Digital BW, The Print

I just upgraded from a 2100 to the 2400, and so far I have mixed
feelings. 

- Paper handling is worse than the 2100 - Much worse. It frequently
misfeeds the paper and spits them out again. What's worse is that once
this has happened marks are left on the paper and they're no longer
usable for porfolio prints as the marks can be seen through the
printed image. 

The front or back feed should solve this, but print quality really
suffers when I load the paper from the front and I haven't been able
to get a decent print this way yet. I'm out of ink until my CIS
arrives, so I haven't been able to test this further - I'm pretty sure
I'm just doing something wrong and that there is a way to do this and
get decent print quality.

- Ink load on matte papers is very high. It doesn't take many prints
to use up a cartridge. I really wouldn't want to use this printer
without a CIS. Cartridges here in Norway are around $20-$25 each,
maybe this is less an issue for you with the lower US prices.

- I've had serious microbanding problems. But it seems to vary from
paper to paper. The 2400 does not have any way to do a horizontal
alignment, but will vary the paper thickness depending on the paper
type chosen in the driver which seems to have an effect on banding.
Again, I haven't been able to test this further as I'm out of ink and
waiting for my CIS.

I might have been regretting my purchase if I actually paid full price
for this printer, but since it was given to me for free I'm not
complaining. I'm hopeful that I will be able to solve these issues.

On the positive side I'm very happy with the BW print quality with ABW
which is as good as or better than my best UT7 prints on the 2100. The
2400 is also much faster than the 2100. You no longer have to wait
ages for a print tro finish. 

Now if only I could leave a stack of papers in the printer and trust
it to feed properly I would have been able to print larger batches of
prints very quickly.


> Have any of you had experience with both of these printers ... or 
> with either one ... that would lead you to offer any advice?  Any 
> other differences that I've not mentioned that should be considered?
> 
> (At least initially, I'll use it with regular Epson inks, since I'll 
> need to print lots of color as well as some black and white.)