written by walkerm on 16/07/2006
Good Points
When it prints, the quality is excellent.
Bad Points
Jams often
Ink cartridge often rejected
Cost of ownership very high
General Comments
I have owned an Epson Picturemate digital photo printer for 6 months and have just put it on Ebay. The average cost of each picture you print is about £0.50, which is very high. The main reason is that about a quarter of the ink cartridges you will buy (£25 each from Staples, but probably cheaper elsewhere) will be rejected by the printer with the error "The ink absorbing pad in the cartridge has become saturated, the cartridge must be replaced" when FIRST REPLACEED NEW!
As usual, there is no reply from Epson on the 'Customer support' line, and when I finally get through on a telephone call, the line either goes dead after I describe the problem, or they (probably reading from a screen) keep repeating that 'when the ink absorbing pad is saturated, the cartridge must be replaced' - completely ignoring my words "the cartridge is new".
The only good points are that when the printer behaves itself it is very easy to use with a good user interface, and very good quality pictures.
The bottom line is don't buy one. It is simply not worth the money; customer service is appalling (seemingly the norm these days for large companies), and the build quality is very bad.