Inkjet Printer for Photos

That is an interesting one and I can get it direct from Epson UK for £78 odd.

Also you can get the genuine Epson carts on Ebay, very cheap. (under £30)
One of my printers is the 285 an A4 the same as the 585 but without the scanner,and as I said before good photo colour prints but not for perfect monoprints.
Another + is i do not have the old Epson problem of having to clean the print heads every time i use it.
Yet another + is you can take up an extra warrantee when buying from Epson direct, but dont buy it on line after you get the printer phone customer services, and you get it for about 25% of the online price

I have an HP too - the Photosmart C5280 all in one. We needed an all in one, much as I would have like a dedicated photo printer, and I chose this one because it can take the HP100 greys cartridge for b/w photos. It also can print CDs, but that is something I am unlikely to ever use.

Thank you everyone for your helpful comments, it is a bit of a minefield sorting out a good bet as you can see.
After more research I am fancying a Canon MP970 all-in-one.
Has anyone any knowledge on this one?

I now have the Epson R800 and have printed two photos on Epson premium glossy photo paper.
I'm happy to say that it's brilliant so far. Cannot find fault with the prints and it seems that the colours are spot on using the R800 profile when printing from Photoshop. Of course it also is quite a bit quicker and quieter than the old one.

From all the other posts in this thread I think that all of the major brands are able to turn out photo printers capable of high quality prints.

Prieni

Any views on the CISS systems and third-party inks for the Epson R800?

Do they really work as well as the original cartridges? Any danger of buggering up the printer?

Very true, but so they should be able to, as my 9 year old Epson 750 does a respectable job when the nozzles are working freely.

I wouldn't want to go down that route. I have fared well with the original inks. However, looking at the price of the replacement inks compared to that amount of original ink it might well be worth a try. But only if you are printing a lot.

I would think that the danger of buggering up the printer is not too great. What I don't know is how good the replacement inks are. Do they fade quicker (Epson is quite good on longevity of prints)?

I'll stick to Epson ink and paper and I'm not printing enough to get a CISS. But it certainly looks tempting.

Prieni

The trouble is that I don't think I could afford to run the printer with the official cartridges. I would be doing a lot of printing once I had such a good printer. How could I resist?!

The alternative would have be to get a more economical printer or use only online/mail order printing services

Being on A4 print number 6 tonight I know exactly what you mean!
Once the novelty wears off a bit I hope that I can restrain myself and use the high quality printing service that I was lucky enough to find. There I pay 1.11 EUR for A4 size (20 x 30 cm, 8" x 12") on photo paper, 2.12 EUR on metallic paper (that looks fab!). Certainly not the cheapest but I get exactly the colours as I want them and constant high quality.

I'm not sure of the exact cost of printing yet, but I'm confident that the printing service will be cheaper.

A more economical printer will only make sense if you can get the same quality prints out of it. Otherwise I think it's just a waste of money.

Prieni

I learnt that lesson with the Epson R800, With so called top quality “compatibles” I binned it in the end
So now I only use genuine cartridges in my 3 Epson’s no more head cleaning and top quality prints.

I might have to forget the whole idea if I can only use genuine cartridges and ink for decent results

Specifically I interested in opinions on the CISS system rather than simply using alternative ordinary compatible cartridges.

If you want the best results stick to the Epson carts,
with the print head Nozzles / jets being so minute any dust etc will block, you can buy cheap ciss systems on ebay, but I would not recommend it.
You can buy cheap genuine Epson carts on Ebay.

£88 a set? That's not cheap if they don't last long.

A set for which printer?
My 285 Under £30 and the R1400 A3 printed under £40 those 2 prices can be got at any time,I have had a set for the 285 for £17 & one for the R1400 £22, any of the -85 series will give you top colour prints of competition quality.
Unless you want to do loads of mono prints forget the printers with multiple blacks.