Epson EcoTank ET-4850 Inkjet Multifunction Printer

This printer's top document loader doesn't automatically do copies of double-sided documents, but it is otherwise proving to be a quick and versatile machine with a small footprint. For me, it remains to be seen if the ink tank design is superior to using ink cartridges, even though the tank design might be cheaper. I used a Canon ink cartridge machine for almost a decade without any quality issues. Time will tell if the tank design is as reliable for me. I do also miss having a separate back paper loader or second paper tray for switching quickly to printing on glossy paper or other paper stock. You must first remove the regular paper. I preferred this black model, which is more costly over the white model because of the black model's fax capability — which I don't ... MoreThis printer's top document loader doesn't automatically do copies of double-sided documents, but it is otherwise proving to be a quick and versatile machine with a small footprint. For me, it remains to be seen if the ink tank design is superior to using ink cartridges, even though the tank design might be cheaper. I used a Canon ink cartridge machine for almost a decade without any quality issues. Time will tell if the tank design is as reliable for me. I do also miss having a separate back paper loader or second paper tray for switching quickly to printing on glossy paper or other paper stock. You must first remove the regular paper. I preferred this black model, which is more costly over the white model because of the black model's fax capability — which I don't use. (Why should the machine's color determine price or capability?) If you create an Epson account, be sure to check your machine's warranty status. Even though I promptly registered the machine, my machine's warranty as shown on my account was listed incorrectly. (Wrong dates.) Emails and a call to Epson were frustrating. The issue was still unresolved a week after purchase, but I remain hopeful. In any case, I have a receipt.

I bought this printer to mostly print in black and white, but I wanted color available. I also at times print user manuals for vintage amateur radio equipment, which are sometimes over 100 pages, so I wanted something cheap on ink. I also needed a scanner, and while I preferred a full duplex scanner that can scan both sides of a page on a stack of pages like my previous Brother 4710 printer, I could no longer find such in any printer I looked at under $1,000. I found the Epson EcoTank line and looked through most of them and settled on this one. It has the larger ink tanks than the less expensive models, and reviews said it was fine for envelope and card printing, so I purchased this model. I got a price match at another retailer and purchased an extended warranty ... MoreI bought this printer to mostly print in black and white, but I wanted color available. I also at times print user manuals for vintage amateur radio equipment, which are sometimes over 100 pages, so I wanted something cheap on ink. I also needed a scanner, and while I preferred a full duplex scanner that can scan both sides of a page on a stack of pages like my previous Brother 4710 printer, I could no longer find such in any printer I looked at under $1,000. I found the Epson EcoTank line and looked through most of them and settled on this one. It has the larger ink tanks than the less expensive models, and reviews said it was fine for envelope and card printing, so I purchased this model. I got a price match at another retailer and purchased an extended warranty since every printer I looked at the reviews of had some people who had premature failure, or needed something fixed, and I didn't want to end up owning a brick after the manufacturer's warranty was over. I normally don't buy extended warranties except on laptops but made an exception here. Setting up the machine was difficult at best, even with the Epson technical support. I had already got the printer to connect to my network on both the 2.4 and 5 GHz networks in my home, but I couldn't get my laptop to find the printer. The tech support person had a fairly strong Indian or Pakistani accent, and being hard of hearing to begin with, this made understanding her problematic. We tried a few different things, and what finally got it recognized was an Epson pop-up that tried to troubleshoot the network connection. It kept popping up, and I'd let it run while the support person tried to help me, and eventually it seemed to fix it. I haven't tried this on photo paper, envelopes, or anything except letter paper. The duplex printing works fine. It has a much smaller footprint than my Brother printer did, but then again, the scanner doesn't scan 8.5 x 14 inch paper, either. What is probably the greatest feature of this printer is the EcoTank system. It comes with enough ink to print 7,500 black and white and 6,500color pages, or about 90 ink cartridges that other printers would have to use up to provide that much printing. This brings the cost per page way down, and saves you some time and trouble of not having to change so many ink cartridges. It comes with empty ink tanks, and 4 bottles of ink. Filling the ink tanks is very easy. There will be a little ink left in each bottle. After priming the ink system, it will have lost a bit of the ink in all tanks, so I used what was left to top off each ink tank after I had it up and running. Just enough room was left in the ink tanks after priming the ink system to allow the rest of the ink to be used up. They tell you in the instructions that priming the machine will use enough ink that the first charge of ink won't quite last as long as when you do your first refill. However, topping the tanks up with the small amount of ink left in the bottles brought the level back up to the full level, so don't throw away the bottles after filling it. Run the priming operation, then use what's left to bring it back up to the full mark. The printer will ask if you topped up the 4 colors and if you tell it yes, then it will reset the calculations back to a full tank for each color and black. I deducted one star for the difficulty of setup combined with off-shore tech support that has a harsh accent and therefore was difficult to understand. I have nothing against people from other countries, but most companies screen their potential offshore tech support operations for an almost perfect American or English sound with little of the local dialect sound heard. I expected more of Epson. All in all, this seems like a very good printer. Time will tell if I have problems down the road. I will eventually use it to print some envelopes from time to time, and maybe make cards with it, too. If I have problems with the paper-handling, I will likely come back and update this review.

I purchased the ET-4850 for the office about 6 months ago. The purchase was a little difficult because it was hard to find one in stock but eventually Best Buy had a few. I had previously purchased an ET-8550 for home use so I had a reasonable idea as to what I was getting. I also reviewed the ET-8550 and while it's a great printer for what I use it for, it wouldn't have been a good replacement for the office printer. We needed the ET-4850 because we still need the ability to FAX. Normally we aren't high volume and our printing tends to be just a few pages most of the time or a large document of a few hundred pages once in a while (our insurance company is pretty wordy). Normally the printer is fast enough however it tends to be a bit on the slow when printing on ... MoreI purchased the ET-4850 for the office about 6 months ago. The purchase was a little difficult because it was hard to find one in stock but eventually Best Buy had a few. I had previously purchased an ET-8550 for home use so I had a reasonable idea as to what I was getting. I also reviewed the ET-8550 and while it's a great printer for what I use it for, it wouldn't have been a good replacement for the office printer. We needed the ET-4850 because we still need the ability to FAX. Normally we aren't high volume and our printing tends to be just a few pages most of the time or a large document of a few hundred pages once in a while (our insurance company is pretty wordy). Normally the printer is fast enough however it tends to be a bit on the slow when printing on both sides of the paper. That isn't a big deal because I can do other things while I am waiting for the output. Ink consumption is pretty good but we aren't going to get two years out of the factory supplied ink. On the other hand, older printers would have gone through several cartridge changes by now so we are already saving money on ink. It is nice being able to actually view the remaining ink because it gives you a better idea when to order ink and you know you aren't throwing away unused ink just because the printer thinks the cartridge is empty. I have also seen cases where the printer under estimates ink usage and a color will run dry while you are printing. This helps reduce wasted ink needed to clean the printer heads. I have had to clean them a couple of times when the printer went unused for over a week but this is less than with other printers. The black ink tank is twice the size of the color ink tanks which is important for an office printer. Black tends to be the most commonly used and more ink storage means you have to service the printer less often. Even with the huge ink tank, the black ink level is dropping faster than the color ink levels. As with any Epson printer, allow sufficient time to set the printer up. You should do the head alignment as it will result in your output looking much better. In my case, I needed to fix the IP address of the printer so the computers don't lose track of it should the printer need to be cycled. This printer has a 250 sheet input hopper for paper which is half a pack of copy paper. That has pretty well eliminated running out of paper because when you think it about time to add paper, there is usually a fair amount left. Double side printing extends the paper supply even longer resulting in the printer being even more economical to operate. We are using the printer with a WiFi connection even though the printer is close enough to easily cable it. WiFi would allow you much more freedom in placing the printer and normally it shouldn't have much of an impact on printer speed. In our case, WiFi just means one less cable to deal with. This printer is used with both both Apple and Dell computers. The only problem is with the Dell where the printer appears off line even though the Apple thinks the printer is usable. If you attempt to use the Microsoft diagnostic software on the printer, it will find no problems and the printer will start working. I suspect this is a Microsoft bug and hopefully it will get fixed soon. For that matter, it may be fixed already because we haven't seen the failure in over a month. There are applications where a laser printer is still superior however if you're not doing a huge volume of printing or you need quality color, this printer may be exactly what you're looking for.