http://www.gadgetspeak.com/gadget/article.rhtm/130124/479351/Epson_Stylus_DX7400.html

Epson Stylus DX7400 

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This is quite a squat unit, it will never pass the lounge police as it is very dark grey, so if not in an office into a cupboard never to see the light of day.

Epson Stylus DX7400 multi-function printer

It is 44x34x16cm the latter figure the height increases by 18cm when there is paper in the rear vertical tray waiting for printing.

This is an All In One unit as it prints copies and scans. There is no fax capability so it's not a Multi Function unit. As always the first set of Epson cartridges (four colour four cartridges unit) last very little time as a good proportion go on the initial charge. I was supplied with a spare set that I soon installed and these lasted better but they come in a 14x11x3cm package and considering the actual cartridge is 7x5x1cm at the very least that's excessive packaging.

As a text printer the speed was not good 16PPM for the nonsensical 200 word document in 'draft' mode was only any use for position checking as the output was grey not black. The same document printing in 'normal' was fine but it only printed at 6PPM. The more normal 1500 word document spread over four pages in 'draft' printed at 12PPM but of course was useless as it was grey. Again in normal it was fine but printed only at 5PPM.

As an image printer the output was good - especially using the excellent Epson Photo Print software - the printing time for an A4 borderless image or four near 15x10cm images printed on a single sheet was 250 seconds. Not fast but not slow either, however what matters for me with printing of photo paper is quality and that was fine.

As a copy machine it can work from inside Windows where a lot of choices can be made from a single interface or direct from the machine where you have less choices and these have to be input separately via the limited display choices. However the beauty of basic copying is being able to get a single copy quickly. So the times I will give are when the PC is switched off and copying using only the machine. For a black copy it is 25 seconds and a colour copy 35 seconds. Copy quality was fine.

As a scanner it uses the same flatbed that you use for copying except of course the output is sent to the PC as either an image or to an OCR engine to be turned into text. As with most recent units give it a good clean crisp sheet of paper and the image or text via OCR output will be good.

The controls on the machine are a total of eight buttons three dot LED's and a larger LED that shows a single number for the amount of copies to be produced. These all range down the left edge of the top of the unit with the landscape opening flatbed taking the rest of the top. There are two card slots on the front left edge as well as a Pict Bridge socket. As there is no LCD display printing from the camera cards will require you printing a thumbnail page first so hardly quick or convenient.

The software took around ten minutes to install on a reasonably fast PC and took just over 600MB of hard disc space. A slight change from earlier versions is that Epson Photo Print is now included in the main interface Epson File Manager - rather than having it's own icon - no great problem in fact for the novice user probably easier.

At this point as I type the summery I have no idea of the price and that's the way I like it, in my mind I have an idea of what I think it should be and if it's less then the value will be higher.

Doing my Internet searches found the Epson Stylus DX7400 at a best price of £49 from the first link below. I expected about £65 and lots of people have it for that price and more, the link I give includes shipping.

Doing my Internet searches found the Epson Stylus DX7400 at a best price of $60.01 from the first link below including shipping.

Doing my Internet searches found the Epson Stylus DX7400 at a best price of €72,59 from the first link below including shipping.

A reasonable price for an All In One unit but there are better offerings out there.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Epson-Stylus-DX7400-individual-cartridges/dp/B000U4SS2I

http://www.amazon.com/Epson-Stylus-CX7400-Color-Printer/dp/B000SDXZX8

http://www.amazon.fr/gp/offer-listing/B000V30H90?condition=new

http://www.epson.co.uk/printers/durabrite_general_printers/Epson-Stylus-DX7400-printer.htm

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What our readers said!

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Comment by TomKirk, 10 Oct 2010 18:38

Epson dx7400 is rubbish.

1) The ink it consumes is ridiculous and the supposedly empty cartridges are still full.

2) noisy and slow

3) expensive to run

4) it lies to you - it wont recognise ink cartridges when new leading to temptations to hit it with a hammer when you are needing to print. unreliable. Don't buy
Rating:

Comment by neil, 1 Oct 2010 22:13

Rating is as it says for article very helpful.
I agree about card it takes ages to get it to accept a sheet of card. there are compatible cartridges available I buy mine from UKDVDR at just over £1 each and have used them for 2 years with no problems the generation 7 inks are suitable for those printers manufactured after june 2007. If anyone has found a way of getting the printer to take card I would love to know. Apart from the noise of the paper pick up and the card problem I think the printer is a great buy, its my 3rd epson printer and must say I would not consider another make, but wont be buying another noisy DX7400.
Rating:

Comment by blue, 16 May 2010 22:05

I have DX7400 i need to print on  card but it locks up any one help?????????????????
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Comment by blue, 16 May 2010 22:03

Stylus DX7400 won't let you print on card why i need to make some cards up it just locks up any one help...
Rating:

Comment by Just, 9 Jan 2010 22:57

Crappy thing!

First, it eats ink for breakfast. Once, half of each of every three new colour cartridges was gone after a power failure during a printjob! I have not printed anything other than B&W with those cartridges before that. Next, half of the black is gone after printing more than 50 pages of plain text... WTF??

Second, the cartridges are not refillable AND there are no substitutes - very
expensive, considering it's appetite for ink. I could have bought three new all-in-ones for the money I spent on inks.

Third, I could not print on thicker paper. I tried setting different paper types in printer settings (Epson matte, Epson glossy, plain, etc.), but I still couldn't print, because printer would not pick up paper no matter what!

Fourth, it refuses to print if either of the four cartridges (C M Y or B) is empty! It won't even print B&W if one of the colours is empty!

Conclusion - never buy Epson again. Ever!
Rating:

Comment by John Hardman, 30 Oct 2008 21:08

I have a DX7400. Put new cartridges in and doesnt recognise that they are new. New cartridge again still doesnt print. What a waste of money
Rating:

Comment by allanharvey, 31 Dec 2007 12:38

Is it true that compatable ink cartdridges cannot be used if your epson was manufactured after June 2007?
Rating:

Comment by j7054, 19 Dec 2007 21:19

I agree printing times are a bit slow, however for home use it doesnt really matter that it takes that bit longer. Colour photos printed out are superb quality,and ink refills relatively cheaper than competitors,but not sacrificing colour quality. I can put up with the slow speed and am pleased with resulting finish.PC interface is easy to follow,and for the price uncomplicated user interface is worth every penny.

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