Over the past year, I had been hearing reports that Epson had quietly fixed some of the paper handling issues I (and others) had run into with early production models of the SureColor P900 and P700 photo printers, and I wanted to see if the rumors were correct. So, in late 2022, I ordered a new P700 and a P900, one from B&H, the other from Amazon. Epson also loaned me a P700 to test as part of this project, so I felt that I had a good sample from multiple sources.
After months of printing hundreds of photos, ranging from 4×6 to 16×20–and through two recent printing workshops where the three printers were in constant use–it is clear that appears to have fixed the paper feed issues, and I have updated my review of the P900 and P700 to account for the fixes. Epson won’t go on the record to say that something in the feed assembly has been fixed, but they have told us in the past that they are “always looking at ways to improve” their products.
With the updates, it is clear that the P900 (17-inch) and the P700 (13-inch) printers provide the best combination of print quality, paper handling and usability found in the dedicated photo printer market today. Canon’s imagePROGRAF PRO-300 (13-inch) and PRO-1000 (17-inch) are each quite good printers, but they feel like last-generation machines compared with the P700/P900 series.
I’m finishing up a more detailed overview of the current photo printer market, but if you’re looking for the best combination of photo print quality and cost today, the P900 is it. Yes, you’ll pay more for it than the P700, but the more-efficient ink costs will pay for the upgrade in a couple of years. The review has all the gory details, of course.
Thanks for your review of the ET-8550. I have an Epson P800 but thinking of switching. For more critical prints I use a local print service. Sorry I had to leave the Charleston workshop early but both my wife and I were really ill.
Rick,
I purchased an Epson P900 and need help with setting up printer profiles for paper. If I purchase a 3rd party paper and then download and install that paper profile in Win 10 so that I can see the ICC profile for the paper in the print module of Lightroom do I still need to change the paper type in the Epson printer driver? If so this is frustrating that the ICC profile selected in Lightroom would not also result in the Epson P900 software driver selecting the proper type of paper. Would you and Hudson do a video about this?
Thanks
Richard Roby
Lufkin, Texas
P.S. I look forward to meeting you and Hudson at the upcoming Yellowstone class this summer.
I’m in Cuba teaching and won’t be back until May 2. I’ll send a detailed reply when I return home. That’s a great question