughter gets into sublimation ink though.
Very good job in explaining the set-up. I will be purchasing one tomorrow.
Just bought mine today after watching your video , thanks for the good job .
I see Costco back on sale with the bonus ink. This printer has served me well and glad I chosed the Epson.
The most important reason to buy N ET3835 or ET3830 (no ADF) is the replaceable waste ink maintenance tank. Cheaper models don't have it and stop working when the ink used in priming and cleaning the print head fills the unremovable tank.
Excellent how-to-set-up video! Voice clear and instruction focused! 👍
I enjoyed your video. But I wanted to see you print a few pictures. I’m trying to decide on this printer. I was trying to see one of the smart features used.
-Debbie
I have done extensive research and the Epson is best for home/small business use. I do not do photo printing anymore since going to Walgreens is less than doing at home. Anyway, the 4200x1200dpi scanner is great to scan photos and print. There are 400 black and 128 color nozzles for fine detail. It takes 2.5min for 4x6 prints and 7min for 8x10. Max card stock is 24lbs. Epson et8000 series is more geared towards photo printing; but for casual users the et3850 does do acceptable photo printing. The et3850 will produce lighter photos excellent, but darker photos not as good because Epson uses black pigment ink which is not ideal in photos. Epson is able to do sublimation printing, something most Canon and HP printer cannot due because they use thermal printer. That said, Canon produces the best photos and have always been that way...but Canon has many reliablility issues and the Epson is superior in all other areas. Also, I read some people have trouble feeding photo papers into the printer, something I have not verified. YMMV I guess because all of the professional reviews on-line do not mention this being an issue. Now for regular color prints and black/white printing, this does a great job and good enough for presentations. Again, there are better printers where critical print quality is paramount.
I have the cheaper ET-2800 and working OK. I do not do not print daily. With Inkjet printers if idle for some time can get clogging of print heads and the machines do a clean cycle periodically to fight this. The Eco tank printers have longer path for ink to travel to the print head so increased of clogging of this lines as well. They have a storage box for the waste ink that needs to be changed but related to how long one has the printer. When this needs maintenance I will likely recycle and buy another printer. Some reviews talk about the autofeed of documents malfunctioning. How has it worked for you? Thanks for the video!
No issues with clogs. That is why I suggest doing a print head cleaning once a week. I have another video highlighting a deeper cleaning. The 3850 waste ink bin is replaceable. Autofeed works fine, though I do not use it much.
@@rossishima Thank you for the valuable information Ross!
I have been noticing a lot of referbs for sale. This does not look good to me. Your thoughts?
Of all of the electronics out there, printers are the most finicky to get working properly. Unlike other electronic devices, they are not simply plug and play. Printer technology is mature, but the technology using it is ever evolving. Now that they are wireless adds to this equation. Most returned printers are end users dissatisfaction and as such returns are inspected and repackaged as refurbs. How reliable is the network/wifi. How recent is the modem/router. What condition is the computer. How are you using the printer. Who is using the printer. Running 300# paper stock is not going to work. Having unsupervised children jamming computer or sticking p&b sandwich through it. Using wrong type of ink for your application. A ton of variables to be considered. Printer returns are higher than other electronics regardless of mfgr. Printer itself are generally reliable, it is getting to work with your system/network/computer. Personally, I have had no issues with the printer. I print from several computers. Just do the basic maintenance. My wifi is strong, have the latest wifi6 router, and windows 11.
I got one today 3850😊
Thank you for doing this video. I just purchased this printer fm Costco n on the fence whether to keep it. I'm planning to print mostly papers that are of 80% color coverage (sometimes) for scrapbooking purposes. I hv not seen anyone do that amount of printing using this machine. My concern is the "streaking" for the coverage of printing. What do u think? Have to just try it? The other question I have is whether this printer can handle 110 lb (heavy card stock) printing - not just reg paper weight. Costco hd the option for the ET-2850 which ws $100 less and will also b on sale (-$80 which brings it dwn to $199) soon. Your thoughts?
Try it as Costco is lenient on returns. Though per Epson paper is up to 24# or 90gms for the 3850 and 50# for the 4850. Now, other people have been using 110lb stock paper successfully by going into printer setting and setting to premium presentation matte. Other work arounds seem to be upping the print density to 5%. Since the Epson is bottom tray loaded, heavy cardstock has a hard time running through the rollers and doing the bend. So in short, not recommended. You will have to move up to the 8550 which can handle 1.5mm paper. Personally, I have not seen any streaking on heavy color concentration prints; but that is just me doing one off printing. Doing this as a normal work flow, ymmv. Black Friday is coming up:) and my preference would be the 3850 or 4850.
Sorry, kind of late at night. The 2850 loses the auto doc feeder, 2 sided printing, ethernet port, lower paper tray for better paper handling. Although the rear paper feed is less desirable, it probably handles heavier paper better since the paper does not have to bend 180 degrees with a bottom load feeder. 110 lb vs 300gms vs paper thickness comes into play as to whether a printer can handle heavy paper vs thick paper. The 2850/3850 may handle heavy paper, but not thick paper. The 4850 will handle both heavy and thick paper. Expect to pay a lot for these like the Canon Pixma Pro 200 which will fit the bill. A cheap laser printer will work. Google the type of paper you are going to use for printer recommendation, check mfg web site, but easier to call/chat Epson, Canon, HP, Brother customer support line as the printer specs are either buried or not shown. So for extended uses get the printer designed for card stock or for a large project have Staples or UPS do the printing for you.
Thank you for ur prompt reply. I will call Epson - that's wil give me the quickest answer. N u r practical: give th 80% coverage to Kinkos or Office Depot instead of draining my own tank. Again, thank you for taking the time to reply n doing the video. BTW: luv ur recipe videos: can't wait to try them!!!!!@@rossishima
Setting up my Epson 3850 I missed one step aligning on the first page is there away to go back
Go to printer. Use the arrows and go to maintenace. Hit the down arrow and there will be alignment setting.
Can you tell me please if I can print 250 gsm in this print? I’m struggling to know about this, please help me.
Though some sources mentioned 300 g/m2, this site tested to 256 g/m2 www.printer-benchmark.com/Services/machine-fiche-6699-Epson-EcoTank_ET-3850-printer-benchmark-en.html. Ejpson states 64 g/m2 min to 100 g/m2 max 250 g/m2 is thick and the 3850 is front loaded so card stock would have to fold over 180 degrees to print. You would have to play with thickness settings and ink flow. There are better printers more suited for heavy card stock.
@@rossishima ok, interest, thank you very much for answering.
I recently purchased a new Epson Eco Tank 3850 printer at Costco for $325.00. The setup was relatively easy and I had it up and running in about 15 minutes after unboxing. However, I am extremely disappointed in the quality of the printing for both documents and photos.The edging in the photos were grainy and the colors were darker then the original photos. I reset the color management and it still produced a low quality image. The scanner is also cheap inefficient. After scanning a simple document I discovered the text had jagged edges and the tops of the fonts in some sentences were chopped off. The only way I could get nice sharp fonts in a document was to scan in Photo Mode. The top automatic feeder which is used to scan multiple documents or make copies, pulls the entire stack of papers into the feeder all at once. I had to physically stagger each page individually to prevent the stack from jamming the feeder. All in all this printer is constructed of poor quality materials and is cheaply made. Thank God I saved the box. I'm packaging it back up and taking it back to Costco first thing tomorrow.
Good thing about purchasing from Costco is the return process. You might have gotten a dud, as for me, the scanning and printing are non-issues.
Where is the reset button located
in the display click home, settings and scroll down to reset default
Not understanding how to scan
First thing is to go to your computer and add a printer. Make sure you installed the Epson printer software--Scan Smart. Next on the scanner , select scan and follow the prompts. Basically the printer will scan for all connected computer. Choose the computer you want to scan to from the list click ok click send. The scan will go to the documents file on your computer. On the screen where you choose the computer; you can also highlight preview click ok. This will allow you to save as jpeg or pdf file. Also the arrow on the scanner glass is the upper left corner of the document when placed face down. You click the diamond shaped icon on the printer to start scanning.
My pictures seem to come out quite dull. Not impressed after moving from a Canon Laser.
Canon is the best home use for photos. Epson way of handling black is different than other printers since Epson uses a different style ink. Google search leads to some ways of making colors punchier with the Epson Ecotanks. But overall general use, the Epson is far better than the Canon or HP. As I mentioned, there are other printers that do photos better than the 3850; if you can handle the price the Epson Et8850 is top notch.
Wrong Epson 502 black ink is pigment like Canon. CYM are dye based.
You can adjust the brightness, intensity, contrast of color prints.
Printing color on regular paper expecting photo paper results is futile.
My HP 8610 prints well without adjustments on regular paper. My Canon MB2720 puts too much ink on the page unless I set it to Light and - 10 Intensity.
t
You're saying photos look better from a laser printer? That's not what people usually think.
Epson 2710
Junk
We bought this printer at Costco several months ago (also on sale) and are getting ready to set it up, though not with a smartphone app. I do wish you had printed at least one 4" by 6" photo for your RUclips channel, even though you normally use Walgreens. Are you able to tell how much a 4" by 6" photo on photo paper would be on the Epson? We also have a Canon MG 7100 series printer and just printed out a handful of 4" by 6" photos on photo paper and they came out excellent. Absolutely top quality. But it seems like we lost a lot of ink during the process. Here's for your pooch 🦴
Hi, pooch thanks you. I used google ichat bard to search and according to ai, the 4x6 photo ink usage will be .05 cents per page; not including the photo paper. Per bard A 4x6 photo on the Epson ET-3850 printer uses approximately 0.7ml of ink. This means that you can print about 1,428 4x6 photos with a single set of ink bottles....This means that you can print hundreds of 4x6 photos before you need to replace the ink. The cost of replacement ink bottles is also very reasonable. .. This means that the cost of printing a single 4x6 photo is around $0.05 . Per Epson using their creator 6 ink photo printer comes out to around .04 per 4x6 which is close to ai estimate.