Peter W
Getting Fingers Dirty
- Joined
- Oct 4, 2018
- Messages
- 23
- Reaction score
- 12
- Points
- 38
- Printer Model
- Epson WF-7720DTWF
I’ve just bought an Epson WF-7720DTWF for general home printing, but including quite a lot of A3 photos for personal use (as opposed to exhibitions), mostly because it can do A3+ printing and scanning, is cheap, fairly well reviewed and comes with a 3-year Epson on-site guarantee, which I thought too good to pass up.
So here’s what I’m wondering about.
The inks supplied with the printer are all DuraBrite pigments. Genuine refill cartridges are, of course, very pricey. And I have read that pigment inks are lesser performers than dyes for photo work on glossy or satin paper, though more permanent and better for text and block graphics. Is this true?
All compatible cartridges and CISS seem to use 100% dye inks, so presumably the Workforce printers can work fine with dye.
However, the EcoTank printers use a pigment black and dye CMY colours.
Would it be a good plan to get some refillable cartridges and use them with the surprisingly affordable genuine Epson EcoTank inks, e.g. the 774 pigment black and 664 dye CMY?
Or (assuming I’m never going to be buying genuine Epson cartridges) get the refillables and fill with aftermarket all-pigment inks, or all-dye inks?
I was thinking there are so many suppliers of aftermarket inks out there, with obviously some great inks and some rubbish inks, it might be better to go for genuine Epson inks, and the combo of pigment black and dye CMY might make for better photo quality.
Then again, I read that pigment black while giving a deeper black on some media isn't capable of much subtlety in greyscale photos.
Can anyone give advice or guidance on this?
Many thanks!
So here’s what I’m wondering about.
The inks supplied with the printer are all DuraBrite pigments. Genuine refill cartridges are, of course, very pricey. And I have read that pigment inks are lesser performers than dyes for photo work on glossy or satin paper, though more permanent and better for text and block graphics. Is this true?
All compatible cartridges and CISS seem to use 100% dye inks, so presumably the Workforce printers can work fine with dye.
However, the EcoTank printers use a pigment black and dye CMY colours.
Would it be a good plan to get some refillable cartridges and use them with the surprisingly affordable genuine Epson EcoTank inks, e.g. the 774 pigment black and 664 dye CMY?
Or (assuming I’m never going to be buying genuine Epson cartridges) get the refillables and fill with aftermarket all-pigment inks, or all-dye inks?
I was thinking there are so many suppliers of aftermarket inks out there, with obviously some great inks and some rubbish inks, it might be better to go for genuine Epson inks, and the combo of pigment black and dye CMY might make for better photo quality.
Then again, I read that pigment black while giving a deeper black on some media isn't capable of much subtlety in greyscale photos.
Can anyone give advice or guidance on this?
Many thanks!