Epson’s new printers will make ink cartridges a thing of the past

Epson says one set of ink cartridges for the printer will sell for just a little less than a current ink set-$52 per set. This is an absurd amount of ink, unless you are home-printing an outrageously popular zine, and even then you should be pretty well covered.

Johansson continued, “By producing and releasing RIPS technology Epson have combined the ability to cover general colour print requirements for day to day use whilst having the added bonus of utilising specific media stock to deliver flawless customer facing documentation and imagery”. Instead, Epson EcoTank printers have refillable tanks, so instead of buying replacement cartridges, you buy bottles of ink to fill up the tank. Not only is that more cost-effective for ink costs, it should dramatically cut down on the waste that discarded cartridges create.

Thank god we’re moving closer and closer to a paperless society, because dealing with printers still sucks. Epson wants to make that a reality. A major barrier to color printing has been the cost of ink replacements. It can turn out up to 11,000 black and 8,500 color pages at a faster clip than the less-expensive models. These printing solutions allow customers to print high impact colour documents with ultra-low operating costs and minimal maintenance.

Expression ET-2500 EcoTank All-in-One ($379) – For home use, its reservoirs hold enough ink to produce up to 4,000 black and up to 6,500 color pages. Finally, the WF-R4640 WorkForce Pro is available for $1,200.

Yes, you pay more upfront, but you also end up paying far less in the long run, both in money and sanity.

Granted, there’s a huge gap between the volume capabilities of this EcoTank model and the next one up, the $1,199 WF-R4640, which might, we suspect, convince some small and home-based offices to try to coax more pages from the ET-4550 rather than spring for an additional $700.

Offering the highest page yield in its class, WorkForce Pro RIPS printers significantly reduce the need to stock many consumable items and parts.

Epson is banking on American consumers and small businesses recognizing that a higher purchase price will translate into lower overall costs.