Digital BW, The Print

Hello all-

After sitting for about a year (I know, I know; mea culpa) I pulled 
two still-wet VM cartriges and put in the new UT cartriges.  Had 
microbanding (same direction as print head travel) evident in the 
flatter midtones.  Also some ink dribbling out in large smears where 
the printhead changes direction.  Put it through 5 head cleaning 
cycles and there was some improvement, so changed to regular epson 
carts to save ink and 5 more cycles.  Smearing has stopped and color 
prints now look passable, but the microbanding is still evident.  
Nozzle check ok. I started seeing occasional bands last year and 
didnt have time to work it out - what else can I do about this, other 
than cleaning/running ink through heads?  Any advice?
 
I'm really only interested in using it for B&W and 4 shades of black 
certainly seems enough -- On his website, Paul Roark mentioned he is 
using the 1280 now, anybody care to comment on that?

Any and all thoughts appreciated;

rob