EpsonEcoTank ET-8550 A3+ Wi-Fi Ink Tank Photo Printer

Bought to replace an aging Epson Inkjet printer for home use. We home educate so our printers get fairly heavy use for both colour A4 and photo printing.First - the obvious downside. It’s expensive whichever way you look at it. You could get several standard cartridge inkjet printers for the price of this. Any savings you will make from having an ink tank will be realised over the course of several years after the initial outlay.Secondly, it’s not entirely straightforward to set up. The app you have to download for it walks you through the process but it still takes at least an hour to fully put the thing together, and then you need to get it talking to your computers. We live in a Mac/PC/iPhone household and it did take a while to set it up on each system. I’m fairly confident with technology but it still felt like a bit of a chore.Now, the positives.The print quality blows any home printer I’ve had before out of the water. Photo printing is indistinguishable (to my eye) from what you’d get commercially. Standard printing on paper is quick and clear. Using the manual feed paper tray at the rear of the printer we have managed to print directly onto thick card stock which has come out perfectly.Once set up, the connection is stable and consistent. Not a single “unable to locate printer” error and due to its AirPrint capabilities iOS devices on the same network recognise it without needing to download the app.Having spent years with the choice of either paying through the nose for genuine printer cartridges or getting cheap generic ones that only work half the time, having the ink tank system seems to be the way forwards. Despite fairly heavy use we’ve barely got through any of the ink that it comes with, and replacements ink, both genuine and generic, is reasonably priced. As there is no security system like the chips you get in cartridges you won’t be penalised for using generic ink.The printer’s other features all seem to work well. The LED touchscreen is brightly lit and functional. There’s a button on it which can give you tutorials on pretty much all of the printer’s functions. You can load several types of media at once (we have A4 paper, glossy photos and use the rear feed for card stock or A4 photos). The scanner works well with various devices.All in all, I’m very happy with it despite the initial outlay

This printer is amazing. It has no touch screen which takes a bit of getting used to. It’s big when you open it up for printing at 990mm deep. You need 160mm at the back for the paper feed.Filling the ink tanks is easy. Slot the bottle in the port and it self fills. There is no spillage at all.Priming the printer with ink isn’t explained very well. This is what you do.Turn on printer. Wait till you see the orange ink light come on. Then press the button for 5 seconds. The priming cycle should start. If nothing happens. Turn off printer and unplug power cable and usb lead. Then press the start button for 30 seconds. Connect everything again. Turn it on and do the priming cycle again. This is what Epson told me to do and it worked. It took about 5 minutes and then I had to turn printer off and then press start button and the right hand button at same time to print the nozzle check.It’s then you install the software and you will get a firmware update as well.The Epson printer connection checker has the printer utilities but I’ve not used them as yet.Software support isn’t as comprehensive as I would have liked. Nowhere near as good as my XP-960.There also a phone app which may give you more functions.I did 2 print test images on Epson A4 glossy photo paper 183gm using the Epson photo+ on standard quality setting. This is a brilliant piece of software. My phone camera doesn’t do the quality of the prints justice.Once you get your head around not having a touch screen this is for my usage the perfect printer.Replacement 70ml ink bottles are £9.99 direct from Epson so printing even at A3+ is very affordable.If you want high class prints on Glossy metallic. Lustre and Baryta papers this is for you.Update 2Been using this printer a lot. My print output has gone through the roof.I've printed a further 47 Astronomy images on A4 with 19 on A3 along with close to 60 A5 test prints. My ink levels have hardly moved, I'm now about 1/3 of the way into the 2nd mark. I'm wondering if my extra 2 sets of ink bottle purchases were a bit premature.If i was still running my Epson XP 960 i would have used 2 or 3 sets of XL Elephant cartridge sets by now which is approximately £192-£288 of ink and be into the 3rd or 4th set which is another £96. Which makes this printer a very cheap investment even though the initial cost felt high.The out tray is still a little stiff and so is the rear paper feed platen. The printer still makes clunking noises when printing but i have become used to the sound now and doesn't detract from using it.Using the High quality print setting isn't much use to me as all it does is lay down extra ink which can in some situations remove some of the finer details in my images.On big bold colour prints it's ideal, for my type of prints it detracts so i will stick to Standard quality and let the ICC profiles do their magic.As for print quality.. I can't tell the difference between Claria photo inks in the XP 960 and the 107 Eco tank ink sets in a side by side comparison.The Astro images are 800dpi scans of my printouts on Lustre 300gsm with ICC profile. I hope they give a good idea of the print quality of this printer.I've now expanded my range of paper types to 5 with Smooth pearl 310gsm and Velvet Fine Art 275gsm in A4 which give me a better look for LRGB images ( Luminance Red Green Blue ) bare in mind paper weight does not equate to paper thickness the 275gsm Velvet is slightly thicker than the 310gsm Pearl.The only downside.. if this is a thing, I had to buy a cabinet to hold the paper boxes and sit the printer on.

I’ve been blown away by the Epson EcoTank ET-8550. The print quality — especially for photos — is absolutely stunning, with rich colours and sharp detail. It’s incredibly cost-effective too; the ink bottles last forever compared to regular cartridges, and refilling is easy and mess-free. Whether you’re printing documents, artwork, or high-quality photos, this printer handles it all with professional results. If you’re serious about printing and want to save money long-term, this is 100% worth it. I wish I bought it sooner!