Epsons Photo Stylus 890 is a newly released model that competes in the same arena as the
Canon S800 that we reviewed previously. Like other current generation inkjet printers, the 890 sports a multi-ink system, and several advanced technologies to create lush coloured printouts that are perfect for framing.
The 890 uses a Micro Piezo ink jet with 48 nozzles for monochrome printing and 240 nozzles for colour printing, and an ink droplet size of 4 picoliters, and a maximum resolution of 2880x720, the 890 is capable of some very fine detailed prints. The printer also supports a neat Borderless print feature for 4x6, 5x7, and 8.5x11 paper for that professional photo look.
The 890 uses Epsons own Lightfast Inks, which are rated to last around 25 years on framed matte paper under indoor conditions, or around 6-7 years on Epson Photo paper under the same conditions.
Installation
Installation of the 890 is fairly simple the printer supports both parallel and USB connections. Though the unit uses a muti-ink system, it is a fairly standard configuration whereby all the colour inks are in one cartridge and the black ink is in a separate cartridge. As discussed with the Canon S800, this means that any uneven usage of colour inks requires that you replace the entire colour cartridge when one of the coloured inks has been used up.
Performance
The Photo Stylus 890 performed well in all our tests. Printing colour graphs and photos on plain paper produced some stunning results, and print quality on specialized photo paper also produced lush and exquisitely detailed results.
When testing with plain paper and ink jet paper, the Epson 890 produced some great looking colour prints that put it ahead of the Canon S800, but slightly behind what we have seen from some of HPs upper end printers. Colours were bright and the usage of inks was controlled so that pages did not appear over saturated and worn. Particularly impressive was the even distribution of black inks on printouts with dark backgrounds we have yet to see a colour inkjet capable of producing the pure black strips, bars, and blocks that are laser-like in quality.
Text print quality appears to the be the 890s true weakness. Our standard test printout showed that while the text was legible down to an 8pt font, the quality of the text was characterized by jagged edges and imperfections. Text below the 8pt font were below acceptable legibility and were sometimes smudged beyond recognition. Larger fonts were cleaner, but overall text quality was below par.
Printing on photo paper always produces excellent results, and the Photo Stylus 890 delivered as expected here. All of our standard images on glossy photo paper were impressive, with some of the best colour saturation weve seen yet. We did find that on some of the images, darker colours tended to be a little too thick, and the thickness of the ink deposited on the paper was not always smooth, but this was only really apparent on the 4x6 prints and could have been an artifact from 4x6 Epson Photo Paper, which was less glossy and lustrous then their 8x10 photo paper or 4x6 photo paper from other vendors.
As far as print speeds go, the Epson is a mixed bag. When we put the printer into quality print mode, a plain paper full-size (8.5x11) colour printout took 7minutes and 42 seconds to print. In speed mode, that same picture printed in 2 minutes 4 seconds.
On 4x6 photo paper, printouts in speed mode took varied from 1 minute to around 1.5 minutes, while an 8x10 full-page print took just over 4 minutes, more than twice as long as it took to print the exact same photo on similar 8x10 photo paper using the Canon S800.
Text print out speed was respectable at around 32seconds per page, or just under 2 pages per minute. This puts the Photo Stylus 890 as the slowest of 3 current generation ink jet printers that we have tested in the last month.
Although the specs state that the Epson has a noise level of 42dB during operation, the printer operates less intrusively then does the Canon S800, rated at a lower 39dB of noise. I found that while the Epson was in use, it was hardly a disturbance at all, compared to some other inkjet printers you may have used in the past (some of the early generation printers were particularly noisy).
Bundle and Software
The Epson Stylus 890 comes with a basic software bundle consisting of Arcsofts PhotoImpression and PhotoStudio 2000, Qbeo Photogenetics, and EPSONs Software Film Factory TE. Full drivers for MS Win9X, WinME, Win2K, WinNT 4.0, and Mac are included.
The 890 is designed such that it can use rolls of photo paper, and included with the package is a roll of Epson photo paper, and the add-on peripherals that allow you to set it all up. No connection cables (either USB or parallel) are included.
Conclusion
With an avereage net price of around $280US (the lowest we could find was around $250), the Epson Stylus is priced competitively against the previously reviewed Canon S800. The Canon offers faster print speeds, clearer text, and slightly better overall quality on professional photo paper, but the Epson produces significantly better black and colour graphics on plain paper. The difference in plain paper printouts is quite astounding, and anyone looking for a colour printer to do some colour reports on plain paper should definitely consider the Stylus 890 over the Canon option.
Overall Score: 81%
Find the Lowest Prices on the Net for the Epson Stylus Photo 890
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