epson

For my 1280, I would not use any other brand. The colors are really nice. I have not finished my first set of cartridges yet, but I'm sold-and would not use ANY other but EPSON.

On Epson's heavyweight matte paper, the prints almost have a velvet like texture-like nothing I had expected (I am pleased). The browns, blues, greens, reds, etc. in my landscapes are very nice-beautiful gradations of color are possible. I do not think I would chance any other brand except Espon-a real winner.

I'm an illustrator and I sell a lot of prints using my epson 1280. Considering at the time of my purchase the t009 color cart cost more than [X], the t007 more than [X], and paper costs, I was really cutting into by profits. I needed to find a lower cost solution for printing. And after extensive research I found that just sticking with epson cartridges was the best solution for the moment.

The problem with these epson cartridges is that they have a "smart chip" attached to each cart. These chips allow for real time monitoring of ink usage, but more importantly it prevents you from refilling your cartridge with the third party inks. However, there are many viable solutions to the chip problem like hardware and software chip resetters that resets the chip to full status. With the chip out of the way, you still have the problem of refilling ink with a syringe which is not worth the time nor effort and is very messy.

Another solution I opted for was to go with third party cartridges. In my experience with these carts I have found that it is really tricky to get as good of colors like epson ones. Sometimes they come out too red or too green. Other times too blue or yellow. The thing is, Epson printers using epson profiles are meant to be used with Epson inks. When they developed these print profiles they were using only Epson inks. That is why you will always get skewed results with any third party ink.

The ultimate solution to the 3rd party ink problem is to purchase custom profiles or profiling software and install a continuous flow system so that you don't have to mess with refilling ink. It will save you in the long run, but be prepared to plop down a few hundred for the setup. But if you are on a budget, you don't print a hundred prints per month, and want good results, just stick with the original Epson carts. By the way, they're pretty cheap now.

PLEASE SHOW ME WHERE TO BUY INK FOR MY PRINTER, BECAUSE I DON'T SEE THE TO17 AND TO18 CARTRIDGES MENTIONED ON MY PLASTIC BAG THAT MY ORIGINAL INK CAME IN.> PLEASE HELP< THANK YOU.