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The Nature, Wildlife and Pet Photography Forum Presents:
The Epson 1400 Review by James Morrissey © 2008

Edited by Chanthee Keokhaw

Announced in January 2007, the Epson 1400 is the widest format dye-based photographic printer in the Epson Stylus Photo line of printers. The 1400, according to Epson, will print images as wide as 13 inches and as long as 44 inches using a 6 ink print head. The 1400 costs about $250 from several on-line stores.

Epson 1400 Printer

Set-up:

I was pleasantly surprised when the Epson 1400 arrived in the mail. The box that it was shipped in is easily ½ the size of the box that came with my older Epson 2200. For those of us who horde our boxes, this is a great advancement. This is not to say that the printer is small though. Measuring 24.2x31.6x16.3 inches when fully opened, it commands quite a bit of space on the desk top. Sitting next to my Epson 2200, I have no space on my desk at all for any of my typical clutter.

Inside the box was the Stylus 1400, a full supply of ink cartridges, and the supporting cables, drivers and guides. Epson provides drivers for both PC and Mac. Having owned several Epson printers in the past, I was able to install the printer in about 10 minutes without help from the instruction manual. This included removing all of the tape that Epson uses to insure that the moving pieces do not get damaged in transit.

After I have untaped and properly connected the printer to the desktop, the next step is to turn the printer on. The print head moves into position so that the ink cartridges may be put into the unit. Loading the inks into the carriage is nearly fool proof, with each ink color emblazoned above the cartridge slot.

Epson 1400 Printer: ink cartridge location

Similar to other Epson printers I have owned in the past, the 1400 is a top loading printer. The tray can hold about 20 sheets of Epson premium glossy photo paper. Unlike the Epson 2200, the printer does not come with a roll feed option. The 2200 comes with a roll feeder, though I have found that I generally have not used it. There have been times when I have printed panos, and I found the roll feeder a nice accessory. However, it is one that I can live without. As I recall, it was available as an option on my older Epson 1280.

Performance:

As I was mentioning earlier, the 1400 uses six individual inks instead of one large ink cartridge, such as in its predecessor, the Epson 1290. The individual ink cartridges are a huge advancement over the single unit as now whenever a color runs low, only the offending ink needs to be replaced. This provides a huge savings over time as they all definitely do not run out at the same time. The 1400 uses Claria inks, which were designed for longer life and smudge/water resistance over their predecessor.

The cost of inks for the 1400 ranges significantly, depending on where you are purchasing your consumables from. If you purchase inks from the larger office supply stores, expect to pay up to $22 per ink. However, purchasing from photographic supply stores, such as B&H brought the price down to about $17/cartridge. This is significantly higher than what I pay for the Ultrachrome Inks in my Epson 2200, which cost about 12/ink cartridge.

Print Screen of printer profile

The one thing that I will say about the Epson 1400 is that while the individual cartridges are more expensive than for my 2200, they have considerably greater yields. Typically, I am lucky if I have been able to get 30 prints out of my light magenta/cyan cartridges on the Epson 2200. I was very pleasantly surprised to see that I was able to print 45 8x10s out of the 1400 without changing even one of my inks. As usual, the Light Magenta and Light Cyan were the first inks to go. We were able to squeeze a few more prints out of the Light Cyan before replacing it. The other ink cartridges, particularly the black, cyan and magenta colors still had lots of life to them even after 50 prints.

Print Screen of printer profile 2

One of my favorite things about Epson printers has been the different media available for the printer. It can even print on DVDs and CDs. I have had the opportunity to test the printer with several different papers. Using their own drivers, ink, and papers, I was able to get great quality prints that matched my color calibrated CRT with near perfection. This included trials on the Premium Glossy, Luster and Matte papers. I had initially had some frustrating experiences with the Premium Presentation Paper Matte, but realized shortly afterwards that it was me who was making the mistake, not the printer. I did not have the color management control set properly. The moment I turned off the color correction, the prints began to come out exactly as they needed to. This is an important reminder – always make sure that your settings are accurate.

Epson 1400 Printer: printing an image

As I own an older Epson 2200 printer, I had the opportunity to compare the output from the two. I realize that it is not the same as pitting the 1400 to the newer Epson 2400, which has new and improved inks. However, I have always been very pleased with output from my Epson 2200, and I believe that it was up to the challenge to go toe to toe with the newer Epson 1400.

Having printed several side by side color images, I found that I generally preferred the color output from the Epson 1400 over the Epson 2200. Colors from the 2200, using Epson's drivers, often had a slightly warmer output than the identical image printed from the 1400. While some may prefer the slight warmth, there is no question in my mind that the 1400 was actually more accurate, matching my color calibrated CRT nearly perfectly. The images from the 1400 were also a tad sharper, as one would expect from a printer with twice the resolution along one axis.

Epson 1400 Printer: printing an image

After printing out several color photos, I decided to try my hand at printing some black and whites. I observed a couple of interesting things about images from both the 2200 and 1400. The first is that neither my Epson 2200 nor the Epson 1400 captured the image on the screen perfectly. The 2200 produced slightly ruddy B&W images. The 1400 provided much cooler output. Neither of them were completely accurate, though I think I prefer the over-all look of the 1400 over the 2200. The other thing I noticed is that the Epson 2200, even though it is older and has lower resolution, provided very slightly sharper fine detail in the shadow areas of the prints than the 1400. This was a definite surprise. However, I repeated the test and found the same result. My wife also examined the print and came to the same conclusion.

black and white image of the Tetons

Print speed on the Epson 1400 is significantly improved over past printers. Printing on the highest print mode, the Epson 1400 churned out an 8x10 in about 4 minutes and 20 seconds. While it is not the fastest printer on the market, it is significantly faster than my Epson 2200. I have read of other reviews where the 1400 clocked an 8x10 in under 2 minutes. I am sure that using lower resolution settings, this is indeed possible.

Having had the opportunity to review the printer for several weeks, I can say that I am sold on it. At $250, it is a very affordable alternative to Epson's professional line of printers. I believe that for the photographer who does not need the increased durability of the pigment based inks that the 1400 is a great buy. In virtually every respect, I feel that the 1400 outclassed the older, higher end 2200.

As most of my commercial prints are shipped out and done via a traditional chemical process, I would have absolutely no problem purchasing and keeping the 1400 as my stand alone printer to share prints with friends and family, or to hang some art on the wall. Having had the opportunity to use and review the 1400 over the last several weeks has also spiked my curiosity as to how Epson's newer professional printers have been improved over the generation that I currently own. Maybe later...

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