Black And White - Epson STYLUS PRO 3880 Brochure

The maintenance cartridge is already in place.
This collects inks discharged by cleaning pro-
cesses and by purging when the Photo Black
and Matte Black inks are swapped. The status
of the cartridge is continually monitored to give
adequate warning for replacement, an event
not likely to eventuate unless many hundreds of
prints are produced.
First Prints
With any new printer I usually start out by making
some small prints and with the expectation that
several trials will need to be run before a good
result is achieved. The Stylus Pro 3880 merely
follows through on its easy set-up routine and,
if all the settings are correct, those fi rst prints
will be spot-on.
"Media choice is a very personal matter and although
semi-gloss or lustre are popular choices, it's with the
more expensive fine-art papers that the Stylus Pro 3880
really shows its potential."
I started out with Epson gloss, semi-gloss and
Traditional Fibre (Premium Gloss profi le), used
the 'canned' profi les and allowed the printer to
manage colour. No problems whatsoever.
Media choice is a very personal matter and
although semi-gloss or lustre are popular choices,
it's with the more expensive fi ne-art papers that
the Stylus Pro 3880 really shows its potential.
Printing on papers such as Epson Fine Art
Velvet and Epson Fine Art UltraSmooth is a real
pleasure. Simply lock in the Epson profi le and
select the high quality mode. Excellent results
were obtained every time without any need for
test strips, even on the A2 prints.
In the main dialogue panel of the printer the
defaults are for the Premium Lustre Photo Paper
and the sRGB colour space. However, most of
us work with Adobe RGB 1998 colour space and
prefer either a matte or fi ne-art media, but once
your favourite routines are established then
all settings can be saved to convenient names
(e.g. "My Glossy Premium") and dialed up for
prompt usage.
Borderless prints are a welcome feature, but
the facility only applies to six standard paper
sizes and doesn't function on custom settings.
The auto sheet feeder can handle papers from
150x100 mm (postcard) to A2+ while the front
feed prints on paper or board up to 1.5 mm in
thickness. Custom or 'user defi ned' sizing varies
from 89 mm to 431.8 mm in width and from 127
mm to 950 mm in length.
There are nine profi les built-in for popular
Epson media types and settings for proofi ng
paper, plain paper and "others" . ICC profi les for
other papers or any custom profi les can be intro-
duced. Gloss differential and bronzing on gloss
and semi-gloss media are problems generally as-
sociated with pigment printers, but the Stylus Pro
3880 test prints in colour didn't exhibit these dis-
tractions and most of the black and white prints
were satisfactory. One black and white print with
high contrast edgings did have gloss differential,
but it was evident only at an acute angle.
Quality And Speed
The level of print quality can be established and
high-speed printing may be set to 'on' or 'off'.
With all the variables available it's up to the
individual to assess the difference in print quality,
note print times and measure ink usage.
At 2800 dpi (unidirectional print head
movement) the printer uses only small droplets
compared to some large and mostly small drop-
lets at 1440 dpi (bi-directional). Printing times
almost double at the higher resolution and about
ten percent more ink is used. I found no real dif-
ference in the prints, but I'm inclined to believe
anyone using expensive fi ne-art papers would
prefer to go for the maximum quality
settings. The following results were achieved
with a 370x272 mm image on A3 Epson
Premium Gloss paper.
• Level 5, high speed off – 8:05 minutes,
1.5 millilitres of ink
• Level 5, high speed on – 4:55 minutes,
1.4 millilitres of ink
• Level 4, high speed off – 5:35 minutes,
1.4 millilitres of ink
• Level 4, high speed on – 2:24 minutes,
1.4 millilitres of ink.
Printing on fi ne-art papers like Epson Velvet at
maximum quality is decidedly slow, but the end
results are a joy to hold... and to behold. Few
users will be concerned about the speed and will
savour the paper's journey through the printer.
For the record a 370x210 mm image on A3 Velvet
took 9:35 minutes, while a 540x305 mm image
on A2 size paper took 17:40 minutes.

Black And White

When it comes to black and white prints the
Stylus Pro 3880 leaves little to be desired. The
three-level technology – photo or matte black
plus two greys labeled as 'Light Black' and
'Light Light Black' – allow all those subtle
tones to be revealed. In the 'Advanced Black And
White Mode' the default setting is "Neutral" ,
but "Cool" , "Warm" or "Sepia" (or, indeed, any
custom toning) can be established along with
variations in tonal brightness. Metamerism is
virtually eliminated.
Changing over from the Matte Black to the
Photo Black ink takes 3:30 minutes and purges
4.6 millilitres of ink while switching from Photo
Black to Matte Black takes 2:30 minutes with a
loss of 1.6 millilitres. This happens because the
two blacks share a common line to the print head
and one must be cleared. It's all part and parcel
A print made on the maximum paper size of
431.8x950 mm shown half-way through from the
rear manual feeder.
A monochrome LCD read-out is provided on
the 3880's top deck and includes a set of ink
level indicators.
Straight out of the box – printer, ink cartridges, rear
tray feeder, the "Start Here" sheet, software CD and
mains power cable.
of the cheaper printer price and will enforce
effi cient printing sessions with mixed media.
The front feed for fi ne-art media requires a
platform to be fi rst lowered. The 'Down' button
on the menu panel is pressed to open the gate
and paper is fed through to a guide position.
The button is pressed to pull the paper through
(hence space is needed at the printer's rear) and
the gate to close. When printing is complete
press again to release the paper and the process
can continue for the next print. This involves a
few steps more than the standard rear sheet
feeder but it does make for a perfectly fl at and
straight paper path and hence the very best rela-
tionship with the print head. Papers or board up
to 1.5 mm can be accommodated.
Maximum Size
The maximum paper size that can be established
in the User Defi ned panel is 950x431.8 mm. It's
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